By Anna Harvey, President, Social Science Research Council (February 18, 2025)

Achieving Government Efficiency Requires More, Not Less, Investment

SSRC President Anna Harvey reflects on the meaning of “government efficiency” and better and worse strategies to increase government efficiency.

"Government efficiency doesn’t mean that the government does less. It means that the government does more for every dollar it spends. ...

"At the end of the day, a more efficient government might spend more or less than it spends today. But right now, we don’t know which programs we should cut, and which programs we should expand. If our goal is really a government that does more for every dollar spent, and not a government that just does less, we’re going to have to spend the money and do the work to find the programs and policies that produce more of what voters want for fewer public dollars.

"It would certainly be easier if we could achieve government efficiency simply by cutting government spending. But thinking that government efficiency can be achieved just by reducing public spending is like thinking that we can make cars more efficient just by giving them less gas. Filling your car’s gas tank only half full won’t make your car any more efficient. It just makes it less useful."