But Congress has made a habit of letting these measures expire and then bringing them back to life, no matter how useless they are.

FORBES: Whatever Happened To All Those Expiring Tax Breaks?

How about just simplifying taxes and reducing useless regulations and paperwork?

FORBES: Small Businesses Are A Job Engine

Loyalty programs can show that a person is not a useless customer, if the firm knows how to use the information.

FORBES: BBVA Pursues Profits Among The Unbanked Using Nontraditional Data

They have to understand how the U.S. can afford all this, and how their tax money is being invested in our future rather than spent on useless pork.

WSJ: How Obama Can Fix the Economy

Yet the report shows how poor countries' governments often tie their own people down in a thicket of useless regulation.

ECONOMIST: A new report gives governments some facts to ponder