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I think the most important issue in modern governance that nobody ever talks about is the tendency for the number of laws and the size of the legal code to mono

I think the most important issue in modern governance that nobody ever talks about is the tendency for the number of laws and the size of the legal code to monotonically grow towards infinity

shaki-dora 7y ago
I think that's mostly just cynicism. If you actually chart document lengths, you are far more likely to see logarithmic growth or something asymptotically approaching a (finite) value. More importantly: this is both to be expected and rather benign. It's expected because regulation simply grows with the complexity of society, which is increasing at a similar or even larger pace. Most of our wealth is due to specialisation and research. And with the benefits of, say, flying cars, comes the need to establish rules. It's also benign because almost nothing of it will ever concern you, or any other specific individual. You can fly your car without knowing the crash test procedures for it. They are relevant only if you are building flying cars. In that case, you do have to familiarise yourself with the rules, but that is a task of the same magnitude as it was with existing regulation for (regular) cars, which no longer concern you.
- voldacar 7y ago
  Logarithmic growth monotonically increases to infinity, no? And I would be highly skeptical that it would ever approach a finite value, I mean, why would it? What is the incentive for politicians to just stop making laws once they reach a certain threshold? Here is a quick chart I found with google that indicates, at least as the American federal govt is concerned, the growth is essentially linear: https://regulatorystudies.columbian.gwu.edu/sites/g/files/zaxdzs1866/f/image/GW%20Reg%20Studies%20-%20Pages%20Published%20in%20the%20CFR%20-%206.12.19.png https://regulatorystudies.columbian.gwu.edu/sites/g/files/za...
true_tuna 7y ago
I’ve heard of the idea of baking expiation into any given law. Useful laws get renewed, useless ones get expunged.
- wahern 7y ago
  The article mentions that Rhode Island did that wholesale: "The Democratic-dominated Rhode Island government recently eliminated more than 30% of its rule volume by setting an expiration date for its entire regulatory code, forcing state agencies to start fresh."
  - gumby 7y ago
    I just learned that they did that to their state constitution as well a few years ago!
    - Fjolsvith 7y ago
      That's handy for frequent regime change!
      - wahern 7y ago
        Ah, good point. If you believe a particular regulation is useful and necessary now, why wouldn't you also believe it would be so in the future? You may not be in power to conditionally renew it. And from a pragmatic political perspective, sunsetting smells like compromise; the political base and interest groups generally frown on compromise. All of which may explain why sunsetting isn't as common as one would think, even if most legislators share the sentiments expressed in this thread (and I would presume that they do).
- malandrew 7y ago
  Idaho just completely reset all it's regulations. https://fee.org/articles/idaho-repealed-its-entire-regulatory-code-now-what/ https://fee.org/articles/idaho-repealed-its-entire-regulator...
- gumby 7y ago
  It's historically been hard to do because there's a tendency to just automatically extend the sunsets when they arrive. Though a couple of other replies to your comment have a couple of nice examples.

I think the most important issue in modern governance that nobody ever talks about is the tendency for the number of laws and the size of the legal code to monotonically grow towards infinity

shaki-dora 7y ago

I think that's mostly just cynicism. If you actually chart document lengths, you are far more likely to see logarithmic growth or something asymptotically approaching a (finite) value. More importantly: this is both to be expected and rather benign. It's expected because regulation simply grows with the complexity of society, which is increasing at a similar or even larger pace. Most of our wealth is due to specialisation and research. And with the benefits of, say, flying cars, comes the need to establish rules. It's also benign because almost nothing of it will ever concern you, or any other specific individual. You can fly your car without knowing the crash test procedures for it. They are relevant only if you are building flying cars. In that case, you do have to familiarise yourself with the rules, but that is a task of the same magnitude as it was with existing regulation for (regular) cars, which no longer concern you.

voldacar 7y ago
Logarithmic growth monotonically increases to infinity, no? And I would be highly skeptical that it would ever approach a finite value, I mean, why would it? What is the incentive for politicians to just stop making laws once they reach a certain threshold? Here is a quick chart I found with google that indicates, at least as the American federal govt is concerned, the growth is essentially linear: https://regulatorystudies.columbian.gwu.edu/sites/g/files/zaxdzs1866/f/image/GW%20Reg%20Studies%20-%20Pages%20Published%20in%20the%20CFR%20-%206.12.19.png https://regulatorystudies.columbian.gwu.edu/sites/g/files/za...

true_tuna 7y ago

I’ve heard of the idea of baking expiation into any given law. Useful laws get renewed, useless ones get expunged.

wahern 7y ago
The article mentions that Rhode Island did that wholesale: "The Democratic-dominated Rhode Island government recently eliminated more than 30% of its rule volume by setting an expiration date for its entire regulatory code, forcing state agencies to start fresh."
- gumby 7y ago
  I just learned that they did that to their state constitution as well a few years ago!
  - Fjolsvith 7y ago
    That's handy for frequent regime change!
    - wahern 7y ago
      Ah, good point. If you believe a particular regulation is useful and necessary now, why wouldn't you also believe it would be so in the future? You may not be in power to conditionally renew it. And from a pragmatic political perspective, sunsetting smells like compromise; the political base and interest groups generally frown on compromise. All of which may explain why sunsetting isn't as common as one would think, even if most legislators share the sentiments expressed in this thread (and I would presume that they do).
malandrew 7y ago
Idaho just completely reset all it's regulations. https://fee.org/articles/idaho-repealed-its-entire-regulatory-code-now-what/ https://fee.org/articles/idaho-repealed-its-entire-regulator...
gumby 7y ago
It's historically been hard to do because there's a tendency to just automatically extend the sunsets when they arrive. Though a couple of other replies to your comment have a couple of nice examples.