from: http://www.investors.com/politics/columnists/stephen-moore-government-makes-the-poor-poorer/ STEPHEN MOORE 4/07/2017 For all the obsession in Washington and in college faculty lounges over income inequality, why isn't there more outrage over government policies that exacerbate the problem? There are hundreds of programs that make the poor, poorer and increase poverty in America. Many of them were exposed last week by my colleagues at the Heritage Foundation forum on this very topic. Economist Don Boudreaux of George Mason University unmasked two such policies. One is trade protectionism. Trade barriers raise prices and "act as a regressive tax" on Americans, Boudreaux explains. They also stunt the very innovation process that makes goods and services widely available to people at affordable prices to begin with. Think about who the consumers are that shop for those everyday low prices at Walmart. It's not Hillary Clinton. Minimum wage clearly fits into this category as well. In every other industry, Boudreaux notes, when something is more expensive we buy less of it. Why do some economists think that isn't so when it comes to buying labor... ...the fuel economy standards ... ...the anti-fracking crusade... Social Security is the greatest swindle of the poor ever... Occupational licensing laws — in trades like moving companies, realtors, hair dressers, limousine services, beauticians, physical therapy... ...the government school system in inner cities. Every study finds abysmal educational outcomes and even unsafe environments for school children despite cities spending upward of $20,000 per child... ...These examples merely scratch the surface... ...Where are Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren and Nancy Pelosi and the class warfare warriors on reversing government policies that are stealing money and opportunities for low income and minority families? Do they care more about protecting the poor or big government? It's time to really find out.
The biggest thing the govt does to keep people poor is provide handouts without giving them a real path towards self sustainability. Every new handout program and every time govt makes money cheaper to get, they make it harder for people to work themselves up from the bottom.
In all reality Jimmy79, many of the people receiving government handouts do not want to become self-reliant, which is why many of those same people F-E-A-R Mr. Trump and Mr. Pence and partly why I am happy to see the both of them in government. I have realized for years now, since the 1990s that many seek to promote governmental intervention so they have to do as little as possible to properly rear their own children. This is just a peek into the mind of AlifQadr. I know, it is frightful. The key is not look into the light, Carol Ann. NYUK NYUK NYUK.
In no particular order: Government is a necessary evil; specifically central government, the more central the more evil and less necessary due to inevitable corruption, cost, inefficiency, incompetence and waste that central concentration of violent fiat power over the population entails. Whenever possible and feasible, free, individual human choice is preferable to state compulsion on threat of violence. In the US, 100 years of gov-edu-union-contractor-grantee-trial lawyer-MSM Complex media and cultural propaganda have been dedicated wholly to denying this axiom of the evolved human community, turning this self-evident truth on its head, and positing in its place that involuntary, violent central fiat power is superior, and provides superior results to free, voluntary human choice. It is not, and it does not. The Complex conducts this massive propaganda campaign for the purposes of enlarging and enriching itself, and does so under countless ostensible "causes." Those causes are window dressing specifically crafted to fool different groups of people, to make them fearful, or to make them envious and resentful of their fellow citizens. Unlike the private sector, that benefits from economies of scale in central operations, the massive growth of central government during the most thrilling period of technological advance in human history proves that it is incapable of significantly capturing economies of scale. Most of the growth of the illicit central state in the US is accomplished via contractors today, graft-laden transactions in all areas that displace private sector voluntary business. In the US, the federal government is the largest corporation by an astonishing degree, and government the home of a surprising number of "the 1%." The propaganda outlets of the gov-edu-union-contractor-grantee-trial lawyer-MSM Complex hide this by filling media and public discourse with lie narratives about "the rich" in the private sector and wealth disparity... using distortions or omitting necessary context. Tens of thousands of Complex minions are tasked with this in union, lobby, educational and other "PR departments" (propaganda ministries) across the country, and there are many of those paid ones posting to this forum. In the US, we need government to perform a few basic functions in society. The government we need for those functions is mostly LOCAL, not central. Central, federal government provides common national defense, REASONABLY moderates interstate commerce, disputes and issues, enters treaties with other nations, enforces nationwide guarantees of the rule of law as equally applied to citizens, performs a very, very short list of national infrastructure and common works. Anything else it does, is either a) interim, and should be ceded to states and local governments as soon as possible, especially in our current state of technological development, or b) illicit involuntary central fiat power that exists for graft and the enrichment of a permanent class of dependents, the gov-edu-union-contractor-grantee-trial lawyer-MSM Complex and its underclass vote farms. That is the case of US politics today, not "conservatives versus liberals," "rich versus poor," "Democrats versus Republicans," "SJWs versus racists, xenophobes and misogynists." Though there are nuggets of truth in those false categories, all of them are created to conceal the actual political divide, the gov-edu-union-contractor-grantee-trial lawyer-MSM Complex versus the voluntary economy, including mostly the middle class private sector that pays the lion's share of it via taxation, regulatory burden and other means. Does this mean that everyone who works in the Complex is evil? Of course not. Most are good people, some are deluded and tricked by Complex propaganda. The ones who aren't tricked, but cynically repeat the lie narratives as propaganda because they know that their own self benefit depends on greater and greater illicit central extraction and redistribution from their middle class fellow citizens? Those are the bad guys.
