The System Is Not Broken
I hear the phrase constantly. From journalists, from politicians, from well-meaning advocates. “The system is broken.” They say it about healthcare, about housing, about criminal justice, about education. They say it with frustration and sincerity, and they are wrong.
The system is not broken. It is working.
This is not a semantic distinction. It is a diagnostic one, and getting the diagnosis wrong means getting the treatment wrong.
The Difference
When you say a system is broken, you imply that it was designed to produce a different outcome than the one it is producing. You imply that the current outcome is an error – a malfunction, a deviation from the intended purpose. And the logical response to a malfunction is repair: fix the broken part, and the system will resume its proper function.