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Get Government Out of Government

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Discovered in Puerto Rico – at least 10 trailers full of food, medicine, and baby supplies that were left to rot as a result of government ineptitude in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria, recently reported the NYT.

“Given the ongoing evidence of government’s inability to carry out even its most basic tasks, “why,” asks Michael Tanner from the Cato Institute, “do so many Americans want to expand its control over our lives?”

… the record of government in this country provide much more on which to hang faith in big government. Yet that doesn’t seem to make much of a difference. Indeed, every demonstrated government failure seems to lead inevitably to calls for … more government.

Obamacare – driven up the cost / driven down the quality of care.

Medicare – tens of trillions of dollars in debt.

The Veterans Administration – delivering substandard care to American veterans.

Well, then, the answer must be to put the government in charge of the entire U.S. health-care system.

U.S. government-run schools – millions of poor and minority students are left behind, despite massive increases in spending.

Well, then, the answer must be to spend still more, while attacking private alternatives.

100+ federal anti-poverty programs and roughly $1 trillion in anti-poverty spending –the poor are neither flourishing nor becoming self-sufficient.

Well, then, we must immediately spend more money on ever-more-complicated schemes.

Social Security – racing toward insolvency, as the hue and cry is to expand benefits and impose more restrictions on private retirement options.

Well, then, we must immediately spend more money on ever-more-complicated schemes.

Have government jobs programs failed to create meaningful and productive work?

We’ll just have the government guarantee everyone a job. Have government subsidies and regulations driven up the cost of everything from college to housing? I guess we’ll have to regulate and subsidize more.

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Debbie Young

Debbie, editor-in-chief of Richardcyoung.com, has been associate editor of Dick Young’s investment strategy reports for over three decades. When not in Key West, Debbie spends her free time researching and writing in and about Paris and Burgundy, France, cooking on her AGA Cooker, driving her Porsche Boxter S through Vermont and Maine, and practicing yoga.

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