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> Isn't that a good argument that it should be run by the state government instead? Sometimes, the state has other skewed motives and will spend the money rece

> Isn't that a good argument that it should be run by the state government instead? Sometimes, the state has other skewed motives and will spend the money received from federal governement for unintended causes. This happened in Missouri as well. Mississippi used welfare money for needy families to pay Brett Favre for motivational speeches https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/mississippi-welfare-money-brett-favre-motivational-speeches https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/mississippi-welfare-...

skissane 4y ago
Do other developed countries have these kinds of problems? I get the impression that governments in the US are unusually corrupt, at least by the standards of the English-speaking world.
- kevin_nisbet 4y ago
  I'm not fully following the situation in the US, so I don't know if it's a fair comparison or not. But I have seen some issues north of the border here in Canada over my lifetime. I think there are reports of bad water fairly often in First Nations communities, but I haven't followed the topic too closely. Some recent information: https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/first-nations-water-drinking-settlement-1.6382206 https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/first-nations-water-drink... And another one I sort of remember more than 20 years ago was: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walkerton_E._coli_outbreak https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walkerton_E._coli_outbreak But these seem to pale in comparison to the limited stories I've heard out of the US. The Flint water crisis, and some of the poorer communities in the US. I do believe water systems are incredibly expensive infrastructure, even for those of us living next to the great lakes.
  - skissane 4y ago
    I was looking for anything objective to back up my impressions and I found the 2021 Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index – https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2021 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2021 Looking at major English speaking countries – New Zealand comes 1st as least corrupt country in world (equal with Denmark and Finland); UK is 11th; Canada and Ireland are equal 13th (along with Austria, Estonia and Iceland); Australia is equal 18th (with Belgium, Japan and Uruguay). The US is equal 27th, with Chile. So yes, among major English-speaking countries, the US is the most corrupt.
- vkou 4y ago
  > Do other developed countries have these kinds of problems? The short answer is 'Yes'. The long answer is 'Yes, they do.' It may be more prevalent in the US, because of its particular political climate, but its omnipresent.
  - skissane 4y ago
    If we are asking specifically about state governments diverting federal funds earmarked for a particular purpose into something completely unrelated – I honestly cannot think of any instance of that ever happening in Australia. I'm not saying it has never happened, but I'm not aware of any examples. Have any Canadian provinces done that? Any of the UK's devolved administrations? I am thinking that particular form of corruption may well be, in the English-speaking world, somewhat unique to the US.
    - smabie 4y ago
      How would you even know? Maybe the US is just particularly bad at covering up corruption.
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
- btilly 4y ago
  The USA is very much not corrupt by world standards. But our corruption ranking is well below other English speaking countries. Looking at https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2021/index/usa https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2021/index/usa I'm worried by how much more corrupt we became after Trump got into power.
  - oefrha 4y ago
    There’s no “corruption ranking”, only corruption perception ranking. People who dislike a government will perceive more corruption regardless of the reality, and vice versa. Similarly, people who are hardly scraping by will likely perceive more corruption compared to those living more prosperously, even if there’s no corruption at all.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
- otikik 4y ago
  Well, lobbying in other countries means talking with politicians. In the US it means giving them money so they pass the laws you want. While this is seen as perfectly fine in the US, in other countries they call that bribing, which is illegal.
  - r00fus 4y ago
    So basically, it's legalized corruption in the US.
    - zach_garwood 4y ago
      Well, if it were illegal, then rich folks might go to prison, and we can't have that, now can we!?
  - mellavora 4y ago
    No no no no, you are so wrong! You don't give money to the politician, that would be bribery. You give it to their re-election fund. Because that is free speech.
- muro 4y ago
  Taleb was telling for some time that this can also be due to (over) reporting scandals in US and other western countries and is actually the best way to deal with corruption - expose, elect someone else and prosecute. If press is controlled by power, you might end up with no corruption published, yet a corrupt system underneath. https://mobile.twitter.com/nntaleb/status/1440688885189677061?lang=en https://mobile.twitter.com/nntaleb/status/144068888518967706...
- sershe 4y ago
  My pet theory is it's for the same reason public and public-ish housing works better everywhere else (from Vienna and Singapore to even ex-USSR) - robust private sector, in jobs and housing. In other places the alternatives may be limited/very expensive/not much better, so the public housing/jobs retain a mix of all kinds of people. I think in Singapore they used to emphasize luring the best people into government jobs, even; not sure how well it works in practice in the long term. In the USA, private sector can provide much better housing, and much better jobs, for most people, so anyone capable of leaving the public ones does. So, public housing eventually becomes dominated by the least functional members of society, and public sector, with the exception of the idealists and the corrupt, mostly retains the incompetents. The process is self-perpetuating too. Govt aside, in a tech company it's really hard to maintain a semi-crappy department given that people can leave - either it needs to be cleaned up and fixed, or the best developers will leave and it will just become crappy.

