I often hear complaints that start with “If government were run like a business…”. The rant is usually about the time it takes for decision-making or the cost of conducting government affairs. It is also used in criticising the use of tax dollars, often with something similar to “if this was your own money, you’d be more careful with how you spent it.”
Unfortunately, those are competing arguments – act faster, be more careful. It’s a similar contradiction to the oft offered ‘be more creative, take less risk’ advice. Then followed by the angst-laden criticism of wasted tax dollars if an experiment fails.
Government is not business. Government has to be more careful than business. Government has to be much more open and transparent than business.
Openness and transparency is expensive, invites criticism needing a response, and creates an environment of fear and culture of risk aversion.
The expectation that government not make mistakes causes a decision-making system that has many layers of scrutiny built in. All that time, all those reports, and all those procedures – it all costs money. They are all staff intensive. More staff time = more of your tax dollars.
Business doesn’t have to jump through those public hoops. That’s why it takes so much longer for government to get anything done. And perhaps that’s why it’s so rare for a government to go bankrupt, but quite normal for businesses to close shop.
Is this another case of being careful of what you ask for? Will demanding faster decision-making create more risk? Will demanding more careful spending actually cause an increase in administrative spending?