Why The Best and The Brightest Don’t Fit Into Public Service

Author and Economic Professor Steven Landsburg writes,

The main reason to hold down public salaries/benefits is not to save money for the taxpayers. I have no a priori reason to care any more (or less) about the taxpayers than I do about the public employees themselves. Instead, the main reason to hold down public salaries/benefits is to avoid drawing the “best and the brightest” away from more productive careers into public service.

More thoughts:

Aside from the crowding out effect, “best and the brightest” into public service translates to more fatal conceit (or the presumption that the knowledge they have is better than the markets). This subsequently impels them to boldly dabble or experiment with more interventionist policies at the cost and risk of the taxpayers. In other words, they tend to find new creative ways to pick on someone else's pocket.

In addition, “best and the brightest” also means figuring out cunning ways to game the political economic system (corruption, arbitrages, cronyism).