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Dr. E. S. Savas was formerly Assistant Secretary of U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development during the Reagan administration. His career in government began when he served as First Deputy City Administrator in the administration of New York Mayor John V. Lindsey. During that service, Dr. Savas was asked by Mayor Lindsay to find out why A blizzard in 1969 paralyzed the city. "I learned that during this snow emergency, department of sanitation workers were plowing streets only half of the time. The rest of their time was spent on breaks. I wondered, 'Gee, if they're working only 50 percent of the time in an emergency, what are they like during the rest of the time they're on garbage collection?'" Dr. Savas learned they probably worked even less. "Private guys were charging $17 a ton to haul waste. City guys were costing us $47 a ton." Savas suggested hiring private contractors through competitive bidding in a couple of collection districts, leaving city sanitation workers to continue collecting garbage in other districts. The city could then compare who was doing a better and more cost-effective job. That launched his research in privatization of government services.
Dr. Savas has been a consultant and advisor in fifty-four countries, sponsored by the World Bank, United Nations, U.S. Agency for International Development, U.S. Information Agency, other international bodies, foreign governments, and private organizations. He has consulted for the U.S. federal government and many city and state governments as well as the President's Commission on Privatization, and has served on transition teams of newly elected officials. The author or editor of fifteen books and 140 articles, his first article on privatization was published in 1971. His 1987 book, Privatization: The Key to Better Government, and its sequel in 2000, Privatization and Public-Private Partnerships, together have been published in twenty-one foreign editions. Dr. Savas received BA and BS degrees from the University of Chicago, MA and PhD degrees from Columbia University, and an honorary doctorate degree from the University of Piraeus (Greece).
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