I keep hearing in threads about how the government is so inefficient. And it’s not a proposal, or an argument, but a given. Like, someone will be allowing for the natural inefficiencies of the current health care plan, and end it with, ‘…but the government is so ineffecient, so…’. But is it an actual valid point?
Is government inherently ineffecient? Is it a natural outcome of a structure set up to administer an entire nation? Or is it specific to democracy? A republic?
If government in general isn’t inherently inefficient, is there something wrong with American government (because that’s almost always where the accusation is thrown)? Is it that much worse than other governments?
No; government isn’t innately less efficient than any other organization. It’s better at some things, it’s worse than others. It’s just a point of dogma in right wing America’s quasi-religious worship of the Magic Free Market that the government is always less efficient than the market. Even when the government works better at a particular task here or in some other country; even when privatizing something makes it less efficient the contradiction is ignored or handwaved away.
The known greater efficiency at government in providing national health care is an obvious one. Basic scientific research is another; corporations tend to ignore anything not immediately profitable. The military is yet another.
He made a statement of fact. So, he should prove it. Or retract what he said, or modify it to be more reasonable. Something along the lines of ‘Well, IMHO it’s an article of faith that Governments are less efficient than, say, private industry. I base this on my own political bias and world view, but I fervently believe it. Oh, and American is evil too…’
Then his statement can be taken as his own assertion of reality, not fact based, and dismissed as it should be. So…he has the chance to prove his viewpoint…or not. All the same to me.
I believe this would be called an interrogative statement, though I barely got a passing grade in English speech and syntax class. Is it relevant to the discussion? Perhaps you should start a GQ thread on it…
The idea is that without competition, government doesn’t react in a rational way to issues the way the free market does.
There are a couple of problems, though, with a direct comparison of the free market and government.
The first is simply that the government is usually in a position of having to make sure all X get Y while the market just wants to make money. That X will, say, die without Y doesn’t mean anything to the market except that X is more likely to pay more for Y if they can. A good example of this in action is private schools. They are able to follow the money and take only certain students. Public schools don’t have that option.
The second is that certain things have limited opportunity for competition. Heath care is an excellent example of this since most people can’t really shop around for health care in any comprehensive way.
“Efficiency” isn’t really the measure I’d use for government when government is handicapped by responsibility to all citizens. Markets aren’t.
You have not demonstrated any of these things however. You have asserted them and then appealed to common (in a certain world view) ‘knowledge’ to ‘prove’ your points.
I would say that all this proves is that the government has more funding than private organizations…it doesn’t demonstrate that they are more efficient at doing those jobs.
How do you distinguish between a “statement of fact” and a “statement of opinion”? Is it fact if it doesn’t say it’s opinion or is it opinion if it doesn’t say it’s fact? Or do you just pick whichever one serves your purpose?
As for “ehe,” I’ve never seen it other than from you so I wondered if it had some meaning.
This is obviously a statement of fact. A statement of opinion would have some sort of caveat like ‘IMHO’ or ‘I believe’…some indication that this is not an assertion of fact but instead is the opinion of the poster.
YMMV…Der is perfectly capable of coming back and saying that he isn’t talking facts but only asserting his opinion. I don’t always like him very much, but if he says it’s his opinion and not fact I’d be more than willing to take his word for it. He doesn’t lie IMHO…he really believes what he says.
Nope…it’s just the way I actually talk. Though in reality I say ‘no?’ or ‘que?’ instead of ‘ehe’.
I think it’s important not to get “efficiency” bound up with “effectiveness” or “need.”
A market can be efficient without serving everyone. A market isn’t inefficient just because someone goes without because someone going without isn’t what the market cares about.
I’m not sure how you’d compare the “efficiency” of a government program vs. a private company, since they always have different goals. I can’t think of any government agency or program where profit is the primary goal.
Of course it is pretty meaningless to discuss something as general as “government efficiency.” But here’s one example - make of it what you may.
In 2007 Social Security took in $784.9 billion, and paid out $594.5 billion.
Administrative costs were .8% of money taken in.
I think that compares pretty well to most charities or other organizations that take in and disburse funds.
It is very difficult to compare government to private entities because many government functions do not have the goal of generating a profit, and would not be assumed by a for-profit entity. Nor do government providers have the ability to cherry-pick, and refuse service to unprofitable customers.
The US government is stunningly inefficient - I see it every day - but probably no more so that any similarly huge corporation would be. Especially a corporation with no profit motive and a vague mandate to help the public. Could you imagine the FDA run for a profit (conspiracy theories aside)? Often the govenment does jobs that nobody else can or will, like attack other contries, and which don’t make a profit, like providing free education. These things may be inefficient when compared to a ruthless for profit business. On the other hand, sometimes the government gets bloated, useless departments that do nothing but pay their employees to sit around and surf the net all day.
I don’t think the post office is less efficient than the parcel carriers. I think they just skim the cream off the top. And they don’t “bother” with things like forwarding when you move.
If UPS had to deliver junk mail they would be out of business in a week.
I think public transit and Amtrak does better than any of the private passenger systems of the sixties, when you were better off riding a bus at half the speed. Matter of fact, if Amtrak took over the bus lines we’d probably have decent bus service again as well.
What makes you think this? Wouldn’t they simply charge more to the junk mailers? Perhaps this would shift more of the cost to them, instead of having it subsidized by us…and perhaps that would force the junk mail companies to become more efficient or go out of business, ehe?
Governments went to standing armies instead of mercenary armies because they do the job better. The verdict of history is pretty clear on that. The government is better at basic research because it does far more of it; no one is stopping the corporations from doing it, they just don’t care. And Americans spend more for inferior care, a shorter lifespan and a less healthy population. That’s hardly efficient.
But if the supposed purpose of the enterprise IS to serve everyone, not reaching everyone is an inefficiency. And at any rate, when the government bashers use lines like “the government is less efficient” they clearly mean “effective” as well. It doesn’t serve as much of a criticism of government to essentially say “the free market is more efficient but does a rotten job”.
This might be a valid comparison: This article says Blackwater charged $11 million a year for a 34-person security team in Iraq. That’s $324,000 per person. It doesn’t exactly say what it costs the US Army to employ 34 soldiers, but the article does note that General Petraeus makes $180,000 a year.
