Spending Other People's Money

[♦ nivek ♦]

Spending other people's money

The Voluntaryist

by Carl Watner

 

"The bailout is wrong because it steals from some and gives to others.

And it makes no difference if it is the poor stealing from the rich,

or the rich stealing from the poor. It is the stealing that is wrong;

not what or how or to whom it is dispensed. Spending other people's

money is wrong because you cannot rightfully spend what belongs to

someone else. Spending other people's money without their permission

is simply theft." (12/08)

 

http://www.voluntaryist.com/forthcoming/ba...bservations.php

[PaulQ]

The bailouts are not inherently wrong; they're just bailing out the wrong people. They are giving the money to the people who screwed up in the first place, rather than to the people who suffered the most from those screw-ups. For example, when the banks screwed up, the bailout money should have gone to the homeowners who faced losing their homes. With the auto sector, that money ought to go to those workers who face losing their jobs. The way it is now, people will still lose their homes and jobs, and the rich will stay rich on the backs of those people who just lost their homes and jobs. Pretty sad.

[DanInPA]

Yes, the bailouts ARE inherently wrong, as the article says, it's theft.

 

So are government sponsored welfare, gov funded research, NASA....and scores of other unconstitutional programs.

 

Dan

[PaulQ]

Yes, the bailouts ARE inherently wrong, as the article says, it's theft.

 

So are government sponsored welfare, gov funded research, NASA....and scores of other unconstitutional programs.

 

Dan

 

So, you think they steal money from childless people so that those with kids can have a school with teachers to send their kids to?

[DanInPA]

So, you think they steal money from childless people so that those with kids can have a school with teachers to send their kids to?

 

The federal govt has no reason to take money from someone (us), waste half of it and send the rest back-but only if schools follow their "guidelines". Right. How's that worked for the last 40 or 50 years? Think kids today are better educated?

[PaulQ]

So, you think they steal money from childless people so that those with kids can have a school with teachers to send their kids to?

 

The federal govt has no reason to take money from someone (us), waste half of it and send the rest back-but only if schools follow their "guidelines". Right. How's that worked for the last 40 or 50 years? Think kids today are better educated?

 

That would depend entirely on which country you're talking about. That said, schools in the United States 50 years ago were publicly funded. I'd say that, overall, kids today are still better educated than they were in the days prior to secular public education.

 

I suppose that people should also build their own roads if they want to drive, and that public libraries ought to not exist.

[DanInPA]

That would depend entirely on which country you're talking about. That said, schools in the United States 50 years ago were publicly funded. I'd say that, overall, kids today are still better educated than they were in the days prior to secular public education.

 

I can only address the US, as it's what I know. Yes, schools 50 years ago were publicly funded, but locally rather than from DC. Here is an Eighth grade Civics test from 1954. I doubt many college students could pass this today.

 

I suppose that people should also build their own roads if they want to drive, and that public libraries ought to not exist.

 

I'm addressing Federal Government waste here, I am not as familiar with State Constitutions (after all, there are 50 of them). As for roads, I haven't researched the interstate system and it's origins and can't address that issue until I do.

 

As for libraries, it is good that they are publicly funded, but I'd like to see them funded voluntarily, rather than by force.

 

Here's an example of what I'm talking about:

 

When Davy Crockett served in the United States House of Representatives, a bill was proposed appropriating money from the public treasury for the widow of a distinguished naval officer. This bill was about to be passed when Crockett arose and argued against the bill:

 

