Government Downsizing

Read an article in USA Today about a trend in the Northeast to downsize local governments. Towns in New York are holding referendums to eliminate council positions. This is fascinating. You have a group of people who are finally standing up and proclaiming that government is "for the people by the people".

What is fascinating to me about this situation and others I've recently read about is the extent to which human emotion plays into decisions. I've been reading "How to Win Friends and Influence People" and the book gives some real insight into situations such as this.

The ringleader of the movement, Kevin Gaughan, has successfully ousted many town council positions consolidating the five positions down to three. He sells his downsizing by playing up the anger of the people, talking about how times are tough, that they've lost jobs, why shouldn't the government have to tighten its belt too? Council members sit on their bench, raised above the crowd, and that is just not how it should be. They are servant of the people, and if they are not doing something to fix the problem then they are a problem.

So to think through the situation logically, what does the council have to do with jobs being downsized by international corporations? Nothing. Have these council positions been expanded in the past ten or twenty years? No. Does a council position make someone wealthy? No, a position only makes about $16,000 a year, this means eliminating two positions would save each tax payer about $4 a year.

While I am not really for or against the idea of eliminating town council positions it is fascinating how a man can rally a cause using situations where people are scared and blaming those that have no authority or ability to change the situation causing the fear.

I remember a history professor talking about this. There is a need within humans to simplify bad situations into black and white. If there is an economic downturn the problems are rarely black and white.

Try making a talking point of the current situation, what exactly happened to cause the downturn? Economics has always been part black magic. Was it the oil prices going up causing inflation? Was it the real estate bubble? Was it the over leveraged credit? You know what I think it was, the guys with red hats, they did it!!! It was those guys!!

See how effective that is? You see the red hats in your mind don't you. You can visualize guys in red hats. You now have something to concentrate your frustration on.

I think this movement has the potential to go national, and by that I mean people actually discussing eliminating Congressional districts. If the current instability remains I have no doubt this will be discussed. It doesn't matter that it doesn't make sense, that people would be asking to eliminate representation, they want to blame someone, who better to blame than politicians?