@sarae You say "the federal government ABSOLUTELY has the cash to pay for the work they want done," and perhaps that happens to be true of the National Archives, but as a general statement that is false in my experience. Many if not most government agencies outside the defense (DoD) and intelligence communities are often tasked to do more than they're actually budgeted to do and are perpetually short on cash.

Now, if you said that the *country* can totally afford these things then I agree, but collecting and allocating those funds is generally in the hands of Congress, not the the executive branch agencies themselves.