If you stop almost anyone on the street and ask them how they feel about bureaucracy or government efficiency, they are likely to tell you that they dislike bureaucracy and that government efficiency is an oxymoron. You don’t have to be a regular reader of LRC to have these feelings – they are pervasive. Yet, bureaucracy and government inefficiency persist. Sure, there are countless reforms, but they always seem so complex to me. The simplest solution – opening the industry up to the free market – is almost always avoided, ignored, and ridiculed.
Case in point: The new National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant-reviewing process. When you are giving out someone else’s money, so many perplexing questions pop up. Who should get the money? How much should they get? How will we decide? The enormous NIH budget has scientists constantly chomping at the bit, especially since their careers depend on getting a piece of the pie. But the number of eligible scientists is not at all correlated with the amount of money in the NIH budget (can you guess why?). So, there are constantly “problems” that need to be “solved” with “reform.” It is guaranteed that this will not be more effective, efficient, or less bureaucratic, since every time there is reform, the rules get more convoluted and complex.
Bonus question: Do you think, given the number of hoops and the importance of obtaining a grant, that there can possibly be a culture where scientists are only concerned with fact, truth, and love of the scientific method? (neither do I)
5:01 pm on June 8, 2008
