If you're asking about the US; it's fund mismanagement. Where I live local politicians and so forth make more to even double what federal politicians make (lets ignore the bribes, then again I'm sure they're there as well), but nobody wants to jump on the train of lets pay the government more money when some of these people are paid 400K-500K. The budget keeps climbing and nothing gets done, actually it's been getting worse and worse. I think that partially breeds that greed of wanting to help your fellow neighbor.