Quote of the day comes from Chris Dillow:
Everyone knows centrally planned economies are a stinkingly bad idea. The lesson of the collapse of many banks is that centrally planned companies are also a bad idea. And they’re a bad idea for the same reason – that, in complex organisms such as economies or big companies, fragmented and tacit knowledge cannot be centralized, and “leadership“ often degenerates into mere rent-seeking.
I suspect there’s quite a bit to be said for this view. Then again, I would say that since this perspective also accords with my view of politics. That is to say, I’m unconvinced politics can be be effective in large, fragmented countries.
Ministers have an inherent bias for sweeping, inclusive one-size-fits-all plans that presume that Whitehall Man or some Beltway Mandarin has the knowledge and, dash it, the wisdom to do it all himself.
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