Many people around the USA think that things could be much better in this country. So how do we achieve that? For a large segment, the key is ideology; we need to follow a particular philosophy and all will improve. For others, the key is political party; we need to vote for a particular party and all will improve. Still others want to fight against all change because things are as good as they can get. Additional numbers are driven by philosophy or religion. If you think about it, radical Islamic terrorists are pushing to make things better by following the dictates (as they understand them) of their religion.
The truth is that none of these ways work well. Sure, some ideologies work better than others. Some parties do better with one subject or another. Some religion driven-views can make life for all better while others (like that radical Islamism mentioned above) can reduce the quality of life in dramatic fashion.
The real key to improving life is for society to answer two questions:
1. What exactly constitutes a better life?
2. What practices and policies can we follow that actually move us towards that better life?
This may seem simplistic, but it is one of the most complicated and difficult things to actually achieve.
Let's start with what constitutes a better life. We should consider this from a societal standpoint. To begin with, we can conclude that we want -- just like our founders wanted -- to have individual freedom. Each individual be free to decide what constitutes a good life for him or her. This basic decision was part of the original genius of the USA. Prior to our founding, the decision regarding what was good for a nation was made by the king or the emperor or other ultimate leader. These leaders were either considered gods or people who got their power from God. There was no arguing with divine decisions; these decision were just to be followed. After the Revolution, America became the first nation to realize that the decision regarding what is best for the country was one for the people to make. The leaders got their power from the people rather than from Heaven.
There are some determinations of what constitutes a better life that still rely on divine direction or the equivalent. Radical Islam views the construct of a society as good or bad depending on how well it follows a set of parameters stated in the Koran (or at least as the adherents believe is stated in the Koran.) Far left movements -- be they communist or socialist -- nominally give the source of their power as the "people", but this is not true. No country with an actual socialist or communist government has allowed the very people from whom the leadership claims to get its power make the choices regarding what the nature of a good life ought to be. Consider China where millions of people perished in "re-education" camps because the government decided that these people held the wrong views regarding society. Consider Venezuela where about 20% of the population fled the country to escape the "good life" inflicted by the socialists. The economy contracted by over 70%, people were reduced to starvation and poverty was the norm for all (other than the leadership) because the people in charge wanted to do things to conform to their ideology. Reality in Venezuela didn't matter. Only Chavez and Maduro mattered.
In a society based upon individual freedom, let's posit that a better life is one that supplies individuals with the necessities of life like food, shelter, healthcare, etc. Let's further posit that such a good society would provide protection to the individual from criminal activity and to the nation from foreign enemies. Such a society would also provide a fair method for settling disputes that arise among the citizens so as to protect the weak and insure fairness and consistency in its results.
There is much more we could discuss regarding what constitutes a good life, but such a discussion could continue over 20 volumes and still be nowhere near complete. Let's move instead to the second question: what policies should our nation follow so as to move towards a good life for all.
While this too is something that could be discussed nearly forever, there is one basic rule that ought to be followed if we are to move in the correct direction. We need to have results-driven policies. In other words, if a new policy is adopted and it works, we should keep it. If the new policy does not work, it should be dropped and an alternative tried.
A results-driven policy sounds like a no brainer. Of course we should do what works and not what doesn't work, right? In reality, however, it is uncommon to see this practice actually followed.
Here's a good example: In the mid 1960's Lyndon Johnson proposed a federally funded program called Head Start. It provided pre-K schooling for children 3 and 4 years old. These programs were set up across the nation. First, the programs were in poor neighborhoods. Today, pre-K programs of this sort are in cities and towns across the nation. There are still political candidates who make it a major plank in their platform to extend pre-K programs for all children in their jurisdiction. Over the last 50 years, the USA has spent many hundreds of billions of dollars on these programs.
But there's a problem with Head Start and equivalent programs: they don't work. Over the last 50 years there have been many studies done comparing children who went through the program and those who did not. The latest large study was done by the US Department of Justice during the Obama administration. The study found that after going through Head Start, the children in the program performed better in reading and arithmetic for first and second grade. By third grade, there was no observable difference. That lack of any difference remained constant for the rest of the children's schooling. Think of that. Hundreds of billions of dollars have been spent on a program with no lasting positive effect on the participants. Just imagine if that same money had been spent hiring tutors for kids with challenges in English or math over the years. More than a million kids could have been helped.
Another sort of practice that prevents results-driven policy comes from inertia. Some policy is adopted by the government which works at first. After a while, it stops having a positive impact. Instead, though, it has a constituency that wants it to continue so that they can keep their benefits at the expense of the common good. Here's a good example: mohair subsidies. Right after World War II, Congress adopted a program that gave subsidies to ranchers who raised sheep that provided mohair wool. These fibers were used in uniforms for cold climates. A few years later, the army adopted synthetic fibers for that purpose but the mohair subsidies just stayed in place. Sixty years later, the subsidies were still being distributed. It wasn't a huge program, just a few million dollars each year, tiny by federal standards. Still, there was no longer any reason to encourage the production of mohair in the USA, so the money was totally wasted. There were no good results for society, but inertia kept the program in place anyway.
Another example comes from the job training programs run by the federal government. At last count there were over 100 separate programs. Each has a director and management and separate offices. There is no reason why the USA needs so many different programs. We could easily get by with just a few programs with different focuses. That would save hundreds of millions of dollars spent on overhead for all the many programs each year. The savings could go to train more people or just to reduce the deficit. Inertia keeps it in place.
