The Register Citizen (Torrington, CT)
The fallacy of Conn. innovation
On the campaign trail for governor of Connecticut two years ago, political insiders warned that governing is “different” from leading a private company. “You can’t expect government to innovate and improve lives like Amazon or Apple do. Government exists to provide basic services and drive consensus, not to foster great economies.”
But is this reality — or an excuse for public officials to justify a perpetually inadequate status quo while focusing their power on getting re-elected or promoted to a higher office? Are they even trying to innovate and improve lives, or is their hidden agenda to increase the scope of government to create coalitions of loyal voters that keep them in power?
Our elected officials have the same tools available to them that corporations and entrepreneurs use to innovate every day — and more. Why must government be mired in mediocrity, or worse, create longterm economic disaster while the business of transforming lives is left to business?
World class companies put the interests of customers and shareholders ahead of management. Shareholders expect management to be a fiduciary of their hardearned money. To spend it wisely. To develop strategies to enhance the organization’s value, and to deliver good returns on the capital invested. While these responsibilities may sound modest, a government that followed such basic rules of ethics and, really, human decency, would be a wonderful surprise to Connecticut residents.
Amazon built perhaps the most customer focused organization on Earth with more than 353 million products, delivered overnight, through a user-friendly web application. You can say, “Alexa, order coffee,” to the Amazon smart speaker and be inhaling the bag’s aromatic brew 24 hours later. It’s like magic. Meanwhile, the state of Connecticut is just realizing that three-hour waits at the Department of Motor Vehicles can be reduced with something called the World Wide Web.
In the heat of the COVID crisis, the Lamont administration blamed long delays in issuing unemployment checks on a decrepit 40year old Cobalt software system. Why did our leaders think maintaining an efficient, modern computer system for vital services paid for by workers and employers alike was such a low priority, and what was that money used for instead?
Taxpayers are both customers and shareholders of state government. They give money, albeit non-voluntarily, to elected officials and trust them to use it judiciously. To provide efficient services while using innovation to improve their quality of life.
With the billions of dollars spent on roads each year, you might imagine we’d be zipping around in flying cars by now. But residents are told they need a whole new form of taxation — tolls — just to prevent the state’s ancient bridges from crumbling down onto cars using the same carbon emitting fuel that Ford’s Model T used in 1908.
This past week, residents were shocked by energy bills that went up by 50 percent or more. In a hastily crafted response to irate customers, Eversource blamed Connecticut’s legislature for forcing them to
You can say, “Alexa, order coffee,” to the Amazon smart speaker and be inhaling the bag’s aromatic brew 24 hours later. It’s like magic. Meanwhile, the state of Connecticut is just realizing that three-hour waits at the Department of Motor Vehicles can be reduced with something called the World Wide Web.
buy high cost power from a nuclear power plant (Millstone) that went into operation 50 years ago. Millstone countered that their price is actually lower, and that Eversource is padding delivery charges to the detriment of customers.
Regardless of who’s right, why is government even involved? Is it the role of government to force residents to pay for technology installed in the same year that Elvis Presley visited with President Richard Nixon in the White House? A competitive market drives progress and innovation. A centrally controlled, heavily regulated market puts politics ahead of people.
While a human tragedy, COVID-19 provides an opportunity to fundamentally change how Connecticut operates. Imagine the people Connecticut could attract if state government lowered property, income or sales taxes, or reduced the regulation on small businesses, providing a competitive advantage over neighboring states. Or connected business with Connecticut’s world class universities to innovate as Boston did with a fastgrowing technology hub? Or stopped the political infighting and made a real investment in cleaner, cheaper sources of energy?
Several weeks ago, Gov. Ned Lamont paid $2 million to out-of-state consultants to “Reopen Connecticut.” Allowing small business owners to reopen before they go bankrupt is easy. What the state needs is a commitment to put the interests of taxpayers ahead of special interest voters, once it does reopen.
Decades of higher taxes to fund wasteful spending has proven to be an inherently flawed strategy for Connecticut — and we don’t need a team of high-priced consultants to tell us that.