“Mr. Speaker – I have as much respect for the memory of the deceased, and as much sympathy for the sufferings of the living, if suffering there be, as any man in this House, but we must not permit our respect for the dead or our sympathy for a part of the living to lead us into an act of injustice to the balance of the living. I will not go into an argument to prove that Congress has no power to appropriate this money as an act of charity. Every member upon this floor knows it. We have the right, as individuals, to give away as much of our own money as we please in charity; but as members of Congress we have no right so to appropriate a dollar of the public money. Some eloquent appeals have been made to us upon the ground that it is a debt due the deceased. Mr. Speaker, the deceased lived long after the close of the war; he was in office to the day of his death, and I have never heard that the government was in arrears to him. This government can owe no debts but for services rendered, and at a stipulated price. If it is a debt, how much is it? Has it been audited, and the amount due ascertained? If it is a debt, this is not the place to present it for payment, or to have its merits examined. If it is a debt, we owe more than we can ever hope to pay, for we owe the widow of every soldier who fought in the War of 1812 precisely the same amount. There is a woman in my neighborhood, the widow of as gallant a man as ever shouldered a musket. He fell in battle. She is as good in every respect as this lady, and is as poor. She is earning her daily bread by her daily labor; but if I were to introduce a bill to appropriate five or ten thousand dollars for her benefit, I should be laughed at, and my bill would not get five votes in this House. There are thousands of widows in the country just such as the one I have spoken of, but we never hear of any of these large debts to them. Sir, this is no debt. The government did not owe it to the deceased when he was alive; it could not contract it after he died. I do not wish to be rude, but I must be plain. Every man in this House knows it is not a debt. We cannot, without the grossest corruption, appropriate this money as the payment of a debt. We have not the semblance of authority to appropriate it as a charity. Mr. Speaker, I have said we have the right to give as much of our own money as we please. I am the poorest man on this floor. I cannot vote for this bill, but I will give one week’s pay to the object, and if every member of Congress will do the same, it will amount to more than the bill asks.”

 

Source

[Amethyst]

Yes, the bailouts ARE inherently wrong, as the article says, it's theft.

 

So are government sponsored welfare, gov funded research, NASA....and scores of other unconstitutional programs.

 

Dan

 

 

You do realize that there is a whole heckuva lot of stuff we would be without if not for government funded research and NASA??

 

Telemedicine, for one thing, was funded by NASA and gives people care they would otherwise not get in remote places and rural areas.

 

Sorry, but I do not buy the argument that NASA and other such research is "inherently wrong". Too many benefits have come of such research for it to be somehow morally deficient.

[PaulQ]

What use of taxation and governance, then? The use of tax dollars to construct and maintain road infrastructure is theft from tax payers who do not drive. The use of taxpayer dollars to fund public libraries is theft from taxpayers who are illiterate and do not ever care to learn how to read. The use of taxpayer dollars to fund the infrastructure needed for global commerce is theft from those taxpayers who have no interest in the import or export of goods. The funding of a police force steals from those taxpayers who would prefer to protect their property on their own with firearms, and the funding of a fire station is theft from those who would prefer to fight their own fires.

 

Taken to its logical conclusion, the argument is that the collection of taxes is, effectively, theft; because at some level, someone who is contributing to taxes isn't benefiting from all that the money is being used for. Of course, there is a reason why we have taxes and why we continue to spend those tax dollars on things that might not benefit everyone; it's because, as a whole, it benefits us and future generations to have infrastructure, a police force, a fire station, a space program, and a library. Without publicly funded schools and libraries, we would not have secular institutions; we instead would end up with the church gaining a stranglehold on the people with libraries filled with only those books they like, and schools that only teach what they want.

 

A bailout in these times is something that could serve the greater good. Could is the operative word. Helping people keep their homes, for example, is good for the many. So is securing jobs for tax-paying Americans. That's because people with homes who have jobs continue to contribute to society in many different ways. A person who is homeless and jobless contributes nothing. We simply need to ask ourselves; what kind of world do we want for ourselves and our children? After all, there is no god looking out for us, so we'd better start looking out for each other. Each right move we make with taxpayer dollars is a move to secure a better future for ourselves and those who come after us. Do nothing, and watch the churches take over again, throwing us backwards centuries.

[pitchu]

The idea of pooling resources in order to achieve that which can't be done or is improbable to do individually is an idea as old as the simplest old societies.

 

Pooling resources only became seen as dreaded socialism/communism once money came into being. But the principle is the same, and I don't think there's anything sacred about coinage. This is not to say that there isn't waste and corruption in the means by which large societies get co-operative undertakings accomplished.

 

But there may be something very right, very necessary and fundamental for human connection in pooling resources... Barn-raising, anyone?

[Guest Net Eng]

The idea of pooling resources in order to achieve that which can't be done or is improbable to do individually is an idea as old as the simplest old societies.

 

I have no troubles with taxes. I have a large issue with tax dollars used for pork barrel projects.

