This article was first published by BBrief in February/March 2026 Issue
People love a good ribbon-cutting. A new road here, a sparkling plant there, a minister wearing a hard hat and pointing at progress. It all feels reassuring, almost cinematic. You look around and think, “Hmmm, the government is working”.
But whenever I hear these announcements – grand plans to revive growth, reduce unemployment, or “unlock potential” – I get a nagging feeling. A quiet voice saying: ‘Hang on… what else is going on in the shadows?’ Because economic policies always have a second storyline, the one that isn’t televised.
A government doesn’t summon money from thin air. When billions are poured into a project, those billions come from someone’s pocket. Mine. Yours. Businesses trying to expand. Traders trying to save for the next crisis. Families hoping their kids won’t have to hustle harder than they did. That cash, once taken, can’t be used for a hundred other things that might have created lasting value.
So yes, a massive construction project provides jobs on paper. It also quietly drains energy and money from thousands of smaller ventures we never see. That hidden loss matters. In many cases, it matters more than the shiny thing we’re told to celebrate.
Picking winners and creating losers
Governments often talk about “encouraging” investment – usually through a few chosen schemes, tax perks, or “strategic” partnerships. That word sounds harmless enough. Encouraging, but what’s really happening is selection. If a government decides some firms or industries deserve a push, others get left behind by default.
This isn’t some sinister conspiracy; it’s just the way incentives bend. Investment flows toward whatever benefits from official blessings instead of flowing naturally toward consumer need, market demand, or raw efficiency. I’ve seen businesses with promising ideas lose out simply because they couldn’t navigate a maze of rules or charm the right officials. Their loss doesn’t receive a press release.
Jobs created? Maybe. Jobs displaced? Definitely.
Here’s where it gets uncomfortable. When government funds a wave of temporary projects – roads, solar farms, dams, anything – it absolutely employs people. You can see them in reflective vests; you can count them.
What you can’t see is the employer who didn’t hire because taxes went up.
Or the shop that never expanded because interest rates climbed to fund borrowing.
Or the entrepreneur who shelved an idea because the state suddenly became a competitor.
So, when someone proudly claims, “But look! Jobs!” I find myself asking: “And what did we lose to create them?” The economy doesn’t magically add up to more just because money was shuffled from one pocket to another.
Central plans, central guesses
There’s a reason central planning struggles: no office, no matter how well-staffed, can keep track of the millions of tiny decisions happening in an economy every single day. Who wants what. Who can supply it. Who has better ideas. Who can’t compete anymore. It’s messy, organic, and deeply human.
Yet policies often assume that a handful of officials can steer entire sectors. Promote this one. Restrict that one. Shield another. Change the rules. Rewrite incentives. The unintended result? Prices shift. Workers move not because demand pulled them, but because policy shoved them, and consumers end up paying for choices they never made.
Energy is the clearest example
Whenever a government announces a grand energy overhaul, it sounds heroic. New turbines. New solar arrays. New transmission lines. “Modernisation”, but behind it all: all that money had alternative lives. Some of it could have expanded private power generation. Some of it could have bought new machines for small factories. Some of it could simply have stayed in households that desperately needed lower costs to stay productive.
Resources are finite. Pushing them in one direction almost always means starving another.
Shuffle is not growth
It’s tempting to believe that subsidies or protectionist policies create prosperity. They often create winners, no question. People always point to those winners. What nobody sees are the quiet casualties – the firms priced out, the investors discouraged, the consumers paying more, the innovations postponed.
That invisible damage stacks up.
The lesson hiding in plain sight
Real prosperity doesn’t spring out of political announcements. It grows when people are free to direct their own time, money, and effort toward what they value. It grows when decisions come from those closest to the action – not from committees guessing from afar.
Big projects can look impressive. But impressions aren’t the same as outcomes. If a country truly wants progress, it must develop the habit of asking not only “What did we gain?” but also “What did this cost us somewhere else?”
Ignoring that second question is how nations end up applauding illusions.
