Tag: bureaucracy

Categories
Accountability folly moral hazard too much government

When in Rome

Italy, housing, corruption, government, bureaucracy

Americans concerned with government corruption really should study Italy.

Why?

“You know Italians,” septuagenarian Elio Ciampanella was quoted in the New York Times last week. “If there is a law, they will try to find ways to go around it!”

But it is not just ordinary citizens — the people — who are evading bad laws. It is government workers who won’t do their jobs, and who engage in a wide range of corrupt deals and shady incompetence.

I know, this seems awfully unfair to the Italians. What I’ve said is the case with governments around the world. But not equally. (Scandinavian countries have a long history of government worker probity, if not ultra-competence.) And Italians do have a well-earned reputation for government corruption.

Arguably, it’s the form freedom takes in Italy.

Be that true or not, Mr. Ciampanella’s story, as related in the Times, is a fascinating one. He asked for a government-subsidized apartment, and had to wait ten years to get one . . . only to discover the problem wasn’t a lack of apartments, but a surfeit.

Yes, the government owned too many apartments to keep track of!

And so they didn’t.

And gave special deals to “special people.”

In other words: incompetence and corruption as a way of life.

Market institutions that behave so chaotically and with so little attention to efficiency go out of business. But government? That’s “necessary,” so: too big to fail. And so, commonly excused.

No wonder, then, that the common-sense approach to government is to limit it.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Printable PDF

Italy, housing, corruption, government, bureaucracy

 

Common Sense Needs Your Help!

Also, please consider showing your appreciation by dropping something in our tip jar  (this link will take you to the Citizens in Charge donation page… and your contribution will go to the support of the Common Sense website). Maintaining this site takes time and money.

Your help in spreading the message of common sense and liberty is very much appreciated!

 

Categories
general freedom responsibility too much government

Security vs. Compassion?

Syrian refugees, refugees, Syria, immigration, welfare, food stamps, compassion, charity, Common Sense, illustration

My family isn’t in a position to take in any Syrian refugees.

Not that we’ve been asked.

Months ago, President Obama simply announced that “we” would take 10,000 refugees. After last Friday’s terrorist attack in Paris, and upon evidence that one of the perpetrators came into Europe with other refugees, 31 governors declared that their states will not accept Syrian refugees.

But note: this country doesn’t belong to Obama; those states don’t belong to those governors.

Back in September, I floated a different approach. “If I were president, I’d push for Congress to pass legislation specifically authorizing the acceptance of as many Syrian refugees as [Americans] stepped forward to sponsor. . . .”

“Sponsors could be individuals, families, churches, glee clubs, what-have-you, and would agree to cover costs for the Syrian person or family for one year or two or three,” I proposed. “But no welfare, no food stamps, no government housing. . . .”

Granted, my suggestion came before the latest terrorism. It was aimed not at security concerns but at sparing taxpayers. Why shouldn’t voluntary generosity dictate the extent of “our” generosity?

But come to think of it, my plan offers greater security, too. Why? It involves the personal faces of citizens, not merely a faceless bureaucracy. No matter how much vetting the government does, an ongoing link to an actual American provides another check.

There’s a legitimate debate about security vs. compassion. Millions are in need, displaced by terror — from both Daesh (ISIS) and the Assad regime. The Niskanen Center’s David Bier notes the resistance to accepting Jewish refugees prior to and during World War II, out of fear some might be spies. Christians may find Matthew 25:44-45 compelling.

On the other hand, there is undeniable risk. GOP presidential aspirants have called taking Syrian refugees “insane” and “looney.” Speaker Paul Ryan argues for a “better safe than sorry” pause.

Me? I support accepting the risk . . . but only if committed individual citizens step forward.

Not by any politician’s decree.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Printable PDF

Syrian refugees, refugees, Syria, immigration, welfare, food stamps, compassion, charity, Common Sense, illustration

 

Artwork based on original photo by Phil Warren on Flickr (endorsement of this message is not implied):

Categories
general freedom ideological culture nannyism national politics & policies too much government

Marriage Savings

Paul Jacob on how governments can save money, and clean up the marriage business, too

We’ve all seen lawmakers yammer on and on about how they want to “streamline” government, or “save the taxpayers money.”

