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Yes it's inefficient, but our founders did not prioritize efficiency. The US simply didn't go through the post-industrial revolution reforms that most other cou
by jjk166 3y ago
Yes it's inefficient, but our founders did not prioritize efficiency. The US simply didn't go through the post-industrial revolution reforms that most other countries did. This was due in turn to going through many reforms just before industrialization really took off due to the civil war, and then only a limited domestic effect of the world wars. Thus we have a constitution designed for a primarily agrarian society combined with a government handling revenues from the world's largest and arguably most advanced digital-age economy. Unfortunately the issue is complex and a solution requires changes to multiple facets of government, most of which are not sexy and certainly not the makings of a slogan you can put on a hat. It doesn't help that there are a number of other desperately needed reforms. I imagine things will improve, but probably not soon.
- m_mueller 3y agoOne aspect that strikes me about the US system compared to other nations is its rigid nature. Maybe due to lessons learned (since almost all democratic Republics are younger than the US) and maybe from a cultural angle (less Evangelicism?), other nations typically don‘t set e.g. their constitutions in stone and e.g. election process reform is a real thing. I think the biggest change the US could & should strive for is to be more open to change itself. E.g. one thing I‘d wish every legal system would introduce is an expiry date for laws - if a majority cannot be reached again after a set amount of time, the law would be removed. For efficiency this could be combined with an exponential backoff algorithm - e.g. the expiry dates are set 10, then 20, then 50, then every 100 years in the future.