 

What is and what is not necessary for the public good is a debate that will vary by the times. This debate is supposed to be carried out by our competent and duly elected officials... and now back to the real world. I blame the jack asses in Washington DC (both parties) and ourselves (we elected the jack asses). Unfortunately there does not appear to be any light at the end of the tunnel and I expect the same ole shit for the next 4 years. No I'm not bashing Obama just reserving judgment (I hope like hell I'm wrong and he really turns out to be a reformer).

 

As far as bailouts are concerned the autos should be left to bankruptcy. No apologies. Why the fuck should I give these companies a single dime when the asshats who are running these corporations are left in power ?? I call bullshit. The CEO (and anyone that has President) in those companies should be forced to resign as a condition of federal money. The leadership of the autos have failed their companies. The price of failure is losing your job. These guys get big bucks and take big risks. Time to pay the piper.

[Sokudo Ningyou]

The idea of pooling resources in order to achieve that which can't be done or is improbable to do individually is an idea as old as the simplest old societies.

 

I have no troubles with taxes. I have a large issue with tax dollars used for pork barrel projects.

 

What is and what is not necessary for the public good is a debate that will vary by the times. This debate is supposed to be carried out by our competent and duly elected officials... and now back to the real world. I blame the jack asses in Washington DC (both parties) and ourselves (we elected the jack asses). Unfortunately there does not appear to be any light at the end of the tunnel and I expect the same ole shit for the next 4 years. No I'm not bashing Obama just reserving judgment (I hope like hell I'm wrong and he really turns out to be a reformer).

 

As far as bailouts are concerned the autos should be left to bankruptcy. No apologies. Why the fuck should I give these companies a single dime when the asshats who are running these corporations are left in power ?? I call bullshit. The CEO (and anyone that has President) in those companies should be forced to resign as a condition of federal money. The leadership of the autos have failed their companies. The price of failure is losing your job. These guys get big bucks and take big risks. Time to pay the piper.

 

Pork barrel spending isn't always a bad thing; it's how some states get the money to pay for projects they need. But a lot of it IS ridiculous.

 

However...why anyone hasn't sat back and honestly looked at the bank bailout vs auto bailout and noticed:

 

The government was quicker than shit to bail out the banks, despite the outcry. And honestly, I'm going to guess that if all those banks did collapse, we'd be in a world of hurt. I could be wrong, but I don't think so many large loaning institutions suddenly disappearing is a good thing at the moment. If the economy was better, we could probably let them go and kick them in the ass on the way out, but not now. The biggest problem with the bailout is that it didn't argue for taking the money from CEOs and their ridiculous salaries, considering they obviously shouldn't have earned them. They knew they were screwing people; now they should be screwed. But those are the people on top, not employees. However, getting another job at a different bank that remained open is possibly not too difficult.

 

But when the auto industry (which, admittedly, should have been changing their business practices almost half a decade ago) asks for a bailout, the government says Go Fuck Yourself. And why? Oh, it's the Unions! The big fat Unions don't deserve help! For fuck's sake, the government has no problem essentially blaming blue collar Americans for getting a decent wage and benefits (what most of us want, and I for one don't begrudge them for being lucky enough to get it), and saying they shouldn't keep their jobs, but bank CEOs can. Was the industry deliberately fucking the economy by making SUVs people steadily didn't want? No. They shot themselves in the foot on that one. Yet the banks knew they were doing something wrong, and they've been barely slapped on the wrist.

 

And what does anyone think is going to happen if these thousands of people suddenly lose their jobs overnight? And not just in the factories making cars, but making parts (which will affect foreign cars as well), car lots, etc? Where can these people go to get jobs that won't be a huge cut in wages for them? Blame the CEOs, fine. But letting the businesses fail and putting thousands out of work because you're pissed at three people is absurd.

[Guest Net Eng]

And what does anyone think is going to happen if these thousands of people suddenly lose their jobs overnight? And not just in the factories making cars, but making parts (which will affect foreign cars as well), car lots, etc? Where can these people go to get jobs that won't be a huge cut in wages for them? Blame the CEOs, fine. But letting the businesses fail and putting thousands out of work because you're pissed at three people is absurd.

 

Fair enough.

 

However, leaving the same leadership but giving them more cash will will change what?? If these guys had the answers and strategies to fix their companies they would have done it.

 

Besides bankruptcy may be the only way for these companies to do the radical restructuring needed to turn them around (including renegotiating labor and supplier contracts).