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I live in a deep blue city (Seattle) and have interacted with some local policy makers. In truth, they just aren't very smart. And worse, they are quite confi

I live in a deep blue city (Seattle) and have interacted with some local policy makers. In truth, they just aren't very smart. And worse, they are quite confident they are indeed very smart. This isn't some grand conspiracy to increase homelessness and increase the cost of housing. The problem is that we elect idiots to local government.

beebmam 5y ago
Completely agree. We should be aiming to elect doctors and engineers (i.e. people who understand Systems Theory) for political positions, not people who have prescriptive solutions.
- endisneigh 5y ago
  There are plenty of stupid doctors and engineers.
  - beebmam 5y ago
    Well, duh. There's plenty of stupid people of ANY classification. But at least most doctors and engineers have proven that they can understand systems analysis and think critically, or they wouldn't have their licenses. Software engineering is barely regulated/licensed, so I certainly wouldn't apply this to most software engineers.
    - endisneigh 5y ago
      What does understanding systems analysis have to do with being a good politician?
- coding123 5y ago
  What would a doctor or engineer do differently?
  - sitkack 5y ago
    Make a decision based on emotion and then retroactively use math to justify that decision.
    - idiotsecant 5y ago
      I am so glad that this response is here. HN in general has this disease, but it's pretty prevalent in STEM fields in general- The "I know how to solve a differential equation so that means I am a rational decision maker" disease. It's important to acknowledge that the more education a person has the more likely they are to reverse-engineer a reason to think something that they want to think, especially when it comes to emotionally charged issues like those that politicians encounter every day. Having technical skills does not automagically make you a good leader or policymaker. It just means you have good technical skills. I would go so far as to say there are probably more people with good technical skills that should not be making policy than the opposite.
      - sitkack 5y ago
        I think having technical people on staff is really important. That the elected leader has a STEM background? Not important. Leaders should be general purpose coordinators of groups that solve problems. Understanding the psychology of all the participants is as important as solving the specific issue. In context, a STEM background is someone who has and can actually engineer or science. Writing some code doesn't qualify. Every human on the planet should be able to design an experiment and do basic statistics. I think the bar we have for our fellow human should be much higher than it currently is. The moniker, that person is an "Every (Hu)Man" , should be a badge of honor.
  - dodobirdlord 5y ago
    Approve construction of market rate housing, presumably.
- cultofmetatron 5y ago
  thats more or less what china does
  - SomewhatLikely 5y ago
    Minus the "we ... elect" part.
  - seanmcdirmid 5y ago
    Most Chinese officials aren't engineers or doctors, they might have a degree given to them in something like Chemical engineering, but they've never practiced as an engineer and have the full life training of a politician.
- testfoobar 5y ago
  Easier to win votes by selling castles in the sky.
pirate787 5y ago
This is my experience as well, after being heavily involved in a local issue. In my state the state employee leaders are also, on the main, very low caliber people.
xondono 5y ago
> This isn't some grand conspiracy to increase homelessness and increase the cost of housing. The problem is that we elect idiots to local government. There’s a bit of both, but it’s not a conspiracy. Most cities have this problem (even outside US), because the issue is that most baby boomers have their financial health tied in real estate. This makes those policies ideal, because they look like attacking the problem without really fixing anything.
tangjurine 5y ago
...but if you were a smart homeowner, wouldn't you want to elect a 'useful idiot' to carry out your desired policy? Just because the policy makers are dumb, doesn't mean that the voters behind them are too.
- xyzzyz 5y ago
  The risk of collateral damage by a bumbling fool who just happens to stumble upon your favored policy is way too high. She might do what you want in matter X, but might also do completely wrongheaded moves in matters Y, Z, or even in X itself from another angle. All you need for confirmation is to look at what Seattle looks like today: I doubt that there is a single voter who can look at the city and honestly say “I support policies of the city government in entirety, and the current state of affairs is to my liking”.
- testfoobar 5y ago
  "According to the U.S. Department of Education, 54% of adults in the United States have prose literacy below the 6th-grade level." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literacy_in_the_United_States#cite_note-2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literacy_in_the_United_States#...
- Izikiel43 5y ago
  It seems you haven't been around Seattle DT. I'm from a 3rd world country and it's really bad even by my standards.
syshum 5y ago
I would say the problem is we give government the power to solve the problem, we expect the government to solve the problem, while electing idiots to government I also suspect many believe the solution to this problem is to "stop electing idiots" when in reality the solution is to stop expecting government to solve the problem, and recognize we should remove the power from the government and allow private actors to solve it
hemloc_io 5y ago
Haha I can see that from my experience with local politicians. It's rough that talent in these large cities generally flows to the megacorps or private companies in general. I'd personally love to leave my tech job temporarily for city govt if the pay/environment was similar.
testfoobar 5y ago
I've also interacted with elected officials. Econ 101 might as well be as hard as quantum chromodynamics.
- exdsq 5y ago
  For fun, could you ELI5 quantum chromodynamics?
  - testfoobar 5y ago
    Haha. No. I quit advanced physics at Schrodinger's equation. Turns out I preferred studying Hamilton instead of Hamiltonians.
seanmcdirmid 5y ago
> I live in a deep blue city (Seattle) and have interacted with some local policy makers. > In truth, they just aren't very smart. And worse, they are quite confident they are indeed very smart. Is that on top of all the house building that has been done and is being done still? If they are so incompetent, why are new town homes, condos, and apartment complexes popping up all over the place? Sure, it still can't keep up with demand...a 25% growth in population over the last decade is no joke. But Seattle is nowhere near as dysfunctional as SF, at the very least.
- coryrc 5y ago
  That's like saying your government is run better than Somalia; damning with faint praise. All the growth is concentrated on like 5% of the land and unaffordable for normal people. Open it all up for development.
  - seanmcdirmid 5y ago
    You mean like…Houston? Can you come up with some better examples of a city that does this that doesn’t suck?
- Izikiel43 5y ago
  DT Seattle and other parts are probably the same as SF with tent villages.
inglor_cz 5y ago
The proliferation of ignorant idiots in politics is pretty universal problem. It is not any better ten timezones from Seattle... Genuinely smart people are usually satisfied with their own line of work, or realize that politicians and their families in the age of (a)social networks are subject to constant barrage of unhinged hate messaging and threats emanating from the Internet. So they think twice before even entering the race for any public office. We would probably be better off with sortition (basically, drawing lots and choosing random people to serve in legislatures).
LeifCarrotson 5y ago
> In truth, they just aren't very smart. And worse, they are quite confident they are indeed very smart. It's not about whether they're smart people or not, it's about whether they're smarter than the problem they're trying to solve. I, aware of the risk of Dunning-Kruger effect, nonetheless consider myself to be a pretty smart guy. I'm a well-educated a computer engineer; I score well in interviews, in exams, and also in Trivial Pursuit. But the steel, silicon, and copper that I work with and am respected for is highly predictable. Electrons and hydraulic fluid are intimidating to a layman but with a bit of education and experience can be broken down into understandable subcomponents and reliable mathematics. Back in school, we engineers with our mathematical, physics-based hard science liked to denigrate the 'soft science' employed in educational, social, and political fields. However, after further growth, I've come to realize that physics is simple and people are really, really complicated.

