Have We Reached Peak Government?

If we are not yet at Peak Debt, we are getting close, and that means we are also getting close to Peak Government.

Have we reached Peak Government? That is, a structural point beyond which government can no longer grow sustainably?

To help answer the question, I've assembled charts of the foundations of growth: population, gross domestic product (GDP), private employment and output per person (i.e. productivity). These have grown 28%, 75%, 28% and 58% respectively. (I have used 1990 as a baseline, as the past 23 years gives us a reasonably accurate clue as to the long-term trendlines of the current economy.)

In other words, if growth depended entirely on population growth, the real (inflation-adjusted) economy would have grown 28% since 1990. Instead, the GDP rose by 57%. This is the result of rising output per person, i.e. an increase in productivity.

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