4 ms·

>The vast majority of things the government touches turn to shit Overtime I've really begun to see this as propoganda that Reagan invented based on little to n

>The vast majority of things the government touches turn to shit Overtime I've really begun to see this as propoganda that Reagan invented based on little to no empirical data. I'm not convinced that the government is anymore dysfunctional than any large corporation. The belief that the everything the government touches turns to shit does far more harm than good; and furthermore gets in the federal government's way of actually solving problems. The federal government may have a problem with incentives (like any corporation), but it's hard for me to believe they are inept. It ends up being a self fulfilling prophecy - the government tries to do something, a hundred road blocks are put up for fear of ineptitude, then when the government is slow due to said roadblocks, they are called inept. When those roadblocks are removed - for example in the vaccine distribution of 2020, it's clear that the government is capable of good outcomes. Millions of highly controlled and sensitive vaccines were deployed across the country in only a couple months under an administration that nearly became hostile to its deployment.

8675309t 4y ago
Bootlicker
- dang 4y ago
  You can't do this here, and we ban accounts that do, so please don't. If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules when posting here, we'd appreciate it.
nostrademons 4y ago
Large corporations are utterly dysfunctional too. The difference is that when a large corporation grows too dysfunctional, it's replaced by a small corporation. When a large government grows too dysfunctional, it's replaced by a small government too, but the process is significantly bloodier. Robust systems are made up of interacting parts that tolerate partial failures. The reason the U.S. economy as a whole remains strong is because its least efficient businesses are continually failing, and their resources get reabsorbed by more competitive parts. When this ceases to happen (eg. the "too big to fail" banks in 2008, "what's good for GM is good for the country" in 1953), the economy as a whole becomes much weaker. There is no similar ablation process for the U.S. government - lately, there hasn't been an easy way to let parts of it fail while still preserving the government as a whole. This will likely lead to the collapse of the whole government, which is unfortunate. It can't avoid the dynamic common to all systems: the way to avoid total failure is to tolerate and adapt to partial failure.
- nemothekid 4y ago
  The problem with comparing corporations with governments, is that corporations are (1) ephemeral and (2) have clearer measurable objective functions (profit). The government should do things that are inefficient and unprofitable. Note that services can both provide value and be unprofitable (they can generate value but not capture it). A corporation that needs to cut costs can layoff workers. A government that is dealing with large unemployment can't just do a genocide. All of this is to say is that even though large corporations and large governments are alike, the most efficient solution for a corporation (bankruptcy) is not a good solution for government and so despite the inefficiencies we are sort of forced to accept them as the engineering realities of the situation. I fully understand large governments have large government problems, I just don't agree with the notion that having a smaller government is a solution and that the small government meme has largely been toxic to the detriment of the middle class.
  - nostrademons 4y ago
    There has to be a check on the inefficient and unprofitable things that a government undertakes, though, because otherwise all of the citizenry gets tied up doing inefficient stuff. In theory democratic government is the check on this - if the government wastes too much money, the electorate is supposed to vote out their representatives and elect new ones that will cut the budget. (In this sense, Reagan-style conservatism is working as intended). In practice, this rarely happens, largely because the average voter is terrible about judging opportunity cost, and every expenditure seems worthwhile in a vacuum.
    - govolckurself 4y ago
      Depends on whose theory you're talking about. I never understood why budget cuts were the Republican rallying cry, because they're almost entirely meaningless when you mint your own reserve currency. If I could impart one thing and one thing only to every American, it would be that the federal budget does not work like a household budget, and the federal deficit is not a credit card. All of these appeals to overspending are just trying to gin up a very specific flavor of fear.

8675309t 4y ago

Bootlicker

dang 4y ago
You can't do this here, and we ban accounts that do, so please don't. If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules when posting here, we'd appreciate it.

nostrademons 4y ago

Large corporations are utterly dysfunctional too. The difference is that when a large corporation grows too dysfunctional, it's replaced by a small corporation. When a large government grows too dysfunctional, it's replaced by a small government too, but the process is significantly bloodier. Robust systems are made up of interacting parts that tolerate partial failures. The reason the U.S. economy as a whole remains strong is because its least efficient businesses are continually failing, and their resources get reabsorbed by more competitive parts. When this ceases to happen (eg. the "too big to fail" banks in 2008, "what's good for GM is good for the country" in 1953), the economy as a whole becomes much weaker. There is no similar ablation process for the U.S. government - lately, there hasn't been an easy way to let parts of it fail while still preserving the government as a whole. This will likely lead to the collapse of the whole government, which is unfortunate. It can't avoid the dynamic common to all systems: the way to avoid total failure is to tolerate and adapt to partial failure.

nemothekid 4y ago
The problem with comparing corporations with governments, is that corporations are (1) ephemeral and (2) have clearer measurable objective functions (profit). The government should do things that are inefficient and unprofitable. Note that services can both provide value and be unprofitable (they can generate value but not capture it). A corporation that needs to cut costs can layoff workers. A government that is dealing with large unemployment can't just do a genocide. All of this is to say is that even though large corporations and large governments are alike, the most efficient solution for a corporation (bankruptcy) is not a good solution for government and so despite the inefficiencies we are sort of forced to accept them as the engineering realities of the situation. I fully understand large governments have large government problems, I just don't agree with the notion that having a smaller government is a solution and that the small government meme has largely been toxic to the detriment of the middle class.
- nostrademons 4y ago
  There has to be a check on the inefficient and unprofitable things that a government undertakes, though, because otherwise all of the citizenry gets tied up doing inefficient stuff. In theory democratic government is the check on this - if the government wastes too much money, the electorate is supposed to vote out their representatives and elect new ones that will cut the budget. (In this sense, Reagan-style conservatism is working as intended). In practice, this rarely happens, largely because the average voter is terrible about judging opportunity cost, and every expenditure seems worthwhile in a vacuum.
  - govolckurself 4y ago
    Depends on whose theory you're talking about. I never understood why budget cuts were the Republican rallying cry, because they're almost entirely meaningless when you mint your own reserve currency. If I could impart one thing and one thing only to every American, it would be that the federal budget does not work like a household budget, and the federal deficit is not a credit card. All of these appeals to overspending are just trying to gin up a very specific flavor of fear.