That opened my eyes to the fact that many government programs don’t actually “do” anything; they are money collection and disbursement schemes to people who actually “do” something.
Yes–and they typically take a big cut of the expense for their services.

Many wail about how interest groups distort and corrupt things. I will not deny this at all. But why is it that so many people fail to see the people employed by the government as an interest group too? And why should they be judged less harshly than any other interest group?

At what point does the tail start wagging the dog?