Every gallon of gasoline you pump would cost you 5.5 cents more.
You’d pay 19 cents more each month to run the water from your tap.
The medicines you take to treat your illnesses would cost an additional 88 cents a month.
Turning on the lights and the television would help run up an additional 79 cents a month on the electricity bill for the typical South Carolina household.
You would have to open your wallets for new taxes at the grocery store and get used to paying for sales taxes on more of the services you buy, such as home pest control treatment, pampering at the beauty salon and a storage unit to stash your stuff.
The budget decisions facing South Carolina’s politicians are not much different than those facing most states.
One theme seems to stand out in the budget balancing measures that are being considered by state legislatures. And that theme of course is to “raise taxes.”
Liberal politicians who have developed state laws that have increased the redistribution of wealth rightfully belonging to the individuals holding that wealth and which have increased state regulation of all sorts of personal acvtivities with their attendant costs for enforcement and compliance.
In most states, this has resulted in a patchwork of laws which constitute a house of cards based upon hardly any logic except those two themes of wealth redistribution and the regulation of how people go about their daily lives.
Its time for the the voters and the politicians to stop increasing taxes and to take a careful look at how the state legislatures have needlessly and inefficiently increased the costs of government.
To drive the point home, its time for states to strip themselves of programs that encourage others to live on the hard-earned income of others and to do away with laws that increase the cost of government and which infringe on personal freedom and the ability individuals and businesses to manage their own affairs free of state interference.
A simple rule: you get what you pay for.
It might be that in some states that people will become firemen, policemen, teachers, auditors and other bureaucratic jobs for cheap. In other countries that makes them susceptible to bribery.
I do agree that as long as a large proportion of our monies go to exploding things rather than, say, domestic benefits we will generally believe we don’t get our money’s worth.
You get what you pay for in private business, but all too often what you get for what you pay in the public sector is waste, fraud, inefficiency, padding of payrolls, etc. You know, all that stuff that comes from the “endless” supply of taxpayer money that politicians and bureaucrats spread around to keep themselves in power by buying the votes of those who enjoy their largesse. As long as some in this county can continue to enrich themselves by having politicians grab it from other citizens and give to them, we will continue to have massive problems, both societal and fiscal.
RE: ” . . . you get what you pay for.”
In the free market we do, yeh. Not with the State [other than bad things.]
RE: “I do agree that as long as a large proportion of our monies go to exploding things rather than, say, domestic benefits we will generally believe we don’t get our money’s worth.”
Let’s rephrase for more accuracy.
[“Though the author didn’t say anything of the sort, I’m going to pretend to agree with the author, and point out that as long as a large proportion of our monies go to exploding things, libs like me won’t like it, and as long as another proportion of our monies go towards domestic benefits, conservatives who wish to follow the Constitution won’t generally believe we get our money’s worth with the domestic benefits side of the equation.”]
There. Much better.
My personal experience in public employment (teacher/administrator in public schools) and private employment (systems analyst) is that there is more waste and inefficiencies business than in government. And certainly recent news makes it absolutely clear that business is riddled with major fraud and inefficiencies. The truth is that there are many hard working, honest, conscientious workers in both government and private enterprise; there are also lazy, dishonest, crooks and con artists in both government and private enterprise. That happens to be the human condition.
Septuagenarian,
Your private industry experience may be skewed. Over the past few decades, IT areas tended to spend more than other areas of business, and a significant portion of it was wasted on expensive toys. In defense of the IT folks, most senior managers and executives couldn’t describe what type of system they wanted if their life depended on it, hence the endless, expensive redesigns required. The joke used to be to just install the DWIM operating system. DWIM stands for “do what I mean.”
On the whole, however, public employers are significantly more wasteful than private ones. The one exception I can support is that very profitable private companies tend to overspend in the good times. They correct, however, when the times get bad, unlike their public counterparts who continue to spend.
I have worked in federal and state government, and done federal government consulting work. The amount of waste that goes on in D.C. is truly disgusting and I regularly came home absolutely livid about the waste I saw from federal bureaucrats who just did not care about anything but expanding their own little empires. Surprisingly enough, some of the stingiest, most cost conscious places I ran across were the regional Federal Reserve Banks.
I can personally attest to friends of my daughter who are not yet ten years out of college collecting 6 figure salaries and regular bonuses and raises working for the federal government, and they only have bachelor’s degrees. Without any profit motive and investment community to demand accountability, public expenditures are just one big slush fund. Any CPA will tell you if private companies were run like the government, most of the agency heads would be indicted for financial fraud.
“The amount of waste that goes on in D.C. is truly disgusting and I regularly came home absolutely livid about the waste I saw from federal bureaucrats who just did not care about anything but expanding their own little empires.”
As a active Navy type, I worked alongside career civil servants who were very concerned about the impact of their management actions and who worked very hard at trying to do their best at performing their duties.
