The "code that directs Social Security payments, tax returns and other payments owed to Americans" is "COBOL and ... it has been such a struggle to maintain it [because it was] developed for decades with very little documentation"
But having a SpaceX engineer start a rewrite is... bad?
I freak out when some minor component of my company becomes abandonware. When no one can or wants to read or work on the codebase, it's _time for it to die_. Either this good news, or you have no experience maintaining existing critical software infrastructure.
As for the "unelected" argument... Did anyone ever elect any of the software engineers who worked on this codebase? It has always been federal employees appointed by federal agencies. Some acronyms changed.
But having a SpaceX engineer start a rewrite is... bad?
I freak out when some minor component of my company becomes abandonware. When no one can or wants to read or work on the codebase, it's _time for it to die_. Either this good news, or you have no experience maintaining existing critical software infrastructure.
As for the "unelected" argument... Did anyone ever elect any of the software engineers who worked on this codebase? It has always been federal employees appointed by federal agencies. Some acronyms changed.