Does big government help people? The assumption made all too often is that the bigger the government, the more expansive the program, the more helpful it is. Indeed, we see that in the metrics used to justify continuing big government programs: how much money we spend.

At a recent event hosted by the Texas Public Policy Foundation, TFR chairman Tim Dunn made an incredibly persuasive speech in which he described the ways conventional wisdom falls completely flat. In reality, the best way to help people, is to reduce the drag government exerts on our economy.

Roddy Stinson, a columnist at the San Antonio Express-News, has hit the nail on the head with a piece in today's paper. He correctly describes the response of local governments to the idea of slowing down the amount of money they can grab as "Weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth. Leading the sky-might-fall chorus is the well-heeled, city-government-is-king Texas Municipal League."

Today, the Texas State Auditor released a detailed report on the number of full-time equivalent employees in state government.  The central conclusion of the report is that, while state agencies have reduced their number of FTE's by 8.4 percent since 1997, higher education institutions have grown their workforce by 26.1 percent over the same period.  In fact, the report found that Texas higher ed institutions now have 143,044 FTE's, more than the 142,621 in all other state government agencies combined.  While most colleges submitted an explanation for busting their FTE target, the Texas State Technical College in Harlingen failed to provide any reason to the Auditor.