SOCIALISM: MAD, BAD, AND DANGEROUS TO DO
It’s the people that pay for politicians’ promises.
Take a politician who says he’ll take care of everything: law and order, health care, education, housing, and even provide work. With nothing asked in return. Unless that person is completely obnoxious or braindead, he will end up being very popular. And also quite irresponsible.
Popular because in these times of instant gratification and“I deserve-everything” mentality, anyone pandering to a people of oatmeal soft-headedness will certainly get ahead.
Irresponsible because such promises are simply not doable, not sustainable, and ultimately damaging.
Someone will have to pay to finance those promises. As I wrote previously, government by nature never generates income. It either collects taxes or borrows money. Should government operate a for-profit institution, it will do so badly. In effect, it’s actually competing for profit against the private sector but with the unfair advantage of tax money ( collected from the private sector) to subsidize its ineptness.
The point is, ultimately, it’s the people that pay for politicians’ promises.
That’s why it’s so ironic to see people cheer whenever we see a politician say “I will release funds for you” or “I will give you money” because it’s actually your money that he says he will release to you or give you.
Government can also be big or small. Its size must depend on the citizenry. If the people are selfreliant and virtuous, then there’s lesser need for government and it will be kept small.
Government cannot be trusted to maintain its size because its logic and nature is to keep getting bigger. It will be filled with wellmeaning officials who, because of their academic credentials, sincerely believe they know better than the people themselves how to live their lives. And when these officials predictably fail, they’ll excuse it by saying “only if they have more powers.” And on and on it goes.
But more and greater powers means bigger expenditures: more offices, more equipment, more regulations to be implemented. Which requires a gigantically growing budget. Which means higher taxes or bigger loans.
It’s bad enough to have governments with a patriarchal/ pater familias complex. It’s worse with politicians that have socialism as its guiding philosophy.
What’s wrong with socialism? Simple: it doesn’t work. See Venezuela, Greece, and even France. At worse, it kills people. In the hundreds of millions. Look at China, North Korea, Russia, Cuba, Vietnam, Cambodia. All victims of socialism and its violent meth-jacked up cousin communism.
Speaking of meth, socialism itself is a drug: making people dependent on government, addicted to entitlements, and ultimately destroying people’s self- reliance, innovation, and competitiveness.
With socialism’s terrible record, how come people keep coming back to it? One is because of the old boomer’s lingering romanticized nostalgia, unable to let go of their youth’s rebellious years. For the younger ones, it’s likely attributable to a bad economics education. But mostly it’s pathology: the obsession with making everybody equal.
To borrow Mark Goldblatt’s analogy: picture a school where Juan, Katrina, and Liwayway are studying. Juan gives a truly masterful recitation and gets three gold stars, Katrina gave satisfactory answers so has two, while Liwayway gave really mediocre answers so has one.
Nevertheless, Katrina can’t understand why Juan has three but Liwayway one.
The teacher explains that it’s because Juan gave great answers. Katrina’s brain hangs for a moment, then she argues back: but Liwayway’s parents are separated, Liwayway works afternoons to care for a younger sister,
her family can’t afford a book. So what do you want, asks the teacher? Katrina demands that Juan’s third star be taken away from him and given to Liwayway so that all three of them will have two stars.
Never mind that it’s not Juan’s “fault” that his parents are together, that his father was able to save for a car and books for Juan, never mind that Juan has problems of his own ( because who doesn’t?). What matters for Katrina is that the “injustice” against Liwayway be addressed by taking away Juan’s hard earned third star.
Katrina’s obsession with equality goes on to adulthood. Now, it’s no longer about the confiscation and redistribution of stars but people’s income.
But think about that for a moment: to contribute to society is definitely a duty. Yet certain points must be considered. One is that: shouldn’t all contribute? Because history tells us that those who don’t, feel they have no stake at all in the country.
Furthermore, shouldn’t the levels of taxes be such that it allows an incentive to the talented and hard working? Otherwise, why work?
Because what’s the difference between working and then getting hit with high taxes, and working but being told up front of a salary limit that gets more restrictive the better and harder you work?
Finally: all that taking and redistribution is coercive. It’s not charity because the income of honest hardworking people is involuntarily surrendered to the government.
Yet, ironically, its capitalism and the free market that’s accused of being undemocratic.