Random stuff I find interesting and you may not.
There’s a shortage of eggs in America right now, and the ones you can get are very expensive. Even Waffle House is adding a surcharge if you order eggs. That’s mostly not about markets, or about government; there’s a shortage of eggs mainly because of a disease killing birds. That being said, we have ample … Read more
Today, we have a tweet that tells us everything we need to know about government bureaucracy. Alex Stapp of the Institute for Progress tweeted about the staggering expansion of middle management in Washington.The tweet shows five sentences from a story in the Atlantic last month, authored by Gary Hamel and Michele Zanini. And Mr. Stapp … Read more
Mostly empty federal office buildings in Washington could make bureaucratic groupthink less pervasive. The government office buildings in and around Washington, D.C., are mostly empty, a report from the Government Accountability Office has found. The report looks at the headquarters for 24 federal agencies. It includes historic buildings such as the Treasury and the Federal … Read more
Out of millions of square feet in federal property holdings, many agencies are sitting at or below 25% capacity in their physical office footprint. The space-to-occupancy ratio at agency headquarters has worsened in the last few years, as many agencies embraced hybrid work and increased telework for their employees. It would be easy to blame … Read more
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Janus v. AFSCME on June 27, 2018, that forced government-union fees are unconstitutional. By doing so, the Court affirmed what many people had felt for years: Public unions are inherently political, and making people pay dues to these unions is the same as compelling them to support a political … Read more
In Wanting, Luke Burgis writes, One hundred years ago, there was a much wider gap in knowledge between someone who had a doctoral degree and someone who didn’t. Today, with the world’s information at nearly everyone’s fingertips, the knowledge gap between people with a great amount of formal education and those with less has narrowed. … Read more
Americans don’t need government officials telling them what to do and what not to do. They do need clear, honest data and risk assessments unbiased by profit or ideological motives. The government, however, increasingly appears incapable of providing even that, even when it comes to foundational needs like nutrition. The Raw Milk Raw Deal Forward! … Read more
The best way for a college to improve its admissions process would be to abolish the admissions office. A simple formula involving high school grades and SAT scores would be best. If many applicants meet the minimum standards for admission, then a lottery can be used to select those to whom to offer admission. Admissions … Read more
The Institute for Justice wants the Supreme Court to rule that the Fifth Amendment requires a prompt post-seizure hearing. Civil asset forfeiture laws, which allow the government to seize property allegedly tainted by crime without ever charging the owner, are fundamentally rigged in favor of the law enforcement agencies that get a cut of the … Read more
I was born in Iowa, raised in the mountains of Virginia, and attended Virginia Tech sporadically from 1974 to 1976 before dropping out to try my luck writing. At some point in the late 1970s, individual liberty became my highest political value and I resolved to do what I could to defend it. I had … Read more
“Don’t put all of your eggs in one basket,” advises the proverb. Why not? Anyone who ever has spoken with an investment adviser has heard the sermon about diversification of risk. And most people understand that in the context of an investment portfolio. But in other contexts, we respond to risk with the opposite of … Read more
Reviewing public policy and the coronavirus, I’ve mostly focused on the manifest failures of Washington bureaucracies. But let’s not overlook the politicized incompetence of the World Health Organization, a U.N.-connected bureaucracy that ostensibly exists to prevent global pandemics. Much of that criticism, as illustrated by this National Review column by Senator Marco Rubio, has focused … Read more