Shock, Horror: Government not very good at doing things
Today’s example is from New Zealand:
New Zealand’s prime minister Christopher Luxon has formally apologised to the more than 200,000 children and adults who suffered “horrific” and “heartbreaking” abuse and neglect while in state and faith-based institutions.
The historic apology follows a harrowing landmark report, released in July, which laid bare the scale of abuse that occurred across care institutions from the 1950s onwards. It was the most complex royal commission inquiry the country has held. The judge who chaired the inquiry, Coral Shaw, described the abuse as a “national disgrace and shame”.
As it turns out government is not very good - or even, is appalling - at taking care of children. This aligns neatly with that suspicion that the one grand signifier of not coping well with adult life is having been in care.
There are, of course, difficulties here. Some people are, at some times, simply going to require care from us all. Government is one of those ways we do things collectively. Teasing out cause and effect is also going to be problematic - those events that lead to requiring care will have their effects just as being in care will.
But we do still stick with that insistence that government just isn’t very good at doing things. Our Big Example being the Bureau of Indian Affairs over in the US. Which is:
The BIA works with tribal governments to help administer law enforcement and justice; promote development in agriculture, infrastructure, and the economy; enhance tribal governance; manage natural resources; and generally advance the quality of life in tribal communities. Educational services are provided by Bureau of Indian Education—the only other agency under the Assistant Secretary for Indian affairs—while health care is the responsibility of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services through its Indian Health Service.
The BIA is one of the oldest federal agencies in the U.S., with roots tracing back to the Committee on Indian Affairs established by Congress in 1775.
Those Native Americans (we do not call them Indians any more) have had their agriculture, infrastructure, education and economy more generally run by the Federal Government for 249 years now. A quarter of a millennium of the Federal Government running things has left Native Americans with the worst education, infrastructure, agriculture and economy of any of the residents of those United States.
This is, as close as we’ve actually got an example to point to, what life for all would look like if government was running everything for all of us. Which is, we insist, useful; that we have before us this evidence that government isn’t very good at doing things.
Yes, yes, there are some things that have to be done by government, things that both must be done and can only be done by government. But given the inability displayed even by the modern and current form of government we’d be better off limiting the power of government to those few and specific cases where it’s both necessary and the only possible alternative.
As ever, the case for minarchy is made by observing real world government.#
Tim Worstall