beebmam 5y ago

Completely agree. We should be aiming to elect doctors and engineers (i.e. people who understand Systems Theory) for political positions, not people who have prescriptive solutions.

endisneigh 5y ago
There are plenty of stupid doctors and engineers.
- beebmam 5y ago
  Well, duh. There's plenty of stupid people of ANY classification. But at least most doctors and engineers have proven that they can understand systems analysis and think critically, or they wouldn't have their licenses. Software engineering is barely regulated/licensed, so I certainly wouldn't apply this to most software engineers.
  - endisneigh 5y ago
    What does understanding systems analysis have to do with being a good politician?
coding123 5y ago
What would a doctor or engineer do differently?
- sitkack 5y ago
  Make a decision based on emotion and then retroactively use math to justify that decision.
  - idiotsecant 5y ago
    I am so glad that this response is here. HN in general has this disease, but it's pretty prevalent in STEM fields in general- The "I know how to solve a differential equation so that means I am a rational decision maker" disease. It's important to acknowledge that the more education a person has the more likely they are to reverse-engineer a reason to think something that they want to think, especially when it comes to emotionally charged issues like those that politicians encounter every day. Having technical skills does not automagically make you a good leader or policymaker. It just means you have good technical skills. I would go so far as to say there are probably more people with good technical skills that should not be making policy than the opposite.
    - sitkack 5y ago
      I think having technical people on staff is really important. That the elected leader has a STEM background? Not important. Leaders should be general purpose coordinators of groups that solve problems. Understanding the psychology of all the participants is as important as solving the specific issue. In context, a STEM background is someone who has and can actually engineer or science. Writing some code doesn't qualify. Every human on the planet should be able to design an experiment and do basic statistics. I think the bar we have for our fellow human should be much higher than it currently is. The moniker, that person is an "Every (Hu)Man" , should be a badge of honor.
- dodobirdlord 5y ago
  Approve construction of market rate housing, presumably.
cultofmetatron 5y ago
thats more or less what china does
- SomewhatLikely 5y ago
  Minus the "we ... elect" part.
- seanmcdirmid 5y ago
  Most Chinese officials aren't engineers or doctors, they might have a degree given to them in something like Chemical engineering, but they've never practiced as an engineer and have the full life training of a politician.
testfoobar 5y ago
Easier to win votes by selling castles in the sky.

