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"The one part of the economy that seems immune to re-imagination is the government. If we were to force it to go through the same technological revolution that

"The one part of the economy that seems immune to re-imagination is the government. If we were to force it to go through the same technological revolution that the private sector is going through, we would see massive efficiencies, and massive job losses, that would free up a huge amount of capital that could be used to pay for things like medical care for all, affordable education for all, and some amount of income for all." What would this look like? The author doesn't really back up their claims from the first stanza with this massive hand-wavey argument. I am all for reimagining the government but I'm a little wary of throwing technology at a problem and expecting it to go away.

maxxxxx 8y ago
You would probably have to run government like a company which basically means a dictatorship where management makes all decisions.
- tlb 8y ago
  The exact opposite approach would be better. You want it to work like a healthy part of the economy, which means companies of all sizes competing to provide better services at lower costs.
  - maxxxxx 8y ago
    Who makes the decision to pick the best service? Essentially government contracting in theory works exactly like you are describing.
    - pcstl 8y ago
      Government contracting is heavily incentivized to privilege companies which have close ties to government officials. Have a look at the political scandals of the last 8 years in Brazil. Nearly all of them had to do with officials getting “favors” from companies in exchange for government investment and contracting deals. As long as the government deals in the peoples’ money instead of suffering from its own choices, you cannot compare government contracting with the open market.
- SolaceQuantum 8y ago
  How would that work, because a government can't lay off citizens.
  - zanny 8y ago
    Plenty of totalitarian states have laid off citizens. By the millions.
tlb 8y ago
I think one of the virtues of the article is that you can make a case for the fact that the government must be terribly inefficient at achieving its goals, based on evidence from parts of the private sector that have or haven't gone through disruption, without getting into the details of what to change.
sjg007 8y ago
This is just like the tired old trope of saying run government like a business and it will fix everything. The government is in fact being transformed by technology. The government funds primary research that is the innovation behind the technological revolution. It's unpopular here but AOC is right on the money about increasing marginal tax rates over $10 million. The American market is unique and we can support it. All this talk of capital and billionaires fleeing is FUD.
- dnautics 8y ago
  > The government funds primary research that is the innovation behind the technological revolution. Why is this gospel? Let me tell you two experiences I had: 1) I worked in a bioenergy lab. We were on a DoE grant. The program manager, who had a BA in biology, did not know what a promoter was. 2) I was asked to write a DARPA grant. I did not particularly want to work for the military, but had to as a personal favor. I deliberately wrote it so that anyone with half a brain would look at it and say "that's too little work for two years". It was awarded. I could go on, but these were the two most entertaining ones. The others are depressing. What's the point. One. Government science initiatives are run by idiots. This has been going on for quite a while (installing a nobel laureate at the top doesn't matter, as evidenced by the first anecdote), and that's largely because you have to ask yourself "who goes to work in the labs and who becomes a program manager" and when they get "outside experts" usually it's professors and the professor promotion pipeline also is horribly broken away from "competent scientists". Two: In the context of the bigger question, increasing marginal tax rates won't help. The big problem is that government mostly gives money to the already-wealthy (I didn't get paid much for that DARPA grant, but I can tell you most of the money for the work I did went to the executives at the small company that got the SBIR). Without getting into how this money comes from stealing from the poor, consider that maybe we look at politics wrong - we think "people have no political power because they are poor" and consider that maybe it's actually "people are poor because they have no political power (to get grants, etc)".
  - pcstl 8y ago
    It’s sad how your lived experience is getting downvoted just because it doesn’t line up with peoples’ almost religious faith that the government is wise and government investment in science is always a good thing.
specialist 8y ago
David Graeber argues that government is already made in the image of corporations. The Utopia of Rules: On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22245334-the-utopia-of-rules https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22245334-the-utopia-of-r... -- My core, motivating principle is helping people help themselves, help those who can't. My second motivator is fairness, whatever that looks like. If I was King, I'd: Invert our current welfare state, from top-down paternalistic to bottom-up empowerment. UBI, more or less. Switch our healthcare from fee-for-service to wellness and prevention. Incentivizing keeping people healthy over profiteering the treatment of disease. aka Capitation Model Change education from grades and scores to achievement, experience, and competency. Think merit badges from Girl & Boy Scouts. Fully extend property rights over the commons, creating efficient marketplaces for water, air, land, etc. Require all accounting to include all externalities. Break the duopoly by changing our voting systems to approval voting (executives, issues) and proportional representation (assemblies) as appropriate.

