The government shutdown and debt ceiling crisis inflicted a toll on the American economy, but that cost is only a fraction of the total damage that the federal government has been causing to the American economy.

Without exaggeration, the single biggest impediment to a stronger economic recovery has been the years of dysfunction in Washington and the policies that have emerged.

According to Standard & Poor’s, the shutdown itself will cost the economy $24 billion, an amount that would have paid for a large and valuable infrastructure project like the Big Dig, the massive highway improvement program in Boston.

But far more harm has been done to the economy since early 2010 by terrible decisions as to how the government spends and the effect on both business and consumers of the uncertainty that stems from making policy crisis by crisis.