A Lesson in Preschool Economics

Bernie Sanders is an economic illiterate, and if you support him, so are you. I am unfortunate enough to include myself in the entitlement generation. A horrible, but expected result of baby boomers wanting to shield us from the harsh realities of life, instead of preparing us for them. Years of receiving participation trophies was all it took to make a majority of my peers feel that they should be rewarded for nothing more than showing up, an idea that is simply not applicable in the real world. This is why we find ourselves with endless politicians willing to promise free stuff to the newest generation of voters, with no intention of following through once in office…or even worse, FULL intention of following through.

Socialism doesn’t work. Socialism sucks, period. When was the last time you saw people building a raft out of tires to escape free market capitalism? Shit, we don’t even have a truly free market in America, and you still don’t see people desperate to escape, because even Crony Capitalism is marginally better than socialism. This is why every time I see some hipster wearing a Che Guevarra shirt, I have to fight the intense urge to punch them in the teeth. If socialism is so great, why not move to a socialist country? We won’t stop you. In fact I bet for every one idiot we have here in the US ready to embrace socialism, there are a thousand people in some socialist shit hole, desperate for an opportunity to come to a country with a free market, so they can work hard and build a better life for their family. Just don’t call us for foreign aid when there isn’t enough economic opportunity in your socialist utopia to provide food for your family.

I know many of those among us still work with this preschool understanding of economics. They think the whole world will work together to a positive end, holding hands and singing kumbaya. These same people likely couldn’t tell you the name of their neighbor, or the last time they volunteered to feed the homeless in their community, but they have the unrealistic expectation that the federal government is going to give more of a shit than they do. I hate to break it to you guys, but not only is the government incapable of taking care of everyone, but it’s not their job. In America you have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Let me break it down simply so the less linguistically inclined can hopefully still grasp the idea.

Life: Nobody has the right to end your life, or negatively affect your life in any tangible way. Hurting your feelings doesn’t count.

Liberty: You can live your life however you see fit. Worship whatever invisible friend you like. Smoke weed and drink all day. Marry a girl, marry a guy, marry 3 guys. Shit, what you do is none of my business, or anyone else’s. As long as it doesn’t affect my life, or my liberty, do what makes you happy and feel fulfilled.

Pursuit of Happiness: Now, this seems to be the one that gets everyone confused. You have the right to pursue happiness. It is not guaranteed. It is not the government’s job to take care of you and your family. That is YOUR job. It is YOUR job to find happiness in your life.

Less than 1% of taxes go to welfare and food stamp programs, and over 50% goes to military spending. And the bright idea of the socialist is to give this already out of control government, more money and more responsibility?

If you want to do nothing, you are free to do nothing. It’s not affecting me. But guess what, when you choose to do nothing and then ask me to pay your bills, all of a sudden you are affecting my liberty.

Now as a free individual if I see that you are struggling, perhaps you are ill and unable to work, I can make a choice to help you. You may say it never happens now, but you would be amazed how much individuals would be able, and happy to contribute to their community if over a third of their income wasn’t stolen from them in the first place. And stolen for what? Less than 1% of taxes go to welfare and food stamp programs, and over 50% goes to military spending. And the bright idea of the socialist is to give this already out of control government, more money and more responsibility? Let’s take a gander at some of the major failed government programs, shall we?

Medicare: Medicare was supposed to cost $9 billion per year when it began in 1965. It was more like $67 billion. And now…it’s about $400 billion per year. And for what? If we need Obamacare so bad it must mean they’re flushing that Medicare funding down the toilet. But yeah, I can definitely see the solution is giving the government more money and more control and hoping they do a better job this time…are you serious? Will I ever wake up from this nightmare of sheer idiocracy?

Prohibition: In 1919 the government decided alcohol was bad and tried to ban it. As a result a black market flourished because where there is demand, there will always be someone to supply. You cannot save a person from themselves. The government realized prohibition was a failure and repealed it after 14 years in 1933. You’d think they might have learned from previous mistakes, but instead they decided to go big or go home. The War on Drugs cost American taxpayers $25.6 billion in 2013, and it is estimated they stop 1% of drugs from entering the country. Fail.

Immigration reform: Now I personally am for going back to Ellis Island standards for immigration. Pass a backround and health check? Welcome to America. Regardless of your stance on the issue its clear that the feds have no idea what they’re doing as illegal immigration has more than tripled since the Reagan administration.

No Child Left Behind: This is when we started the standardized test, which I was unfortunately lucky enough to experience the transition of. I went from enjoying school and learning new things, to spending a majority of my time practicing to pass the standardized test. This is the reason you have adults in college who don’t know who won the Civil War, or literally anything about the Holocaust. All the recourses go to the test. Math, Reading, English. They just want you smart enough to do your mundane job and never think outside of the box, because you are literally incapable of doing so. What’s that saying? Those who do not learn from history are destined to repeat it. Well it’s pretty hard to learn from something you know absolutely nothing about. This is what happens when you let the government decide what your kids learn. They learn nothing.

Obama’s Green Jobs: Obama had the hope of helping out the Eco friendly industry by training over 100,000 individuals to work in the field and get them jobs. At the end of the program about 8,000 people were employed at a cost of over $60,000 per person to get them those jobs. The government is clearly not good at creating jobs either.

I could write a 200 page article listing every failure of the US Government, but I’m sure I’d lose you rather quickly. The point is, the government sucks at literally everything it does. My generation is paying into a Social Security system we will never see a dime from because the government saw fit to bankrupt it. You really want these idiots in charge of wealth redistribution? You want them in control of every aspect of our lives? Monitoring everything we do? You trust them to take care of you and your family, when they can’t even take care of the Veterans who fought for our country and now are dying waiting to get healthcare?

If you’re over Crony Capitalism, I’m with you. We need a truly free market. If you want full blown socialism, you may be too far gone and I don’t know that there’s anything that can bring you back.

I’ll just leave you with this quote to ponder, by a great leader of the liberty movement, Ron Paul.

It must be remembered that the vast majority of mankind’s history has been spent living under the rule of tyrants and authoritarians. The ideas of Liberty are very new when you consider the big picture. By contrast, various forms of socialism and fascism have been adopted over and over again. Be wary of those who try to present these old and tired ideas as something new and exciting. Liberty and free markets are the way forward if we truly desire peace and prosperity.

A Lesson in Preschool Economics

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