Having worked a decade each in private and state positions in my experience they’re just different brands of inefficiency. The big difference is that in private industry inefficiency doesn’t really matter as long as you’re making money. A business that starts in the right market at the right time can do everything wrong and still turn a profit for decades and no one will question their efficiency because they’re profitable. If they’re well established enough they can be relatively immune to competition because the market doesn’t justify enough investment to create competition, so they dominate regardless their failings but still get celebrated as a successful business.
The state is judged by completely different metrics of success and no matter how successful, people will still ask if it could have been done more efficiently. In private industry success is the only measure of success.
Having worked a decade each in private and state positions in my experience they’re just different brands of inefficiency. The big difference is that in private industry inefficiency doesn’t really matter as long as you’re making money. A business that starts in the right market at the right time can do everything wrong and still turn a profit for decades and no one will question their efficiency because they’re profitable. If they’re well established enough they can be relatively immune to competition because the market doesn’t justify enough investment to create competition, so they dominate regardless their failings but still get celebrated as a successful business.
The state is judged by completely different metrics of success and no matter how successful, people will still ask if it could have been done more efficiently. In private industry success is the only measure of success.