Cost Overruns: It’s the Same in Britain
The Taxpayers’ Alliance has published a new study examining a sample of 240 government capital projects in Britain, including weapons systems, highway projects, computer upgrades, health care spending, and other items. The results mirror the serious cost overrun problems we have in the U.S. federal government.
The Alliance study found that 32 percent of projects sampled had cost overruns, while 24 percent came in under budget, but that the projects with overruns were generally much larger. As a result, the average net cost overrun on all the projects was 38 percent. Thus, when the government says that a new project will cost taxpayers 1 billion UK pounds, on average it will actually cost them 1.38 billion.
The study also explores the reasons why UK government projects run into trouble, and I have observed that most of the same problems are also chronic in our government. To me, this provides more evidence that the inefficiencies in government stem from deep, structural factors, not the skills of the particular politicians or administrators in office.
Filed under: International Economics and Development; Tax and Budget Policy
The New Threats to Free Speech
In a new Policy Analysis, Cato Research Fellow Jason Kuznicki examines the ongoing threats to free speech both at home and around the world, from hate-speech laws in the United Kingdom and Canada and university speech codes in the United States, to the Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam:
The result is not more happiness, but a race to the bottom, in which aggrieved groups compete endlessly with one another for a slice of government power. Philosopher Robert Nozick once observed that utilitarianism is hard-pressed to banish what he termed utility monsters—that is, individuals who take inordinate satisfaction from acts that displease others. Arguing about who hurt whose feelings worse, and about who needs more soothing than whom, seems designed to discover—or create—utility monsters. We must not allow this to happen.
Instead, liberal governments have traditionally relied on a particular bargain, in which freedom of expression is maintained for all, and in which emotional satisfaction is a private pursuit, not a public guarantee. This bargain can extend equally to all people, and it forms the basis for an enduring and diverse society, one in which differences may be aired without fear of reprisal. Although world cultures increasingly mix with one another, and although our powers of expression are greater than ever before, these are not sound reasons to abandon the liberal bargain. Restrictions on free expression do not make societies happier or more tolerant, but instead make them more fractious and censorious.
How the Government Broke up the Beatles
Forget the effect on production incentives and GDP growth—Matt Lewis at Politics Daily points to an article in the Times of London arguing that confiscatory tax rates broke up the Beatles, which may be the most heinous crime of government since the liquidation of the kulaks.
Filed under: International Economics and Development; Tax and Budget Policy
Wednesday Links
- Convicted pedophile in the United Kingdom given taxpayer-funded Viagra through the National Health Service.
- Cato senior fellow Tom Palmer filing a lawsuit to legally carry firearms in Washington D.C.
- How it all came crashing down: The causes of the financial crisis.
- A few things you should know to better understand the elections in Afghanistan.
- Podcast: How some on the right-wing are doing everything they can to defend torture. Let’s just call them “enhanced justification techniques.”
U.S. to Share Biometric Data With Foreign Countries
In the name of fighting identity fraud, the U.K. Home Office has entered into a biometric data-sharing agreement with Canada and Australia.
“The USA will be joining the agreement shortly, and New Zealand is considering legislation to join in the near future,” they say.
It would be nice to learn what commitments have been made to the U.K., justifying this statement.
Can a Story about Government-Run Health Care Have a Happy Ending?
Fox News recently reported about how Oregon’s government-run health system gives people advice on how to kill themselves. The statist system in the United Kingdom has a different approach, relying instead on people dying as they languish on waiting lists. But the bureaucrats across the pond are not a bunch of joyless robots. They managed to divert some of their budget to produce leaflets telling kids about the cardiovascular benefits of orgasms. The Telegraph reports on this innovative use of taxpayer funds:
NHS guidance is advising school pupils that they have a “right” to an enjoyable sex life and that regular sex can be good for their cardiovascular health. The advice appears in leaflets circulated to parents, teachers and youth workers and is meant to update sex education by telling students about the benefits of enjoyable sex. The authors of the guidance say that for too long, experts have concentrated on the need for “safe sex” and committed relationships while ignoring the principle reason that many people have sex. …The leaflet carries the slogan “an orgasm a day keeps the doctor away”. It also says: “Health promotion experts advocate five portions of fruit and veg a day and 30 minutes’ physical activity three times a week. What about sex or masturbation twice a week?”