Necessary evil? Since when? The last time that I check (this morning), evil is not a necessitous factor in the lives of people who want to live in peace. As I have stated in the past, government teaches that it is needed, only because those in government seek to prolong their and its existence. Why would people be so reliant on parasites? The only thing that parasites can do is drain you until you cannot be drained any longer. GOVERNMENT EQUALS PARASITE!
Nice retort. How about I move to Arizona or Nevada? Such places have areas with sparse populations and very little to no government. It is just like big government advocates to inject Somalia or some other place. Are you afraid that your stance on government will not hold up to reality, in the absence of said government? You can go to many places in this very society and see that government is not needed. Are you afraid to be without your nanny government? Or are you unsure of your own civility? Those who are civil; those who govern themselves, have no need for the impediment of government. To be honest, those who champion government know that without the government(s) they champion, their high living standard would soon diminish. So being that you advocate the sources of oppression, you are an oppressor yourself. I am for Freedom, Justice, Equality and Independence which is why I am anti-government.
Sanskrit, why would I respond to the circular argument or prose? You are pro-Oppression, I am anti-Oppression. As the lyrics of an Alice In chains song states: "These stand for me Name your god and bleed the freak I like to see How you all would bleed for me" Government is not my God, nor is fear. Governments promote fear and those who are fearful champion government.
I like Alice in Chains... for mindless entertainment, have two versions of that song IIRC ... but not for anything to do with politics or -adult- interpretations thereof. I stand on prior posts as being not responded to.
Who attacked the poor? Showing how givt programs keep people poor isnt an attack on them. Its an attack on the elites that work to keep them poor. To claim the vast majority of the poor do little to nothing to help their situation isnt untrue though.
In many ways, I would be for this. I wouldnt want direct govt employment though. Maybe a govt paid apprenticeship with companies in order for those companies to train machinists, welders, and steel workers. No unskilled work, it would be for skilled labor jobs that we have a shortage on.
I have no issues with a big government who takes care of the poor. I'm disabled and get a monthly SSI check, SNAP, Medicaid and various local benefits a cheap monthly bus pass and yes some charities helping me but that's secondary. I just wish they had government housing for the disabled with low rents available paid for by the government using tax money taken in. Frankly why is big government bad it helps people and takes care of people like me?
Now, I am going to give your posting adequate response. On one hand, you bemoan Centralized Government and on the other hand, You say that the people need government, you prefer localized government to provide the people with that which they can, if they so willed, to provide said amenities for themselves. See, I am against ALL government, save the government of the Self. Even with localized government, it is still government of a foreign entity, so there is going to be a never ending quest for government to gain more and more power, because as you have stated and so have I on several occasions, the basic desire of ALL government is its existence and being that government(s) does not and do not operate themselves, you will always have those in government seeking its sustainability, even if it is at the cost of the freedom, justice, equality and independence of the people. So I take the position of why cause unnecessary strive and contention in your life by having government, that never ceasing entity?
It is a big government problem that democrats love. Workers sent tax money to Washington, and the crooked b'crat send 50 cents or less back to the poor of the dollar taxpayers sent to Washington.
logical1, nowadays, government just borrows on the "full faith and credit" of these United States, which is why the credit rating of the United States was reduced from an AAA status to an AA status. This was the working of both parties. PLEASE READ: http://weeklyworldnews.com/headlines/53230/china-buys-grand-canyon/ This is not make believe, this is has actually taken place. Meanwhile, the talking myopic heads on both sides of the "aisle" simply neglect to mention such factoids to the public. I wonder why? Is there any wonder why I am ANTI-GOVERNMENT? It is not over yet: http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2011/07/21/who-owns-america-hint-its-not-china/ <--- who we, citizens and others of the United States are in hock to!
