Theft at the Public Till
and diversity of the economy. Few would trust the federal government to allocate funds wisely or nonpolitically to development projects or programs. Washington cannot mobilize the community support, business-labor coop- eration, or coordination that successful development requires. Governors and mayors, however are closer to the scene. They have more ways to generate business, labor, and community support for development and put together an effective program to increase investment and jobs. The best chance of having a successful industrial policy in a country this size is to have a lot of communities, states and regions competing with each other to improve their own economic prospects. But that competition must be focused on quality of life and not on giant giveaway programs. Each community needs a sound design that enhances its attractiveness and more fully develops its aesthetic qualities and values. Each will need to develop and maintain a basic infrastructure that moves people and goods in ways compatible with the natural environment. A community must pro- vide basic services of quality that meet business and public needs. Finally, a successful community will need a range of attractions for its own people and visitors. Quality of life must be the overriding goal. Specific Steps:
1. Move the level of control of government programs to the smallest possible unit.
If you were forming our government all over again, what would you do? You would start with towns. You get a town’s logistics ironed out: basic stuff like streets, plumbing, lights, and law. Once you have a bunch of towns working reliably, you make a county. You keep the towns going while adding a layer of complexity that will take care of courts, jails, and schools in a whole district of towns. If the county apparatus were to disappear. the towns would still continue. Take a bunch of counties and add the layer of states. States collect taxes and subsume many of the responsibilities of governing from the county; without states, the towns would continue, although perhaps not as effectively or as complexly. Once you have a bunch of states, you can add a
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