Great Moments in Unintended Consequences (Vol. 5)

Good intentions, bad results.

------------------

----------------

Here are even more of Reason's "great moments in unintended consequences"—stories of when something that sounds like a terrific idea goes horribly wrong.

Part 1: The Transcontinental Tango

The year: 1862.

The problem: There's no railroad connecting coastal elites!

The solution: Pay rail companies for each mile of track laid for a brand new transcontinental railroad.

Sounds like a great idea, with the best of intentions. What could possibly go wrong?

While Congress has never been great at keeping an eye on spending, it's even worse at it during a Civil War. With no one looking, the Union Pacific unnecessarily lengthened the route, adding miles of track and pocketing almost half a million dollars.

After two and a half years of construction, the Union Pacific laid track all the way from Omaha to…40 miles outside of Omaha.

I choo-choo-choose to screw taxpayers.

Part 2: Burning Cash

The year: 2012.

The problem: An over-reliance on fossil fuels in Northern Ireland.

The solution: A subsidy for heat generated from renewable sources.

Sounds like a great idea, with the best of intentions. What could possibly go wrong?

Well, it turns out the rate paid by the subsidy was greater than the cost of the fuel being used—so the more wood pellets you burned, the greater your profit. Voila: the "Cash for Ash" program, with farmers heating empty buildings just to collect a paycheck.

In the fallout, Northern Ireland's first minister refused to stand aside during any inquiry, the deputy first minister resigned in protest, the Northern Ireland Assembly dissolved, and the executive branch collapsed for almost three full years.

Not to mention a whole lot of taxpayer dollars up in smoke.

Part 3. All right, fine. We'll do the cobra thing. 

The year: Uhhh…some time in the 19th century? Maybe? Not sure. Might not even be true. Who knows?

The problem: The English colonial city of Delhi is infested with venomous cobras.

The solution: Give money to anyone who brings in a dead cobra.

Sounds like a great idea, with the best of intentions. What could possibly go wrong?

It didn't take long for folks to realize that the bounty paid for a dead cobra was greater than the cost of raising a cobra. Once city officials got wind of lucrative snake breeding farms, they repealed the bounty—leading cobra farmers to release their now worthless snakes into the wild. Net result: more cobras than ever, a lot of wasted cash, and a book by a German guy with a title that sounds like it's straight out of G.I. Joe.

While the veracity of the cobra story is hard to pin down, a similar story was documented in Hanoi under French colonial rule—only this time the issue was rats, with a bounty paid for every rat tail brought to the authorities. It wasn't long before officials began to notice rats without tails, having been set free by rat catchers with a basic understanding of economics.

But don't worry, we learned our lesson and it never happened ag—

In Fort Benning, Georgia, where the feral pig population was out of control, the bounty—for some forehead slapping reason—was pig tails, which once again…blah, blah, blah…more pigs.

They eventually discontinued the bounty, so don't worry, everything is swine now.

Great moments in unintended consequences. Good intentions, bad results.

Written and produced by Meredith and Austin Bragg; narrated by Austin Bragg.

[mustang]

Regardless of good intentions, it's much easier to have bad results when using other peoples money.

[AusFirewing]

On the bounty thing, there was a highly successful program to reduce the feral goat population in Arkaroola, South Australia. The difference was that because the people running the place didn't have a bottomless bucket of taxpayer money to draw from, they actually paid attention to what the hunters were doing and made sensible decisions regarding bounty payouts.

Within two years the program had been discontinued; not because it was a failure, but because the hunters kept complaining that they couldn't find any feral goats to shoot.

[nicosmind]

I live in Northern Ireland and had no idea this was going on until a friend told me all about it. I'm glad our incompetent government made it onto ReasonTV :)

[LibertyEver]

Government: If you don't like our problems, wait until you see our solutions!

[InnocuousRemark]

It's like they think they're playing Sim City and all the little data points will respond to their polices in exactly one way

[achefwithtwokittens]

These videos teach us that the government has a horrible track record of solving problems

[LikeToWatch]

I almost coughed up a lung laughing when you started to say "don't worry we learned our lesson...".

[fearthehoneybadger]

Sometimes the consequences are intended. Some people deliberately want to disrupt the system.

[jdinhuntsvilleal]

"This country has come to feel the same when Congress is in session as when the baby gets hold of a hammer." - Will Rogers

[Rocketsong]

The Place: Arizona
The year: 2000
The Problem: Not enough alternative fuel being used.
The Solution: Subsidize 50% of vehicles which are bi-fuel and can burn natural gas.

The result, tens of thousands of people buy fully loaded luxury SUVs converted to run on both gasoline and natural gas. And simply run them using gas instead of LNG. Costing the state $800 million and increasing gas consumption. (and a previously popular governor losing reelection)

[paxiahern]

This series and the 'Libertarian PBS' are so great!

[TrentCantrell]

Subtitle: Or when the people who make the plans are never held personally accountable for the outcome.

[RussellNelson]

The Transcontinental Railroads were even worse than that. The meeting point was not laid down in a contact, so when the two railroads got to each other, they kept on building past each other! You can look on the aerial photo now near Promontory Point and see both railbeds. Look east and west of Promontory Summit. The wye at that point cuts through the other railroad's grade, very obviously.

In addition, the track was so poorly built that it had to be completely reconstructed within a year of completion.

[Ryan-is-me]

Great moments in unintended consequences!
The year: 2020
The problem: The government shut down the economy and told people they can't work
The solution: Give everyone thousands of dollars
Sounds like a great idea!
With the best of intentions!
What could possibly go wrong?

[curiousing]

This is the greatest ReasonTV series ever. And that's saying a lot.

[ragnarok]

The train track thing is a classic AI problem. You tell the agent to build it long hoping it will cover a lot of distance. The agent builds a spiral or a zig zag because it's the longest track it can make and doesn't require it to transport materials or move far from its start location. You always get what you ask for so be specific!

[christopherlarsen]

"Blah-blah-blah-blah-blah ... More pigs." Damn, that was funny!

[darthhodges]

I have seen bounties work when the bounty A) specifically required the whole corpse and B) was not an easily bred animal. Specifically magpies (a kind of bird) in rural Idaho. I'm not aware of anyone successfully breeding them for the purpose of exploiting the bounty in that instance. I am aware of stories of teenagers figuring out that certain kinds of guns don't leave enough of a corpse to be able to collect the bounty. The bounty was specifically intended to help farmers whose crops were being harmed by said birds and it has occurred to me it didn't have to be the government to run it. An independent farmer's association or even an insurance company that insures some of the farmers' crops could implement such as long as the government didn't find an excuse to prohibit it.

[TheMichaelMove]

Yeah but THIS time it’s totally going to work!

[ssippishark]

I will never forget Barry Obama's "cash for clunkers" destroying cars that could have been fixed, recycled, and re-used. Very green indeed. Those used cars would be worth double today.