The federal government finds itself in the middle of two contradictory realities: It’s spending far beyond its means while still failing to deliver effective public services to our citizenry. Republicans focus on the former while Democrats focus on the latter, but it is hard to deny either claim.

Outside the platforms of both parties, there are a slew of thoughtful reforms focused more on current economic needs than ideological preferences. Many have advocated moving to an export-oriented economy rather than one dependent on consumer spending. An Infrastructure Bank could turn pork-barrel project tradition into an organized and objectified process to improve infrastructure. Most economists have advocated adopting a national advanced manufacturing policy similar to that of Germany’s.

These solutions have been proposed by business leaders and policy expects recognizing the vast majority of independent research suggesting that current government programs are failing basic measures of efficacy. They recognize the basic social safety net, our job training programs, and the old way of delivering basic public goods are not keeping up with what the country needs. And these solutions given by experts in various industries are not described as spending more or less; they’re described as spending smarter and more efficient.

Regardless of these proposed solutions, both parties continue to argue about reforming government by advocating more or less of the same ineffectual government. They want more or the same of the solutions that worked in the last recession or the recession before it. They can’t admit that our government must be active yet limited at the same time. They fail to recognize not only the changed circumstance in which public policies are forced to operate in, but the incredible failure of arbitrary solutions from the left and right.

Thomas Friedman said it best, saying the Democrats are stuck in the 1960s and the Republicans are stuck in the 1980s. Their solutions for the future were designed for the problems of yesterday.

The lack of thoughtful insight from both parties can be reflected in the current debate on how to reign in government spending. A great example of this is reforming Medicare. There is a bipartisan consensus to gradually raise the retirement age from 65 to 67 in order to make the program solvent. Independent of other factors, it makes sense since life expectancy has increased dramatically in recent years.

However, as Dr. Emanuel wrote in an editorial in the New York Times (8/23), such a change requires preceding reforms. He pointed out that if health care costs aren’t dealt with first, our country would be left with a sizable group of uninsured 65 and 66-year-olds. That wouldn’t only be harmful to seniors, but, as the doctor suggests, it would probably cost the country more in the long run.

In other words, prudent budgeting requires our elected officials to actually think hard about how government approaches problems. The way to spend less is to make government programs perform so that they yield more results for taxpayers. You can’t have an intelligible debate about spending more or less on government if the programs you’re proposing don’t work. In fairness, the super committee tasked with further cuts in the deficit is filled with intelligent and thoughtful people from both parties. Many of them have been involved with negotiating with the other party on key policy issues. But truly reforming our government is about looking at every basic function it performs and making it relevant to an economy aiming to compete in a globalized world.

Until that happens, the platforms of both parties will just be saying a whole lot of nothing.

Ameek Singh is a State News guest columnist and international relations and political theory and constitutional democracy senior. Reach him at sodhiame@msu.edu.