skissane 4y ago

Do other developed countries have these kinds of problems? I get the impression that governments in the US are unusually corrupt, at least by the standards of the English-speaking world.

kevin_nisbet 4y ago
I'm not fully following the situation in the US, so I don't know if it's a fair comparison or not. But I have seen some issues north of the border here in Canada over my lifetime. I think there are reports of bad water fairly often in First Nations communities, but I haven't followed the topic too closely. Some recent information: https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/first-nations-water-drinking-settlement-1.6382206 https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/first-nations-water-drink... And another one I sort of remember more than 20 years ago was: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walkerton_E._coli_outbreak https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walkerton_E._coli_outbreak But these seem to pale in comparison to the limited stories I've heard out of the US. The Flint water crisis, and some of the poorer communities in the US. I do believe water systems are incredibly expensive infrastructure, even for those of us living next to the great lakes.
- skissane 4y ago
  I was looking for anything objective to back up my impressions and I found the 2021 Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index – https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2021 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2021 Looking at major English speaking countries – New Zealand comes 1st as least corrupt country in world (equal with Denmark and Finland); UK is 11th; Canada and Ireland are equal 13th (along with Austria, Estonia and Iceland); Australia is equal 18th (with Belgium, Japan and Uruguay). The US is equal 27th, with Chile. So yes, among major English-speaking countries, the US is the most corrupt.
vkou 4y ago
> Do other developed countries have these kinds of problems? The short answer is 'Yes'. The long answer is 'Yes, they do.' It may be more prevalent in the US, because of its particular political climate, but its omnipresent.
- skissane 4y ago
  If we are asking specifically about state governments diverting federal funds earmarked for a particular purpose into something completely unrelated – I honestly cannot think of any instance of that ever happening in Australia. I'm not saying it has never happened, but I'm not aware of any examples. Have any Canadian provinces done that? Any of the UK's devolved administrations? I am thinking that particular form of corruption may well be, in the English-speaking world, somewhat unique to the US.
  - smabie 4y ago
    How would you even know? Maybe the US is just particularly bad at covering up corruption.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
btilly 4y ago
The USA is very much not corrupt by world standards. But our corruption ranking is well below other English speaking countries. Looking at https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2021/index/usa https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2021/index/usa I'm worried by how much more corrupt we became after Trump got into power.
- oefrha 4y ago
  There’s no “corruption ranking”, only corruption perception ranking. People who dislike a government will perceive more corruption regardless of the reality, and vice versa. Similarly, people who are hardly scraping by will likely perceive more corruption compared to those living more prosperously, even if there’s no corruption at all.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
otikik 4y ago
Well, lobbying in other countries means talking with politicians. In the US it means giving them money so they pass the laws you want. While this is seen as perfectly fine in the US, in other countries they call that bribing, which is illegal.
- r00fus 4y ago
  So basically, it's legalized corruption in the US.
  - zach_garwood 4y ago
    Well, if it were illegal, then rich folks might go to prison, and we can't have that, now can we!?
- mellavora 4y ago
  No no no no, you are so wrong! You don't give money to the politician, that would be bribery. You give it to their re-election fund. Because that is free speech.
muro 4y ago
Taleb was telling for some time that this can also be due to (over) reporting scandals in US and other western countries and is actually the best way to deal with corruption - expose, elect someone else and prosecute. If press is controlled by power, you might end up with no corruption published, yet a corrupt system underneath. https://mobile.twitter.com/nntaleb/status/1440688885189677061?lang=en https://mobile.twitter.com/nntaleb/status/144068888518967706...
sershe 4y ago
My pet theory is it's for the same reason public and public-ish housing works better everywhere else (from Vienna and Singapore to even ex-USSR) - robust private sector, in jobs and housing. In other places the alternatives may be limited/very expensive/not much better, so the public housing/jobs retain a mix of all kinds of people. I think in Singapore they used to emphasize luring the best people into government jobs, even; not sure how well it works in practice in the long term. In the USA, private sector can provide much better housing, and much better jobs, for most people, so anyone capable of leaving the public ones does. So, public housing eventually becomes dominated by the least functional members of society, and public sector, with the exception of the idealists and the corrupt, mostly retains the incompetents. The process is self-perpetuating too. Govt aside, in a tech company it's really hard to maintain a semi-crappy department given that people can leave - either it needs to be cleaned up and fixed, or the best developers will leave and it will just become crappy.