Give away economics


The politics of bread and circuses are beginning to take their toll and the Federal government is creaking under the wait.
Alexis DeTocqueville warned us. And it is coming to pass .

Rarely does a single action by Congress serve as so powerful an example of how the system is working. The recent budget bill, which squeaked through the House and the Senate just before Christmas, is a road map of insider dealing. It shows that when choices have to be made, the interests of the poor and the middle class fall before the wishes of interest groups with powerful lobbies and awesome piles of campaign money to distribute.

Republican majorities in both the Senate and the House insisted that they wanted to cut the federal budget. But the Senate and House offered competing plans for achieving savings. When it came time to meld the two proposals together, almost every choice congressional leaders made favored the interest groups.

This is why government must be kept on a tight leash. Give special exemptions to one group and soon hundreds of others are clamoring for the same treatment. Grant special privileges to one group and thousands more will demand their own.

No matter how good the intentions, no matter how noble the cause, no matter worthy the goal, the rule of law must apply to everyone.

Or it should apply to no one.

Already three programs consume close to half the Federal budget.

Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid accounted for more than $1 trillion in the 2004 budget year, according to the Consolidated Federal Funds Report being released Tuesday by the Census Bureau.

Overall federal spending was $2.2 trillion, an increase of 5 percent from 2003.

The actual impact on the economy is far higher.

Every single social service "provided" by a government agency inevitably costs more than a private sector version. It will be looked upon as a right, not a cost. It will change marginal behavior for the worse. And it will discourage alternatives from developing.

If you want to see the cost of good intentions, go to any major city and look at the rent-controlled apartments. Ask yourself why hospitals refuse to treat people just a few feet beyond their doors. Go to New Orleans and try to find out why people are waiting to be bailed out by a benevolent government. Ask yourself why doctors can't prescribe too much pain medication. Ask yourself why your bank must report all transactions of more than $1000 to the IRS. Ask yourself why more inner-city families have only one parent. Ask yourself why millions of seniors depending on Social Security can't pay the bills, while millions more who don't need it still get checks.

Each and every one of these problems is the legacy of entitlement thinking.

There is going to be a time, and it is not too far off, when the entire system will go through a cascade failure. The longer we put off dealing with it, the more drastic the consequences will be.

To start with, taxes need to be reduced.

But even more importantly, government spending must be reduced.

Congress and the President need debt counseling.

— NeoWayland

Posted: Tue - December 27, 2005 at 04:43 AM  Tag


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