Having said that, I also have to say that the civil service system and the Navy’s system of detailed management focus created a situation that resulted in inefficiencies, discouraged people from exploring alternative ways of doing things and often punished those civil servants for “taking the initiative” and addressing the “real problem at hand” or finding a better way of completing assigned duties.
The civil servant, in particular, was rewarded for performing his assigned tasks. Basically that was it. He did what he was told to do and often little else. If a civil servant saw an opportunity to do something related to his assigned duties but not assigned to him or to anyone else, he took a serious risk.
Since that opportunity seized was not assigned to him, he could be seen as “doing everthing but his own job” even though he might be completing all of his assigned duties. His senior in the chain-of-command might might be a control freak who would sense a “loss of control.” If something did go wrong in his assigned duties, even though the “opportunity seized” had no effect on the occurrence of that event, he would be also be seen as “doing everything but his own job.”
And he would be in real trouble if his seizing the intiative endangered an organizational “sacred cow.” Particularly if that sacred cow was a policy initiated by his seniors or considered truly ‘sacred’ by them.
#5, the difference is that inefficiencies in the private sector are essentially and eventually weeded out by the marketplace (ie competition) whereas in government they are not, there is no impetus for the latter.
#5, unless your business experience was with your local cable company which may have a monopoly, I would ask if that horribly inefficient company you worked for is still around or did it go bankrupt. If it is still around, tell us who it is so someone can develop a more efficient competitor to outmanuver it and put it out of its misery. That is how the free market works, capital will flow to the more efficient just like water will run downhill.
1. The business is not a monopoly, although it is the leader in its specialized field.
2. The company is still in business and is quite profitable.
3. Because of the field and its leadership, the company is likely to remain in business until hell freezes over.
4. The efficiency of the company has improved in this century due to new ownership by a major international corporation specializing in related fields that has made significant changes in management.
5. Capital investment in human capital, more efficient use of employees and better compensation has made workers more productive, actually improving quality and lowering cost.
6. It is none of your business what the name of the company is.
5: I so suppose that some would find the state’s funding of roads, schools, firemen and courts is generally upsetting to some. But I think there’s some evidence that without a social contract, we easily lead to civil war.
I admit, I find references to the “free market” interesting, given that it would be difficult to find any business that did not benefit from a stable government or a healthy sense of civic society and the public. I suppose for some, those who motivated by profit are always saints and those who believe in the common good are always sinners, but I suggest that the world is a bit more complicated.
I’m also intrigued by the idea that private companies are always more efficient than the state. It seems to me an issue of culture: if the people running government believe that it is meant to be wasteful, then it will be. Thus you have conservatives who deliberately wreck public institutions because it doesn’t fit with their ideology. But then there are other cultures in which government service is seen as patriotic.
Are there incentives for businesses to cut corners at the expense of human safety? We see what happened with BP and the miners. By and large, they ignored regulations; and the regulators were probably part of the “government is bad crew” or even underfunded. It does mean that businesses that do try to play by the rules are at a disadvantage.
but in the end, “government is bad and businesses are good” is a fairly shallow way of understanding the world. In the old days, say before the 1960’s, people trusted their institutions – government, businesses, and the church. There may be good reasons not to trust government; but the evidence is that those motivated by short-term profits, who cut corners without paying the consequences of their actions, who are bailed out by a government they later criticize deserve to be critiqued themselves.
RE: “. . . if the people running government believe that it is meant to be wasteful, then it will be.”
One of JW’s latest favorite little assertions — easily demonstrated to be false since so many liberals running the government adore it and are grossly wasteful as well. There appears to be no correlation between “conservatives running government” and “wastefulness” — corruption, incompetence, and waste are rampant with either side running government.
RE: “I admit, I find references to the “free market†interesting, given that it would be difficult to find any business that did not benefit from a stable government or a healthy sense of civic society and the public.”
Uh right, because there is no such thing as a “free market” that is free if the country holding the free market has a “stable government.” [roll eyes]
RE: “but in the end, “government is bad and businesses are good†is a fairly shallow way of understanding the world.”
Yeh — so why JW inserts it into the thread, one cannot say, other than that JW needs something to argue against and consistently over the years has inserted random things into comments that have nothing to do with either the post or the previous comments, precisely so that he can pretend otherwise and “assert” something in opposition.
RE: “I suppose for some, those who motivated by profit are always saints and those who believe in the common good are always sinners, but I suggest that the world is a bit more complicated.”
Yeh — another assertion that JW inserts into the thread so that he can have something that he pretends to respond to and argue against that is irrelevant and was never stated.
Weird.
But typical over the years.
Sarah opines regarding John’s excellent point…
[blockquote]RE: “but in the end, “government is bad and businesses are good†is a fairly shallow way of understanding the world.â€
Yeh—so why JW inserts it into the thread, one cannot say, other than that JW needs something to argue against and consistently over the years has inserted random things into comments that have nothing to do with either the post or the previous comments, precisely so that he can pretend otherwise and “assert†something in opposition.[/blockquote]
#3 Daniel alluded to the fairly common “conservative” shibboleth John mentions.
