Creating a Meritocratic Government

Another long one so bear with me.... or don't, nobody is forcing you down this particular rabbit hole.

So, in the interest of full disclosure, this started off with me "poking the bear" which, in this case, was one of my more populist friends. Still, it sent me down an avenue of thought that I found rather intriguing. Also, I know this is not going to happen but this is an exercise in philosophy rather than policy.

So anyway, reforming government....

To me the biggest problem with government is that there is little to no correlation between the qualities that make a successful politician and the qualities that make a good leader. In fact I would go so far as to say that the people who make the best politicians may be the least qualified to actually lead. Add to that the fact that our system incentivizes people to become career politicians and then use their insider knowledge as lobbyists... It seems fundamentally broken.

So, what do we do about it? In the first article below Andy Rooney suggests giving people a test to see who would be the best leader and putting that person in charge. While his argument falls apart when he starts suggesting ideology based questions and flippantly disregards the need for a neutral scorer I think his idea has merit.

Instead of testing for ideology we could test for the areas that would make an effective leader regardless of ideology. Knowledge of history, how the government works, basic scientific literacy, critical thinking.... whatever we think our leaders need to be good at. I don't pretend that I am the one who should be making this test but I am certain a group of experts who have studied these fields can design test questions that can't be "cheated". Then all we have to do is have a computer score the test and give that person the job.

The next step is to make the test free to take. We can have other gatekeeping measures such as requiring the test takers be of a certain age or meet citizenship requirements, we could mandate that the test taker has a college degree and isn't a convicted felon but gatekeeping measures should be kept to a minimum since doing otherwise defeats the purpose of a meritocracy.

Also, because our society seems to value local representation, we could offer the test in each state or district and continue to give each district a local member. If, however, we plan on maintaining single member districts we should adopt a system like the one here in Iowa that prevents gerrymandering.

Another option would be to offer a second test for ideology to ensure the new government is representative as well as qualified but other demographic information should not be a factor. Finally we would still need a constitution to limit what the government can do and protect basic rights like free speech, fair trial, etc. While tyranny of the intellectuals may not be as bad as tyranny of the masses I still believe that tyranny should be avoided whenever possible.

OK so now that we have reformed our electoral system to create a meritocracy; let's talk about reforming government. In education it is common practice to require students to be in class and, if they miss too many classes, then we don't allow them to take the test. This system could be adopted for congress. Require members to actually be on the House/Senate floor and, if they miss too many sessions, bar them from becoming a candidate the next time around. Additionally; legislators should not be able to raise their own salary. The salary of a legislator should match the median annual income for a person with a college degree in the nation. This would ensure that legislators economic interests were pegged to those of their constituents. It may also be logical to start legislators out at 1.5 times the average and lower it over time. Other safeguards could ensure that legislators would have to do their own taxes or be part of whatever public education or health system they enact.

Will any of this ever happen, no it won't. Still I believe there is some utility in thinking about systems of government even if it for purely philosophical reasons.