maxxxxx 8y ago

You would probably have to run government like a company which basically means a dictatorship where management makes all decisions.

tlb 8y ago
The exact opposite approach would be better. You want it to work like a healthy part of the economy, which means companies of all sizes competing to provide better services at lower costs.
- maxxxxx 8y ago
  Who makes the decision to pick the best service? Essentially government contracting in theory works exactly like you are describing.
  - pcstl 8y ago
    Government contracting is heavily incentivized to privilege companies which have close ties to government officials. Have a look at the political scandals of the last 8 years in Brazil. Nearly all of them had to do with officials getting “favors” from companies in exchange for government investment and contracting deals. As long as the government deals in the peoples’ money instead of suffering from its own choices, you cannot compare government contracting with the open market.
SolaceQuantum 8y ago
How would that work, because a government can't lay off citizens.
- zanny 8y ago
  Plenty of totalitarian states have laid off citizens. By the millions.

tlb 8y ago

I think one of the virtues of the article is that you can make a case for the fact that the government must be terribly inefficient at achieving its goals, based on evidence from parts of the private sector that have or haven't gone through disruption, without getting into the details of what to change.

sjg007 8y ago

This is just like the tired old trope of saying run government like a business and it will fix everything. The government is in fact being transformed by technology. The government funds primary research that is the innovation behind the technological revolution. It's unpopular here but AOC is right on the money about increasing marginal tax rates over $10 million. The American market is unique and we can support it. All this talk of capital and billionaires fleeing is FUD.

dnautics 8y ago
> The government funds primary research that is the innovation behind the technological revolution. Why is this gospel? Let me tell you two experiences I had: 1) I worked in a bioenergy lab. We were on a DoE grant. The program manager, who had a BA in biology, did not know what a promoter was. 2) I was asked to write a DARPA grant. I did not particularly want to work for the military, but had to as a personal favor. I deliberately wrote it so that anyone with half a brain would look at it and say "that's too little work for two years". It was awarded. I could go on, but these were the two most entertaining ones. The others are depressing. What's the point. One. Government science initiatives are run by idiots. This has been going on for quite a while (installing a nobel laureate at the top doesn't matter, as evidenced by the first anecdote), and that's largely because you have to ask yourself "who goes to work in the labs and who becomes a program manager" and when they get "outside experts" usually it's professors and the professor promotion pipeline also is horribly broken away from "competent scientists". Two: In the context of the bigger question, increasing marginal tax rates won't help. The big problem is that government mostly gives money to the already-wealthy (I didn't get paid much for that DARPA grant, but I can tell you most of the money for the work I did went to the executives at the small company that got the SBIR). Without getting into how this money comes from stealing from the poor, consider that maybe we look at politics wrong - we think "people have no political power because they are poor" and consider that maybe it's actually "people are poor because they have no political power (to get grants, etc)".
- pcstl 8y ago
  It’s sad how your lived experience is getting downvoted just because it doesn’t line up with peoples’ almost religious faith that the government is wise and government investment in science is always a good thing.

specialist 8y ago

David Graeber argues that government is already made in the image of corporations. The Utopia of Rules: On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22245334-the-utopia-of-rules https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22245334-the-utopia-of-r... -- My core, motivating principle is helping people help themselves, help those who can't. My second motivator is fairness, whatever that looks like. If I was King, I'd: Invert our current welfare state, from top-down paternalistic to bottom-up empowerment. UBI, more or less. Switch our healthcare from fee-for-service to wellness and prevention. Incentivizing keeping people healthy over profiteering the treatment of disease. aka Capitation Model Change education from grades and scores to achievement, experience, and competency. Think merit badges from Girl & Boy Scouts. Fully extend property rights over the commons, creating efficient marketplaces for water, air, land, etc. Require all accounting to include all externalities. Break the duopoly by changing our voting systems to approval voting (executives, issues) and proportional representation (assemblies) as appropriate.