tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-759178030677978044.post2631497975118316519..comments2024-02-19T07:24:42.397-08:00Comments on Anglican Curmudgeon: The Lesson We Never Seem to LearnA. S. Haleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05108498446058643166noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-759178030677978044.post-75251450198218626082011-12-16T07:35:19.942-08:002011-12-16T07:35:19.942-08:00Well said Mr. Haley.
I often like to think that ...Well said Mr. Haley. <br /><br />I often like to think that in creating large national level programs, we create an analogue of the tragedy of the commons. <br /><br />We are able to say to ourselves "I know I'm paying taxes.. ruinous ones at that.. and therefor I have done my part to help the needy and less fortunate. If they need more, go after all those scoundrels who clearly aren't paying the same burden in taxes I am." But the thing is.. we (almost) all say that. It is always someone else who needs to be taxed more, and I am being taxed too much, and surely these taxes should be enough to cure all social ills.<br /><br />When we remove the level of personal involvement, we remove any real ability to think about the needs versus the resources. When we have a local (and for my view preferably private, such as church or civic society) organization treating local needs, we can grasp the ideas of the need for more service, and a feeling of personal responsibility to care for the least among us. This also draws to our attention the preparations we should make for our own long term well being.<br /><br />When these pools are poured together and we hear about "Four Million for this..." "Ten Million for that..." the numbers are so large we cannot grasp that the needs could exceed them.<br /><br />In the end, we all feel that society owes "us", needs to take from "them", and should be taking care of social problems so that we don't have to confront them.<br /><br />In the end, we get the government program equivalent of a trash strewn lawn and dead shrubs where the homeless sleep in place of a thriving park.<br /><br />-Teilhard Lewis, the Anglizen DreamerAnglizen Dreamerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08142327140220207338noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-759178030677978044.post-51066399656124663942011-12-15T12:37:47.480-08:002011-12-15T12:37:47.480-08:00Dear Mr. Haley,
You are correct that FDR's So...Dear Mr. Haley,<br /><br />You are correct that FDR's Social Security System is "still with us." But we must also recognize that it was designed from the outset, and with the full conscious awareness on the part of the entire membership of FDR's Committee on Economic Security, as a fraudulent system (although it was "sold" to the legislators and the electorate) as a form of "insurance"). And we now have numerous other "insurance" programs which are not economically sustainable nor soundly funded, to wit, National Flood Insurance, FDIC, FSLIC, unemployment "insurance," and, if I am not mistaken, that is only a partial list.<br /><br />I say yet again, that Frederic Bastiat (French economist, 1801-1850) was correct: "<i>Government is the great fiction, through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else</i>."<br /><br />The real question underlying all of this is, when will we begin to understand that all government (tyrants, princes and democracies) follow the same pattern. The differences are matters of the degree of outlawry in government and the rate at which it engulfs the society.<br /><br /><i>Pax et bonum</i>,<br />Keith TöpferMartial Artisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11679584221923893460noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-759178030677978044.post-41432282212745902982011-12-15T12:24:59.626-08:002011-12-15T12:24:59.626-08:00It is not just nineteenth-century Europe and the t...It is not just nineteenth-century Europe and the twentieth century United States where this disastrous process of increasing the number of persons eligible for the dole and increasing the size of government has led to the collapse of a nation. The Roman Empire did not fall because of barbarian invasions in the way typically suggested by public school history books. Rather, the barbarians saw that Roman citizens (indeed, the population of the capital city of Rome itself) was on the dole (started by Caesar Augustus, who ensured that every Roman was fed free bread). The barbarians wanted to share in this free feeding too, especially after the crop failures caused by climate change in the late 300s.sophy0075https://www.blogger.com/profile/03313315186411760221noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-759178030677978044.post-19770363107431474752011-12-15T06:13:33.007-08:002011-12-15T06:13:33.007-08:00Milton Friedman was once asked why since:
1. econ...Milton Friedman was once asked why since:<br /><br />1. economists tend to be highly intelligent<br /><br />2. this sort of information is readily available and incontrovertible<br /><br />they do not argue for the obvious conclusion. His reply was to the effect that he had asked himself the same question, and that their desire to be relevant and influential overcame their good judgment. I suspect this applies to many other intellectual areas.Tregonseehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01705100658499499100noreply@blogger.com