Repeated reforms attempting to correct the harms done by special interests throughout my life have failed in the United States. At this point, special interests are more powerful than ever and have completely corrupted America.
Our national defense has been destroyed by special interest pork barrel projects. . We are building weapons to fight wars from the 1900’s when future wars will be fought with new weapons. The F-35 costs $1.5 trillion and doesn’t accomplish any of it’s missions well… not to mention the fact that future air wars will be fought by drones as they can outfight humans easily. Our founders fought hard to prevent standing armies in our country as those armies are far more likely to be used against our own civilians than against foreign enemies. A huge portion of our GDP is wasted here. Just do a google search for “pork barrel military” and you will find endless examples of billions of taxpayer dollars being wasted.
We have the expensive medical care in the world, but not the best outcomes. Why? Special interest groups, such as the American Medical Association which is basically the most powerful union on earth, have set up enormous barriers to entry to the medical profession and tons of regulations that are not in patient’s best interests in order to enrich their members. 27% of American GDP is stolen from desperate sick people who have no choice but to pay the absolutely outrageous and often falsified medical bills they receive.
Police, teacher, and other public employee unions have made it nearly impossible to fire or even really discipline a bad government worker. Forced union dues have exacerbated the problem by ensuring that the union officials themselves don’t even have to be responsive to concerns of their membership. We have put police jobs ahead of public safety and fairness, we have put teacher jobs ahead of children’s learning, and the problem is even worse in more bureaucratic government jobs where the public does not routinely interact with people.
Corruption is far more common in America now than honest hard work due to special interest’s influence.