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QUALITY IMPROVEMENT STANDARDS FOR LAWS

Quality Improvement (QI) programs for laws involve design changes (amendments) that improve the problem-solving effectiveness and user-friendliness of laws, and reduce their size, cost, and complexity.

Laws that are found to be less than useful to the public by the quality assurance program are submitted to the legislature for repeal. The remaining laws, that have been found to have satisfactory performance, are submitted to a program of quality improvement (QI) to correct design flaws and imperfections, simplify the law, and improve its performance. Under the QI program, each law will be amended according to quality design standards so that its structure and operation approach the characteristics of the Ideal Law. These QI standards are virtually the same as Quality Design Standards for the creation of new laws.

CRITERIA FOR RE-DESIGNING LAWS UNDER THE QUALITY IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM:

Open Competitive Bidding for the Law Amendment (re-design) Process
The selection of a law design institution to amend a law must be based upon a process of open competitive bidding for  the design contract. Qualifications for institutions that bid on law design contracts will be established by the legislature.

Qualified Law Designers
Individuals who design laws must meet licensure requirements or other measure of competency for the creation of bills. Standards for licensure or other measure of competency for law designers will be established by the legislature.

Structure
If possible, the wording of the law will be further simplified, shortened, and clarified.

Quality Criteria
Each law, and every component of each law, must be dedicated solely to the solution of the societal problem that has been selected by the legislature for solution. The objective of the QI program is to modify each law so that it approximates the characteristics of the Ideal Law. Each re-designed law must contain validated statements of the following:

  • Definition of the societal problem that the law addresses
  • Results of analyses of the present size and nature of the problem
  • Priority reassignment of the problem by the legislature (the size and nature of the problem may have changed since the law was first enacted)
  • Name and qualifications of the law design institution and law designer(s).
  • Measurable goal of the law (the purpose, or "intent of the law")
  • Justification of the sanction (tax, fine, subsidy, lawsuit, etc.) of the law as the optimum solution
  • Model ("blueprint") of the law, by which the design is simulated and optimized, and predictions of the outcome of the law are made
  • No extraneous provisions ("pork barrel," special interest exemptions...) have been added
  • Method(s) and milestones for measuring and verifying results
  • References to all of the above.

Redesigned laws, if approved by the legislature, are then reinstated as enforceable laws.

Click here for the Ideal Law of Government