But they rarely show us much for all the talk.

Paul Woolverton, writing this weekend in the Fayetteville Observer, noted one such lapse after the North Carolina Senate voted to create a law to let magistrates “opt out of conducting any weddings if they have a religious objection.”

The problem? “No one in the debate,” Mr. Woolverton asserts, “questioned the underlying premise that a magistrate or clergy member is necessary to seal the marriage contract.”

The involvement of the state in the marriage contract biz is unnecessarily complicated, he explains. “As fiscal conservatives,” Woolverton insists, they could have taken the opportunity to ask something more fundamental:

A man and a woman pay the government $60 to get a government-approved marriage license. Why should they then have to visit another government office and pay the government another $20, or hire a government-designated third party for a fee or “donation,” to finalize their marriage contract?

Woolverton suggests streamlining the process: “. . . [G]overnment should make its involvement the least intrusive it can be. It should record marriages when couples visit the Register of Deeds to buy their marriage licenses.”

And that’s it.

Betrothed couples can legally testify to meeting any and all state requirements — and officially inform the state of their pre-marriage and married names.

Those who want the services of a priest or rabbi or preacher or imam can hire one, or cajole one. Or two.

That’s just not state business.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Printable PDF

Categories
First Amendment rights free trade & free markets government transparency national politics & policies

Your Taxes, in Small Type

The business of business is to profit by helping others. The business of government is to make sure that businesses don’t profit by cheating others.

Unfortunately, sometimes it’s the governments that cheat.

Take the airline industry. Though substantially deregulated by the early 1980s, government has not treated it in an exactly laissez faire manner since. First there are the taxes, quite heavy. And recently the Department of Transportation decided that it must regulate the way in which airlines may advertise their prices . . . and the taxes. That is, the DOT insists that the “total price” — by which it means the price-plus-tax — must be shown prominently, with the tax portion “presented in significantly smaller type than the listing of the total price.”

Talk about regulatory micromanagement!

Now, this rule isn’t something Congress cooked up. It’s the result of a bureaucracy gone wild.

And the rule has one obvious effect: It shields government from consumer criticism, showing bureaucrats at their most self-serving. About one fifth of every airline ticket goes to the government, and folks in government don’t want you to know that.

This being the case, you might think — as George Will does — that the First Amendment would apply, especially since the First Amendment is now routinely held as protecting political speech more strictly than commercial speech. But, so far, courts have ruled for the taxing and regulating bureaucrats, not the competitive airlines. Or consumers.

Frequent fliers (I’m one) should hope the Supreme Court justices take up the case, which shows why economic and political freedom go best together.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
property rights

Castle in the Hay

The haystacks, covered with tarps and old tires, were ugly.

And yet no one complained.

The people near Honeycrock Farm, Salfords, Redhill, Surrey, knew that Robert Fidler was building something behind his haystacks. But, maybe because they were, at heart, good British people, they said nothing.

But what Fidler had built behind the stacks of hay was a mock Tudor mansion, complete with cannons and turrets and such.

Tastes differ as to its beauty, but hey: it was a lot better than hay.

After building it for two years, he and his family lived in it for four. Without telling anybody.

And then came down the haystacks.

And came trouble.

Fidler thought that he had gotten around the local planning laws by living in his structure for four years without complaint. Too bad, then, that the Reigate and Banstead Council says that rule is void — because nobody had been given a chance to see it.

They had seen ugly haystacks, instead.

Now, you probably thought that zoning laws and building codes were there to protect neighbors. But the neighbors had no complaints about ugly haystacks with blue tarp. A nice house in olden style?

Why complain about that?

Well, some did. Why shouldn’t Fidler have to go through the same Kafkaesque nightmare they did?

I guess they didn’t appreciate the cleverness of the ploy.

Not so clever, however, that he’ll be allowed to keep his house. Too bad.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.