UK Home Secretary Abandons National ID
The UK has been operating in parallel to the United States on the national ID question, and rumors about the collapse of the UK national ID have been circulating for a couple of years.
Now comes word that Home Secretary Alan Johnson will scrap the national ID card system, making it voluntary. When volunteers fail to materialize, it is easy to anticipate that it will disappear entirely.
This is another thing U.S. Homeland Security secretary Janet Napolitano might want to note as she struggles with with national ID issue here.
Filed under: Foreign Policy and National Security; Telecom, Internet & Information Policy
Tax Havens Have Stronger Governance Standards
Congratulations to The Economist for reporting on a new study showing that so-called tax havens actually have the strongest laws to weed out shady money. The article cites new research by an Australian political scientist, who conducted real-world tests to confirm that it is much easier to set up anonymous structures in nations such as the United States and United Kingdom than it is to set up similar structures in places such as Bermuda and Switzerland:
…with a budget of $10,000 and little more than Google (and the ads at the back of this paper), [Jason Sharman, a political scientist at Australia’s Griffith University] showed how easy it was to circumvent prohibitions on banking secrecy, forming anonymous shell companies and secret bank accounts across the world. In doing so he has uncovered an uncomfortable truth for many of the leaders of Group of 20 nations meeting on April 2nd to discuss, among other things, sanctions against offshore tax havens. The most egregious examples of banking secrecy, money laundering and tax fraud are found not in remote alpine valleys or on sunny tropical isles but in the backyards of the world’s biggest economies. …A money-laundering threat assessment in 2005 by the federal government found that corporate anonymity offered by Delaware, Nevada and Wyoming rivalled that of familiar offshore financial centres. For foreigners, America is a particularly attractive place to stash cash, because it does not tax the interest income they earn. Thus with both anonymity and no taxation, America offers them all the elements of a tax haven. …America is not the only rich nation Mr Sharman tested. He tried to open anonymous shell companies and bank accounts 45 times across the world. These were successful in 17 cases, of which 13 were in OECD countries. One example was Britain, where in 45 minutes on the internet he formed a company without providing identification, was issued with bearer shares (which have been almost universally outlawed because they confer completely anonymous ownership) as well as nominee directors and a secretary. …In contrast, when trying to open accounts in Bermuda and Switzerland, he was asked for documentation such as notarised copies of his birth certificate. “In practice OECD countries have much laxer regulation on shell corporations than classic tax havens,” Mr Sharman concludes.
Filed under: International Economics and Development; Tax and Budget Policy
Who’s Blogging about Cato
Here’s a few bloggers who are writing, citing and linking to Cato research and commentary:
- Blogging from the 2009 International Conference on Climate Change, The Foundry’s Nick Loris covers Patrick J. Michaels’s lecture on an EPA program that will “circumvent Congressional legislation to curb greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs) and regulate carbon dioxide.”
- Natch Greyes pens his thoughts on Thursday’s book forum featuring Patrick J. Michaels’s new book, Climate of Extremes: Global Warming Science They Don’t Want You to Know.
- Dan Kenitz cites an article by David Lampo on gun control.
- David Kirkpatrick links to Richard W. Rahn’s op-ed in The Washington Times about the increasing loss of liberty in the United Kingdom.
- Free-market energy blogger Robert Bradley, editor of Master Resource, cites Cato’s recognition of the women who launched the libertarian movement: Ayn Rand, Rose Wilder Lane and Isabel Paterson.
- Scott Horton 0f Anti-War Radio interviews Doug Bandow about relations between the US and China.
Let us know if you’re blogging about Cato by emailing cmoody@cato.org or drop us a line on Twitter @catoinstitute.
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