if it makes you feel better, major construction projects in Japan can also take years and years and years. The difference being that you don't have federalism throwing a wrench in projects halfway through.
It's hard to look at America and not draw the conclusion that federalism is a major mistake. So many problems downstream from fickle localities.
> It's hard to look at America and not draw the conclusion that federalism is a major mistake. So many problems downstream from fickle localities.
The "fickle localities" that share sovereignty with the federal government is a tradeoff between efficiency and resilience. Totalitarian places can ignore localities and push huge national projects. China now has the world's longest high-speed rail system; but the same country lost 40-80 million people not even a century ago due to huge national projects that didn't pan out so well, under Mao.
The US has one of the highest median incomes in the world; among the top 5, by any measure. It's hard to understand why anyone would look at the system of governance in the US and call it a major mistake.
Sometimes you can't tell if something is successful because of a distinctive factor, or in spite of it.
There's a lot of weird stuff about the American system of governance. For example, in most countries the legality of abortion would be decided by elected legislators, rather than judges who are appointed for life. And in the US the government can just 'shut down' for some reason, and this is just a normal sorta thing? Pretty weird. And filing tax returns isn't just for people in complex financial situations, practically everyone does it, and they have to pay third party companies? That's pretty unusual.
It's far from obvious how these eccentric features could have influenced the founding of the likes of microsoft, intel, apple, facebook, google etc.
abortion legality was determined by unelected judges from 1973 until 2022. Roe v Wade was overturned and now we have the situation you consider not weird. Elected legislators in each state determine to what extent abortion is legal
Legislators pass laws, judges (normally) can only strike them down. It is pretty much like other places otherwise, but that process of the government limiting itself is a key feature imho.
The American system isn't without its eccentricities, but that's true for every country, I suppose.
> in most countries the legality of abortion would be decided by elected legislators, rather than judges who are appointed for life
State legislatures are doing that job. That there is no federal law on the issue of abortion reflects both that there is no unanimous consensus on the part of the people, as well as some level of craven political maneuvering (since abortion has been a big draw of people to the polls). At various times in the past 10 years alone, there were periods where both the Republican Party and the Democratic Party had control over the presidency and both chambers of Congress. A federal law of some kind, in either direction, could have been passed at those times (though perhaps subject to constitutional challenge).
High-level judges appointed for "life" (and by this I include age-capped retirement) are not unusual in developed countries. The German Bundesgerichtshof, the Australian High Court, and the Supreme Court of Canada all have this. The point, of course, is to promote the independence of the judiciary from the other parts of government.
> in the US the government can just 'shut down' for some reason, and this is just a normal sorta thing
The power of the purse is in the hands of the legislature. When an annual budget fails to be passed, the executive no longer has authority to spend money, and kind of goes on hibernation until a budget is passed.
Parliamentary systems have a different kind of shutdown, where if no ruling majority forms, then a caretaker government comes in with no mandate from the people to substantially change any policy. This can last much longer than any US government shutdown; Belgium had no leadership in parliament from 2007 to 2011, for example.
> It's far from obvious how these eccentric features could have influenced the founding of the likes of microsoft, intel, apple, facebook, google etc.
Well, sure. You pointed out various frivolous (to economic behavior, at any rate) factors that have nothing to do with entrepreneurship or laissez-faire capitalism. It would be far from obvious to anyone how abortion policy relates to the founding of companies.
The difference between the US and China is not a central government which is empowered to make projects and a federalist system which gives undue influence to small interests.
The difference is that the US is a democracy and China is a communist dictatorship. Tens of millions didn't die in china because a huge national projects; they died because they were ruled by a totalitarian dictator who had no regard whatsoever for the value of human life, and who was empowered purely by the threat (or the guarantee) of violence and not by the consent of the governed. There is an ocean of difference between western democracies and communist dictatorships, and it's not how we allocate authority to public works projects
It's reductive to point out that the US has democracy and China does not? These are fundamental differences between the two. The argument the OP posted is like saying that Iran executes gays and apostates because of where power sits in their government and not because that power (regardless of how centralized it is) is wielded by religious extremists
Besides the fact that democracy and dictatorship having become meaningless keywords for good and evil, the difference in governance between US and China is a lot more complicated that democracy and dictatorship. It's an incredibly simplistic way to compare the two countries.
The US has one of the highest median incomes in the world; among the top 5, by any measure. It's hard to understand why anyone would look at the system of governance in the US and call it a major mistake.
The US is not rich because it has such an amazing system of government, but because it was a sparsely-inhabited continent rich in natural resources when it was settled, just prior to the industrial revolution. Australia is rich for similar reasons, despite having a different system of government. Saudi Arabia is wealthy despite being one of the most despotic countries in the world, because it gained independence right around the time that crude oil took over from coal as the industrial fuel of choice, and SA has crude oil in vast abundance.
It's not that systems of government don't matter, of course some work far better than others. But geography matters a lot, and political theorists and philosophers habitually underestimate it.
> The US has one of the highest median incomes in the world; among the top 5, by any measure. It's hard to understand why anyone would look at the system of governance in the US and call it a major mistake
No amount of money beyond being a millionaire gives you nice infrastructure where there was none. I’m not going to say all of the US is messed up but there are many people who choose to move away from the US and to other countries, taking massive pay cuts, because the surrounding conditions are nicer.
EDIT: also, Europe built a massive rail network without the cultural revolution.
Hard to blame this on Federalism when states had more relative power in the first half of the 20th century and we were able to complete amazing public works projects on reasonable schedules
I haven't researched it in depth but I gather a much larger issue is the use and abuse of environmental law by the minority who don't want the projects done
It's hard to look at America and not draw the conclusion that federalism is a major mistake. So many problems downstream from fickle localities.