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Government always behaves in a predictable manner, and nothing’s more obvious than when it comes to taxes.
At any given time there are a set of programs that government runs that costs it a certain set of money. Yet government doesn’t have enough money to to pay for the programs that they have (or they create more programs such that they don’t have enough money), so they have one of two options: cut spending or raise taxes.
The problem is that people grow to depend on government programs—regardless of whether the private sector would replace the function if it could compete!—such that they complain if the program disappears, so government seeks to raise taxes, justifying the action because there’s the need.
The problem is, when they raise taxes, they put a higher burden on those that remain in the tax system. So this causes some to lose their jobs, or move their jobs elsewhere.
This, in turns, adds more people to government programs (welfare, unemployment, etc.), which increases the cost of those programs…
You would think that government would learn that this cycle is unsustainable; however, that would be assuming too much common sense to these elected officials who are simply trying to keep their jobs in public service, so they keep promising more and borrowing more!
The solution is pretty simple, wean people off of government by phasing out government programs—incentivizing investment and use of private companies—but don’t expect to see that any time soon, for it’s in the politician’s best interest to keep you in debt and dependant on him.
Kind of sick, isn’t it?
This is why term limits need to be mandated for all politicians, across the board. Fact is that once they get comfy, they start making deals and grabbing tax dollars and earmarks and pork and all that stuff. Make sure to kick them out after 2 terms, and I bet all this wasteful spending will go away all by itself.
I like Ling’s suggestion!
We recently had to put our little girl on LA’s state health insurance for children (i.e. Louisiana’s Medicaid) when my hubby lost his benefits at his job. Last week she was sick with a 104 fever so I made an appointment with the dr. It was our first time going to the doctor since getting the gov’t insurance for her. When I made the appointment at 11:30 at night I didn’t think to tell the nurse on-call that we had new insurance. When I got in the next day to the dr. office, they told me at the receptionist desk that I had been assigned a pediatrician under the Medicaid plan (a doctor and clinic I’ve never used before) and we would have to go there to get her treated. So i stuffed the Medicaid card back in my wallet and said, “Fine, I’ll pay cash for the appointment.” She told me (very nicely, I understand the lady is just doing her job) that because we were Medicaid recipients she was not allowed by law to take cash payments from us. She finally worked a loophole for me (since our medicaid info had never been entered in the computer she “pretended” she had never seen the card) and said I could pay cash for the appointment and then take it up with Medicaid later to get the bill paid by them.
What galled me about the whole thing is all the red tape. Here I had a child with a very high temperature needing to be seen by a doctor but because the government of the state of Louisiana controls when and where I can go, I might not have been able to get her seen without the help of a receptionist willing to bend the rules in the interest of the child.
This is precisely why these programs don’t work. Take the choice out of the hands of the people and you wind up with people (and children!!!) who don’t get the treatment they need. I agree health care costs are too high and EVERY AMERICAN needs a break from that. But that break should be given without the government having total control over our medical lives.
I admire the state of Louisiana for wanting to provide health care to ALL children and I think it is a noble ideal. But the government has to let go of its control issues and let people make decisions for themselves regarding their own medical care.
Sorry this is long and a little off topic, but it’s had my blood boiling for a couple of days. Now they are saying we “need” an extra $500 billion for Obama’s healthcare plan when the deficit was projected this morning to already be $1.8 trillion. WHEN IS IT GOING TO END????
Rachels last blog post..I’ll take porcelain skin, extra crispy please.