Value for Money

Every Friday my syndicated column appears in a bunch of newspapers in southeastern Ontario. Here’s this week’s.

Last week my husband and I rented the surprisingly enjoyable film Moneyball, loosely based on the 2002 baseball season for the Oakland A’s. The team faced a huge challenge: as a small budget enterprise, they couldn’t compete with the large teams in terms of payroll, so all of their good baseball players were lured away by big bucks.

The General Manager threw the playbook out the window and decided to do something drastic. Instead of trying to recruit individual stars, they’d focus on building a team using statistics to identify the most undervalued players. That year, at one third of the budget of the New York Yankees, they won the same number of games. Now almost all the major baseball clubs use their analysis.

I hope some politicians watch the movie, because they could use this message: when money is tight, you can’t play by normal rules. You must get back to basics and investigate what actually works, instead of doing what everyone assumes works. It’s time to make sure we’re getting value for our dollars.

Value and government aren’t exactly two words that we’d normally put together. Too often politicians pour money into programs because it makes them sound caring, not because the program actually does any good. The Washington establishment was rocked last week when a new report leaked showing that the Head Start program, which provides preschool and other services to low income families, doesn’t actually work. Seven billion dollars a year, and any gains the kids receive from Head Start evaporate after a few years of school. Turns out that preschool can’t make up for a lack of parent involvement.

The problem with programs like these is that no politician wants to be the one to pull the plug. Can you imagine cancelling Head Start? You’d be raked over the coals. No one wants to take money from poor children, even if that money is being badly spent.

I’m amazed our Canadian government has actually just about succeeded in cancelling one boondoggle—the long gun registry—after one billion dollars was sent down the hole. We’re rid of the Canadian Wheat Board, too. Both those moves surprise me, because how often does government actually cancel something? Usually, once a department or program has funding, it’s like a vampire. It can’t be killed, no matter how how many stakes you drive through its heart.

Every politician wants to be seen as being pro health care, pro children, and pro seniors. But what if there’s a truth that no amount of money can change: government programs can’t make up for unhealthy families. A good preschool teacher can’t make up for parents not reading to the children at night, or for Daddy walking out, or for that revolving door of Mommy’s boyfriends.

The more money we spend on programs that don’t work, though, the less money we have to spend on stuff that could make things better, and the more debt we dump on our children. We shouldn’t judge people’s level of caring by how much government money they’re willing to devote to programs. We should judge it on whether or not they’re interested in what actually works, instead of just trying to look “caring” for the news.

So let’s take a lesson from the Oakland A’s. A winning strategy doesn’t depend on throwing money at the most obvious thing. It depends on analyzing what actually works—gasp!—and not going with mere emotion. It depends on sticking to one’s budget, and since there is limited money, putting that money where it is likely to do the most good—even if it seems radical at first. But politicians can’t do it unless voters get behind them. Maybe if we started to demand actual value, and substance over style, we’d finally get a government that did some good.

Don’t miss a Reality Check! Sign up to receive it FREE in your inbox every week:

Related posts:

1. Why Are Struggling Young Families Paying for Wealthy Seniors?
2. Poverty of Relationship
3. Why Governments Shouldn’t Help So Much
4. Government Isn’t Your Mommy