There is a pattern, a recurring blindness, in the approach of the administrative state to everyday human life. Let’s consider a few examples of recent political idiocy and the common thread that unites them:
The Scholz Government hopes to convince more Germans to opt for public transit by tinkering with fares and introducing a universal €49 ticket. The offering, which collapses regional ticket schemes into one simple, relatively cheap monthly subscription, is now more than 50 days old, and preliminary data show it’s changed hardly anybody’s habits. The vast majority of the 11 million subscriptions sold so far have gone to longstanding public transit users; less than a tenth have been purchased by new customers. Surveys show that interest is concentrated in the urban centres, while rural populations have no use for the ticket because everybody drives cars there. Calls for improving transit offerings in the countryside are half-hearted and bizarre; the whole concept of public transit requires dense, concentrated populations.
For some years now, the German state has deployed extravagant subsidies to convince consumers to buy electric vehicles. While adoption has been substantial, the dream of 15 million EVs by 2030 remains very far off. Subsidies aren’t enough to counterbalance the substantial cost of the batteries, leaving conventional automobiles with an enormous competitive advantage at the cheaper end. Also too, it seems that the core market for EVs – relatively well-off Germans who take mostly short trips and primarily charge their vehicles at home – will soon be saturated. For those who have longer commutes or must frequently travel long distances, the limited range and insufficient charging network are disqualifying.
I’ve already written about proposed Government legislation to compel all Germans to transition to heat pumps, beginning in 2024. Massive controversy compelled substantial changes in the law, which has been blunted in many respects, but remains worrying. Because not everybody lives in buildings that are suitable for heat pumps, the law in its original form would have required massive renovations across broad sectors of the housing market, effectively wiping out billions of euros in personal wealth. If enacted in its original form, it might well have rendered many prewar buildings basically uninhabitable.
Read more: The ‘Soft’ Tyranny of the Modern Bureaucratic State