Five Things

​During various speaking events, I have occasionally offered the following challenge to my audiences:  Name five things that the federal government does well.  By “well” I mean effectively and efficiently.  “Effectively” means the intended goals are accomplished.  “Efficiently” means the intended goals are accomplished with a minimum of cost and waste.  I’ve only ever had two answers.  The one I usually get is the military.  My response is that our military is the best in the world (or, at least, it was until very recently) but I don’t think the Department of Defense is going to receive any awards for efficiency.  They’re the ones who make the $400 hammers and the $600 toilet seats.  The other answer—offered only once—was the cross-country railroad.  I confessed that I was not expert on the subject, although I seem to recall some cases of graft and corruption.  I then asked the person who offered that answer if he could think of any example that took place in the last 100 years.  His eyes rolled upward—apparently gazing at the same thing as everyone else in the room—and he remained silent.  My point was this: If we can’t even think of five things, three things, or one thing that the federal government does well, why would we want to keep entrusting more and more areas of our lives to it?

​I intend this to be the first in a series of proofs that the government does not deserve our trust when it comes to solving most problems.  The series will be called, “Five Things.”  Here’s the first installment.

During the Corona virus pandemic Congress established the “Employee Retention Tax Credit.”  It was supposed to help retain workers on the payroll of private companies.  Later, Congress extended the tax break and made it available to additional companies.  The program was originally expected to cost the federal government $55 billion.  The costs of the program have swelled to nearly five times that amount, and new claims are being filed with the Internal Revenue Service every week.  A whistleblower recently estimated that 95% of the claims now being made for this program are fraudulent.  When asked whether this estimate was accurate, IRS Commissioner, Danny Werfel, answered, “Yeah.”

The “Employee Retention Tax Credit” is one of a very long list of items that cannot be offered as an example of something the federal government does well.  Perhaps we should eliminate all the items on that list.  Think how much money would be saved and returned to our pockets.  Think how much anxiety would be spared from being oppressed by the crooked politicians’ bad ideas.  Think how much more productive our nation would be if all the bureaucrats who administer these programs got jobs that actually produced something worthwhile for the nation.