The stickiest case, to my mind, is reforming civil service rules to make it easier for governments at all levels to hire high performers and fire low performers. As Jen Pahlka and others have documented, this is an important foundation for building state capacity and delivering high quality public services that earn public trust. But it also is in strong tension with the short term interests of some of the unions that are most powerful within the Democratic party.
How do we resolve this? Is there a way to get public sector unions on the side of state capacity through high performance? Or do we have to face the unpalatable choice of throwing core constituents under the bus or accepting worse governance outcomes, especially in deep blue states and cities?
The stickiest case, to my mind, is reforming civil service rules to make it easier for governments at all levels to hire high performers and fire low performers. As Jen Pahlka and others have documented, this is an important foundation for building state capacity and delivering high quality public services that earn public trust. But it also is in strong tension with the short term interests of some of the unions that are most powerful within the Democratic party.
How do we resolve this? Is there a way to get public sector unions on the side of state capacity through high performance? Or do we have to face the unpalatable choice of throwing core constituents under the bus or accepting worse governance outcomes, especially in deep blue states and cities?