13.5: Big Government

When Americans complain about “big government” or the “deep state” they are mostly complaining about the bureaucracy under the executive branch of the national government. Critics often deride the bureaucracy as bloated, expensive, sclerotic, complex, and hopelessly inefficient. So-called “faceless bureaucrats,” who mostly operate in the shadows and are not accountable to the public through regular elections, are accused of incompetence, corruption, or even active sabotage against the will of the people as expressed through their elected representatives in Congress and the White House.

But as much as Americans dislike big government’s problems, they also like the benefits it offers. The expansions of bureaucratic size and scope promoted by the Progressives were controversial, but many (such as Social Security and Medicare) have become so popular over time that today most politicians are afraid to even suggest paring them back. The more people expect from government, the more tax dollars and personnel government will need to provide it — and the larger and more unwieldy government gets, the more prone it becomes to principal-agent problems.

That the monumental and insulated nature of America’s bureaucracy lends itself to inefficiency is obvious. Congress strives to provide oversight of bureaucratic action and clear statements of its intent in laws, but there is no way to monitor the actions of an organization this massive without some of them slipping under the radar. Yet a smaller, more directly accountable one would sacrifice many of the traits of an ideal, Weberian bureaucracy. Whether a productive balance between these extremes can be struck, the American political machine as it exists today depends on constant maintenance by a vast supply of technicians — bureaucrats — to ensure that it runs smoothly.