IQ tests are timed tests. They don’t measure absolute intelligence, but the rate that information is correctly goes from the IQ questions to the answer sheet.
Suppose Joe is taking an IQ test. He correctly answers 150 questions in 50 minutes and gets an IQ score of 150. He takes the test again, but this time we have someone read the test questions and another record his answers. If the reader is slow and isn’t motivated to help Joe get a good score, Joe will likely get a lower score. If the person recording the answers also isn’t motivated or able to help, Joe will have his score reduced even further. Joe could theoretically get a zero on the exam.
When Joe interacts with a government agency, a similar thing happens. Suppose Joe calls into a government agency. He first deals an with automatic answering system which slow down the information exchange. When he finally gets through to a real person he may get someone not totally trained, or not motivated to help Joe. He may even be given erroneous answers or misleading answers. Joe might spend an entire day trying to get a correct answer from the government agency. The exchange of information exchange is low. Expressed in terms of IQ, the IQ is low.
It gets worse. People at the agency may quote laws that prevent the exchange of information. They may call them privacy laws or they may say that they just can’t give out the answer over the phone. Joe goes to the agency and they authenticate his identity. Then agency then tells Joe that they don’t have the information he wants and he will have to go to another agency.
The government could, in fact, reduce the exchange of information to Joe to zero. Joe may need to have one government agency exchange information with another agency. For example the court may be required to communicate with the police via Joe’s lawyer. It’s like that game where everybody whispers something to the person next to him. The person at the end of the circle tells what he heard. It is usually so different from the original statement that everyone laughs at the perversion.
Government involvement further perverts the flow of information by writing laws that aren’t complete or are too complicated to understand. Perhaps government workers will try to find loopholes in the law or the wording of the law. By perverting words, strange results may happen. For example, someone with no legs may not be able to collect for disability whereas someone that fakes a mental disability may be able to collect disability income.
It is easy to understand how government can perversely effect information flow. Correct information flow and intelligence correlate. Therefore, government can lower the IQ of society.