A Case for Divided Government

I may be coming late to the party, with all the talk about libertarians costing Republicans victories on Tuesday.

But Bill Niskanen at Cato (a veteran of the Reagan administration) makes an interesting case that divided government produces far more fiscal restraint that one-aprty government - even if that party is the Republicans.

I've always imagined that divided government gets both Congress and the President to compete in the same direction - and that that could be toward fiscal restraint, or toward profligacy. But Niskanen's piece is worth a read. As is his colleague, Slivinski's.

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