With the presidential race underway, it would be refreshing to hear one of the challengers talk about adopting a results driven policy. Imagine someone from the Democrats who ran on what he or she planned to do and how it would make the country better.
The truth is that none of these ways work well. Sure, some ideologies work better than others. Some parties do better with one subject or another. Some religion driven-views can make life for all better while others (like that radical Islamism mentioned above) can reduce the quality of life in dramatic fashion.
The real key to improving life is for society to answer two questions:
1. What exactly constitutes a better life?
2. What practices and policies can we follow that actually move us towards that better life?
This may seem simplistic, but it is one of the most complicated and difficult things to actually achieve.
Let's start with what constitutes a better life. We should consider this from a societal standpoint. To begin with, we can conclude that we want -- just like our founders wanted -- to have individual freedom. Each individual be free to decide what constitutes a good life for him or her. This basic decision was part of the original genius of the USA. Prior to our founding, the decision regarding what was good for a nation was made by the king or the emperor or other ultimate leader. These leaders were either considered gods or people who got their power from God. There was no arguing with divine decisions; these decision were just to be followed. After the Revolution, America became the first nation to realize that the decision regarding what is best for the country was one for the people to make. The leaders got their power from the people rather than from Heaven.
There are some determinations of what constitutes a better life that still rely on divine direction or the equivalent. Radical Islam views the construct of a society as good or bad depending on how well it follows a set of parameters stated in the Koran (or at least as the adherents believe is stated in the Koran.) Far left movements -- be they communist or socialist -- nominally give the source of their power as the "people", but this is not true. No country with an actual socialist or communist government has allowed the very people from whom the leadership claims to get its power make the choices regarding what the nature of a good life ought to be. Consider China where millions of people perished in "re-education" camps because the government decided that these people held the wrong views regarding society. Consider Venezuela where about 20% of the population fled the country to escape the "good life" inflicted by the socialists. The economy contracted by over 70%, people were reduced to starvation and poverty was the norm for all (other than the leadership) because the people in charge wanted to do things to conform to their ideology. Reality in Venezuela didn't matter. Only Chavez and Maduro mattered.
In a society based upon individual freedom, let's posit that a better life is one that supplies individuals with the necessities of life like food, shelter, healthcare, etc. Let's further posit that such a good society would provide protection to the individual from criminal activity and to the nation from foreign enemies. Such a society would also provide a fair method for settling disputes that arise among the citizens so as to protect the weak and insure fairness and consistency in its results.
There is much more we could discuss regarding what constitutes a good life, but such a discussion could continue over 20 volumes and still be nowhere near complete. Let's move instead to the second question: what policies should our nation follow so as to move towards a good life for all.
While this too is something that could be discussed nearly forever, there is one basic rule that ought to be followed if we are to move in the correct direction. We need to have results-driven policies. In other words, if a new policy is adopted and it works, we should keep it. If the new policy does not work, it should be dropped and an alternative tried.
A results-driven policy sounds like a no brainer. Of course we should do what works and not what doesn't work, right? In reality, however, it is uncommon to see this practice actually followed.
Here's a good example: In the mid 1960's Lyndon Johnson proposed a federally funded program called Head Start. It provided pre-K schooling for children 3 and 4 years old. These programs were set up across the nation. First, the programs were in poor neighborhoods. Today, pre-K programs of this sort are in cities and towns across the nation. There are still political candidates who make it a major plank in their platform to extend pre-K programs for all children in their jurisdiction. Over the last 50 years, the USA has spent many hundreds of billions of dollars on these programs.
But there's a problem with Head Start and equivalent programs: they don't work. Over the last 50 years there have been many studies done comparing children who went through the program and those who did not. The latest large study was done by the US Department of Justice during the Obama administration. The study found that after going through Head Start, the children in the program performed better in reading and arithmetic for first and second grade. By third grade, there was no observable difference. That lack of any difference remained constant for the rest of the children's schooling. Think of that. Hundreds of billions of dollars have been spent on a program with no lasting positive effect on the participants. Just imagine if that same money had been spent hiring tutors for kids with challenges in English or math over the years. More than a million kids could have been helped.
Another sort of practice that prevents results-driven policy comes from inertia. Some policy is adopted by the government which works at first. After a while, it stops having a positive impact. Instead, though, it has a constituency that wants it to continue so that they can keep their benefits at the expense of the common good. Here's a good example: mohair subsidies. Right after World War II, Congress adopted a program that gave subsidies to ranchers who raised sheep that provided mohair wool. These fibers were used in uniforms for cold climates. A few years later, the army adopted synthetic fibers for that purpose but the mohair subsidies just stayed in place. Sixty years later, the subsidies were still being distributed. It wasn't a huge program, just a few million dollars each year, tiny by federal standards. Still, there was no longer any reason to encourage the production of mohair in the USA, so the money was totally wasted. There were no good results for society, but inertia kept the program in place anyway.
Another example comes from the job training programs run by the federal government. At last count there were over 100 separate programs. Each has a director and management and separate offices. There is no reason why the USA needs so many different programs. We could easily get by with just a few programs with different focuses. That would save hundreds of millions of dollars spent on overhead for all the many programs each year. The savings could go to train more people or just to reduce the deficit. Inertia keeps it in place.
With the presidential race underway, it would be refreshing to hear one of the challengers talk about adopting a results driven policy. Imagine someone from the Democrats who ran on what he or she planned to do and how it would make the country better.
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