Lazy is best.

Following on this item and this item on the importance of MECHANICAL government.

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Good businesses and good rulers are LAZY as well as mechanical. The two go together. When you make a process mechanical it’s affordable and easy to use. When everything is custom-made and ’boutique’, everything is expensive and hard to access. This has massive consequences for medicine.

Machiavelli said it best in the governmental realm:

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The ruler will chiefly become hated by being rapacious and usurping the property and women of his subjects. Whenever one does not attack the property or honour of the generality of men, they will live contented; and one will only have to combat the ambition of a few, who can be easily held in check in many ways. A prince need trouble little about conspiracies when the people are well disposed, but when they are hostile and hold him in hatred, then he must fear everything and everybody.

Well-ordered states and wise princes have studied diligently not to drive the nobles to desperation, and to satisfy the populace and keep it contented.

= = = = = END MACHIAVELLI.

Well-ordered rulers are LAZY. When a ruler establishes order, with jobs and places for all types of non-criminal people, he doesn’t need secret police and brutality. The people will do what’s needed because they feel secure and useful, and because they can access government services (police, post office, roads) easily. Americans volunteered FEROCIOUSLY for total mobilization in WW2 because FDR had satisfied most of the people. He didn’t need vast propaganda or FBI to force unwilling compliance.

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Philco said it best in the business realm:

Sell merchandise that doesn’t come back to customers who do come back.

Smart businesses are LAZY. Treat customers and employees well, and they’ll stick around and participate happily. Less work for the managers. Treat customers like shit and you have to keep advertising and selling to gain new customers who won’t stick around or tolerate normal errors. Treat workers like shit and you have to hire and train new ones all the time, and they’ll be grudging and unwilling workers during their brief stay.

If you turn out a well-made product you won’t have to waste effort and materials and wages on constantly supplying new shit that will break down. Older cars and appliances and houses were ‘overbuilt’ and easy to fix. Parts were replaceable and adjustable with low effort. Owners could do more of the basic maintenance, so repairmen could be LAZY.

IF YOU REALLY WANT A CLEAN ENVIRONMENT WITH LESS WASTED RESOURCES, RETURN TO THE 1950S.

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In medicine, the story of Saskatchewan says it best. I read this in a Quora piece by Steven Haddock, then verified it with a CBC article.

Saskatchewan established a universal health plan for hospitals in 1947, following the postwar Euro trend toward treating health as a basic human entitlement. In 1962 they expanded it to doctors. Some of the doctors went on strike, so the government replaced them with British doctors. Soon the doctors recognized that their job would be EASIER if patients could afford the product and could use it more MECHANICALLY. More mechanical care means less HEROIC LAST-MINUTE RESCUES. Emergency measures are unique and ’boutique’, automatically expensive, leading to large incomes and fast burnout for doctors.

I wonder if our medical training selects doctors who CAN’T STAND the routine regular work that keeps people healthy. New doctors start by interning in an emergency room where they get accustomed to long sleepless nights and HEROIC LAST-MINUTE RESCUES in the most extreme situations. The rest of their training is oriented in the same direction. They don’t know how to work regular hours and deal with ordinary situations where most people just need advice and guidance about diet and sleep and exercise.

Other trades do the exact opposite. Trainees start with the dullest and most routine aspects of the job, the parts that tend to bore experienced workers. They practice the basic skills repeatedly in the least stressful situation where mistakes can be caught and corrected by the trainer, until they’re ready for more exciting and creative work.