Reply #15: I hate randroids

[makhno]

What a sickening flow of recycled Randian tosh. Worth a rebuttal, but someone taking his inspiration from the heartless hag is unlikely to ever see the light.

aside from the tremendous amount of money lost through bureaucratic inefficiencies

Anyone with experience in a large private sector company would know things are hardly better on that side of the fence. Bureaucracy is not the private domain of government, but of bureaucrats. And these thrive in any system, private or public.

the bottom line is EVERY PENNY spent by the government was first taken from productive activity in the private sector

By the same token, every penny spent by a company was first taken from productive activity resulting in the purchase of the company's product. Do I blame McDonald's for stealing my money when I buy a burger? Of course not. Neither do I blame the government when I buy its services. In a lot of cases, it's money well spent.

...It was first siphoned away from those who create REAL jobs and REAL wealth in our society.

Government jobs are not real jobs? Government contracts do not create real wealth?

A limited amount of government is needed, but what we have today is absolutely monstrous...The federal bureacracy has become a terrible parasite on the back of the American worker.

It's all in the eye of the beholder, and this is precisely the reason why no agreement is possible in an argument such as this. While I would consider free university education and healthcare essential government services, a conservative views them as parasitic government wealth mismanagement. There's no agreement to be had. It is a moral, not a rational issue.

Think for a sec...If I want to buy an ice cream cone tomorrow for a dollar, it means I value the mint chocolate chip more than I value the dollar I'll spend for it. It also means the owner of the ice cream shop values my dollar more than he values the ice cream.

Thanks for the econ lesson!

Let's forget that he already has given three teenagers their first full-time job...forget that he provides a service that makes everyone in the community HAPPY...This isn't good enough. This isn't a real contribution to society according to government, so they must tax him. For some reason, they believe he isn't benefiting society, so they MUST step in and interfere with this process.

They tax him to provide checks on the safety of his product, to provide law enforcement so that he doesn't abuse his teenage employees in the backroom, to ensure that his ice cream delivery truck doesn't get stuck on an unmaintained dirt road, and to provide his kids with an education that few small business owners could afford at a private school. In a socialist system, the government would also tax him to provide him with affordable health care, something that is becoming increasingly out of reach of America's small business owners.

If a worker only produces $8.00 per hour in output, a $12.00 "living wage" is a losing proposition for the parlor owner. So what will he do? Perhaps he won't be able to hire an extra person to work weekends, or perhaps he will need to raise prices on cones to stay in business. Who knows? The costs must be absorbed somewhere, and usually the harmful effects of government are hidden.

It's not black magic. The worker will use the extra money to keep buying his product and perhaps even increase his consumption. With his new, higher wage, the worker might even find it unnecessary to keep two jobs. Hell, that worker might now even save some money and start a business or invest it into an existing one! But no, government cannot fuel growth. It just can't.

One important thing to remember: Government spending has visible beneficiaries and INVISIBLE victims.

It's your government. You are the beneficiary. And if you aren't, perhaps it's time to look at how your political leaders are redistributing your wealth.

Politicians can point to those who benefit through direct transfers of wealth (those who get the artificially high wages, those who get welfare checks, free tuition/healthcare, etc). They point to these people and say "See! Look how we helped them...How could you oppose this you greedy bastards?" What we DON'T see are the millions invisible victims of these policies...the people who absorb the costs of government. We don't see the consumers who pay higher prices every product...the workers who didn't get the raise they were hoping for...the teenager who didn't get hired on over the weekend at the ice cream parlor because a "living wage" meant the owner could only afford two employees instead of four.

The ice cream parlor fallacy makes a comeback. The question is - can the parlor operate with two employees? If it can, then it never employed four in the first place, unless the owner was a dumbass or a communist. Were the profit margins in the ice cream business so small that the company could only afford labor at poverty-level wages? Well, maybe it's time to think of a new business. After all, isn't this what makes America great? The constant innovation in the pursuit of profit?

We never see these people. They are the invisible victims of government interference in the economy. Their plight makes it easy for the left to rail against "the rich"...to push through tax increases for "the rich", and then blame the "greed" of employers when prices rise, or when layoffs start happening. It's a very convenient setup if you ask me. Tax companies...regulate them...create an artificial "living wage"...forcing companies to raise prices, cut pay, or lay off workers to avoid bankruptcy

How about cutting profits so as not to raise prices, cut pay or lay workers off?

...then blame those eeeeevvvviil corporations for gouging consumers not caring about the 'working man'. They then use this resentment as a justification to increase taxes even more...a perpetual cycle leading to socialism and misery for everyone.

That's right. Socialism for everyone. That's the ticket. The misery part we already have.