There is another reason, an even simpler reason, why Trump. “hire the best person I can find, have them work out a solution, and then just do that” won’t work out so well.

The people who are the best of the best in their fields are generally in a position to pick an chose their employers as they are the ones everyone wants to hire. On top of that, such people are generally motivated by things beyond money.

People like that generally don’t work for government, because job security is not a top level motivator for them.

People like that won’t work for a boss like Trump, not at any salary.

In any event, to judge by his past performance, often “the best he can find” are barely competent morons.

It’s also the case that Trump’s method of “hire the best person I can find, have them work out a solution, and then just do that” is not going to be as successful when there’s Congress and a whole Federal bureaucracy who thinks that A) they’re already doing the best job they can, B) they’re already doing the best job anyone can, and C) who cares what this guy thinks because in four to eight years he’ll be gone anyway.

Appreciate the kind personal remarks, Paul B., but I think Scott Alexander’s point — and he deserves credit for it, not me — is that Trump has not offered any ideas for improving the rules *as a national candidate*, not that he failed to do so as a New York development player. If he spoke up now, he would reach a far bigger audience and influence a national debate. Indeed, author Philip K. Howard (“The Death of Common Sense”), another veteran of NYC legal and regulatory battles, has criss-crossed the country telling audiences that rationalizing rules on development is vital if the whole country is not to wind up with a system as expensive and insider-based as NYC’s. Trump could too.