[blockquote]in the public sector is waste, fraud, inefficiency, padding of payrolls, etc.[/blockquote]
The allegation that the public sector is “inefficient” (presumbably viewed as “bad”), while the private sector is supposedly “efficient” (presumably viewed as “good”), is very much a theme of the thread even if Sarah wishes it were not so.
The fact is that this particular good/bad dichotomy is false. There are inefficiencies in both the private and public sectors which the “law of the jungle” does not suppress. There are also efficiencies in both.
One cannot in a large, modern, industrialized country such as the United States operate a business or conduct commerce without a government providing for the general welfare (see Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution). A government-less society may operate in a remote Amazon village where the social culture is enforced by the village. That simply does not work in large, modern, industrial societies where commerce is impersonal.
There is a reason why every such industrialized country has a strong system of government. Economic prosperity requires such formal institutions of government.
No, actually . . . .”but in the end, “government is bad and businesses are good†is a fairly shallow way of understanding the world” =/ “in the public sector is waste, fraud, inefficiency, padding of payrolls, etc.”
The two things are not at all the same thing, and making up a shallow assertion and then denouncing it is cheap sophistry typical of JW.
On to more substantive points . . . “One cannot in a large, modern, industrialized country such as the United States operate a business or conduct commerce without a government providing for the general welfare (see Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution).”
Ah — but if we are going to actually pay attention to the Constitution we will have to acknowledge that “general welfare” actions taken by the State has been formally *restricted* in that same document.
That would be too inconvenient, so let’s just look at the bits we like.
Since the original remark is one of those “shallow” catchphrases one hears from certain quarters that does not bear empirical examination, it should be challenged.
As for the Constitution, it grants the Congress the power to make all laws necessary and proper for carrying into execution the power to provide for the general welfare. And throughout the history of the U.S. the courts have agreed. After all, the Constitution superseded the Articles of Confederation.
[i]One cannot in a large, modern, industrialized country such as the United States operate a business or conduct commerce without a government providing for the general welfare (see Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution). [/i]
Ah, if only, if only, our Federal Govt were simply involved in something as alturistic as “general welfare”. But we have the Dept of Energy, which produces no energy but lots of hot air and paper.
We have the EPA who has now decided each of our exhalations is pollutant and needs to be regulated. We have National Public Radio, taxpayer funded to cheer on the Govt. We have the Dept of Education that educates no one, but strives in vain to return us to the educational levels achieved in the 1950’s. And we are witnessing the collapse of the Social Security ponzee game that would get a regular person thrown in prison (didn’t we do that recently). And now we have ObamaCare, poised to kill the health insurance industry so the Govt single payer plan can come to the rescue. Oh, and how about those thousand upon thousand of congressional earmarks?
Yep, general welfare and a whole lot more! In fact, more than we can afford!!
And we have those banks and insurance companies whose “waste, fraud, inefficiency, padding of payrolls” brought down the world economy throwing millions out of work and on to the streets. Private enterprises that wiped out trillions in people’s retirement savings and pension funds.
We have an oil company that so highly regards profit that they disregard safety–killing 28 workers, sending toxic gases into the air and polluting the Gulf Coast.
We have peanut companies and egg producers poisoning the population.
All in the name of “free enterprise” and the pursuit of wealth.
RE: “Since the original remark is one of those “shallow†catchphrases one hears from certain quarters that does not bear empirical examination, it should be challenged.”
That’s wonderful — those who think it false are welcome to challenge what they please. But it’s simply lazy to pretend as if something was said and then argue against that thing that was not said. Lazy, cheap — and typical for JW.
RE: “As for the Constitution, it grants the Congress the power to make all laws necessary and proper for carrying into execution the power to provide for the general welfare.”
Well . . . “all laws” that is, except the powers that were *excluded*. But let’s not quibble over the Constitution — after all, collectivists have already determined that they do not wish to follow the Constitution anyway.
And that’s what this is actually all about. It’s not about “bad” or “good” government — it’s about a country that has agreed to have its State bound by the limitations of a founding document and Bill of Rights, so much so that its elected leaders swear oaths to be so bound, and some of those people not wishing to be bound by such a document.
Other countries may, of course, run their governments in any way they choose without being “bad” or “good” in whatever actions those governments wish to perform. But our country has chosen to bind and limit its government in accordance with the Constitution’s clear limits.
The good news is that this November will serve as yet another charming referendum on whether we can slap our elected representatives upside the head [figuratively of course] and let them know that they should ever so slightly consider following their oath.
It will be good to see just what the American people believe — do they wish to expand even further the power of the State in violation of our Constitution, or do they wish to attempt to return to Constitutional boundaries, inch by inch.
Hopefully it will be the latter.
When you look at the most fantastic inventions of the 17-21st centuries which have so transformed and improved the human condition, it might be instructive to list all of those made by Government:…………………………………………………………
Well, that didn’t take long, did it.