pirate787 5y ago

This is my experience as well, after being heavily involved in a local issue. In my state the state employee leaders are also, on the main, very low caliber people.

xondono 5y ago

> This isn't some grand conspiracy to increase homelessness and increase the cost of housing. The problem is that we elect idiots to local government. There’s a bit of both, but it’s not a conspiracy. Most cities have this problem (even outside US), because the issue is that most baby boomers have their financial health tied in real estate. This makes those policies ideal, because they look like attacking the problem without really fixing anything.

tangjurine 5y ago

...but if you were a smart homeowner, wouldn't you want to elect a 'useful idiot' to carry out your desired policy? Just because the policy makers are dumb, doesn't mean that the voters behind them are too.

xyzzyz 5y ago
The risk of collateral damage by a bumbling fool who just happens to stumble upon your favored policy is way too high. She might do what you want in matter X, but might also do completely wrongheaded moves in matters Y, Z, or even in X itself from another angle. All you need for confirmation is to look at what Seattle looks like today: I doubt that there is a single voter who can look at the city and honestly say “I support policies of the city government in entirety, and the current state of affairs is to my liking”.
testfoobar 5y ago
"According to the U.S. Department of Education, 54% of adults in the United States have prose literacy below the 6th-grade level." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literacy_in_the_United_States#cite_note-2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literacy_in_the_United_States#...
Izikiel43 5y ago
It seems you haven't been around Seattle DT. I'm from a 3rd world country and it's really bad even by my standards.

syshum 5y ago

I would say the problem is we give government the power to solve the problem, we expect the government to solve the problem, while electing idiots to government I also suspect many believe the solution to this problem is to "stop electing idiots" when in reality the solution is to stop expecting government to solve the problem, and recognize we should remove the power from the government and allow private actors to solve it

hemloc_io 5y ago

Haha I can see that from my experience with local politicians. It's rough that talent in these large cities generally flows to the megacorps or private companies in general. I'd personally love to leave my tech job temporarily for city govt if the pay/environment was similar.

testfoobar 5y ago

I've also interacted with elected officials. Econ 101 might as well be as hard as quantum chromodynamics.

exdsq 5y ago
For fun, could you ELI5 quantum chromodynamics?
- testfoobar 5y ago
  Haha. No. I quit advanced physics at Schrodinger's equation. Turns out I preferred studying Hamilton instead of Hamiltonians.

seanmcdirmid 5y ago

> I live in a deep blue city (Seattle) and have interacted with some local policy makers. > In truth, they just aren't very smart. And worse, they are quite confident they are indeed very smart. Is that on top of all the house building that has been done and is being done still? If they are so incompetent, why are new town homes, condos, and apartment complexes popping up all over the place? Sure, it still can't keep up with demand...a 25% growth in population over the last decade is no joke. But Seattle is nowhere near as dysfunctional as SF, at the very least.

coryrc 5y ago
That's like saying your government is run better than Somalia; damning with faint praise. All the growth is concentrated on like 5% of the land and unaffordable for normal people. Open it all up for development.
- seanmcdirmid 5y ago
  You mean like…Houston? Can you come up with some better examples of a city that does this that doesn’t suck?
Izikiel43 5y ago
DT Seattle and other parts are probably the same as SF with tent villages.

inglor_cz 5y ago

The proliferation of ignorant idiots in politics is pretty universal problem. It is not any better ten timezones from Seattle... Genuinely smart people are usually satisfied with their own line of work, or realize that politicians and their families in the age of (a)social networks are subject to constant barrage of unhinged hate messaging and threats emanating from the Internet. So they think twice before even entering the race for any public office. We would probably be better off with sortition (basically, drawing lots and choosing random people to serve in legislatures).

LeifCarrotson 5y ago

> In truth, they just aren't very smart. And worse, they are quite confident they are indeed very smart. It's not about whether they're smart people or not, it's about whether they're smarter than the problem they're trying to solve. I, aware of the risk of Dunning-Kruger effect, nonetheless consider myself to be a pretty smart guy. I'm a well-educated a computer engineer; I score well in interviews, in exams, and also in Trivial Pursuit. But the steel, silicon, and copper that I work with and am respected for is highly predictable. Electrons and hydraulic fluid are intimidating to a layman but with a bit of education and experience can be broken down into understandable subcomponents and reliable mathematics. Back in school, we engineers with our mathematical, physics-based hard science liked to denigrate the 'soft science' employed in educational, social, and political fields. However, after further growth, I've come to realize that physics is simple and people are really, really complicated.