Measures outlive the conditions that produced them
Bar length is time in force; the marker is where the stated cause ended; the tail after it is the part nobody forecasts.
A measure’s tail is made of whatever made withdrawing it costly: a domestic constituency that benefited, an administrative process with no forcing event, or simply no one’s job to propose ending it.
The cause and the mechanism are not the same thing. The cause is the event the measure answered; the mechanism is the rule, licence or arrangement that keeps running after the event is over — and mechanisms outlast causes far more often than the announcement implied they would.
A diversion adopted for one incident became the default routing long after underwriters stopped pricing that incident specifically.
A rationing mechanism introduced for a drought became the canal’s standing allocation tool, auctioned on every restricted day since.
The lapse counter-example: a waiver granted for a shortage was allowed to expire once the shortage cleared, with no renewal filed.
Identify who has the authority to end the measure, and whether ending it is anyone’s job.
A measure with a written sunset clause behaves differently from one with none.
Ask who built around the measure and would be hurt by its removal.
The cause can end while the mechanism that answered it keeps running.