In my neighborhood, the city put in a new sidewalk. It’s nice. Perhaps the children have needed it…though we’ve done fine enough over the 22 years since we moved here. Anyway, as the city began to do its work, I noticed this bulletin board go up around the work. Take a look.
Do you see the issue. There are 19 8×11 typed sheets of information available to be read. Being the curious type, I of course wanted to see what it said. Also, as some of my readers know, I have had some experience in home construction, both working with my father back in the late ’70s and then again working with the award-winning Charles Clayton Construction company in the early 2000s. I probably should not have been surprised, but I was. Take a second look at the picture with my helpful additions.
Yep, 12 of the 19 pieces of paper were merely government-required regulation statements. One was about OSHAA, others were about minimum wages, still more the rights of workers and whistle blowers. I’m sure that it’s all “really important,” but I couldn’t help but sadly shake my head. We wonder about why so many aspects of business and life have gotten more complicated….this bulletin board tells the story.
This issue of regulation isn’t limited to city infrastructure building projects. I know many, including myself, who are frustrated with issues in health care. The College just changed our health care provider. Costs went up so much that I couldn’t afford to include my wife in our family plan. Meanwhile, checking with one of my doctors led to challenging changes to my care due to the switch. Sharing this with my mother, she told me that one of her doctors had closed down due exhaustion and financial weakness because of the regulation paper trail.
At the College, we see this regulation all the time too. Recently, due to new state rules and some internal attempts to improve costs for students, we instituted new rules for textbook selection. In the end, due to the changes, we ended up with multiple pages of paperwork that has to be filled out. It feels onerous.
Of course, the point of this regulation, and probably all regulatory paperwork, is to protect people. For us, it’s about protecting professors’ reputations from any hint of graft or kickback in textbook selection. The health care, we all know about issues of malpractice…though at times, it feels like many malpractice suits are frivolous, designed to simply get some money from the insurance of the doctor. I suppose with my neighborhood sidewalk project, the state and the fed are protecting workers who may feel like they are getting paid fairly, or to communicate aspects of the project to the citizens.
Still, when I think about pursuing success, I feel as if this picture shows why we, as a nation, struggle. There’s a great verse in the Bible about not being weighed down, tripped up by sin. The imagery given in the verse is like a runner trying to move forward while dragging weights attached to long cords that could easily wrap around her legs, possibly tripping, at least slowing the runner. In your own life, you need to do exactly at the Bible says….strip away those tangling cords.
Maybe that’s something we need to do as a nation too.