It is hard to think of anything more cruel or self-defeating than to destroy the spirit and ambition within a population. Promising equal results to all will certainly result in a race to the bottom for everyone because all incentive will be eliminated thus ensuring failure. The ambitious crowd will cease to strive and take risk while the apathetic crowd will never be motivated to venture into realizing any aspiration. For as unkind as it seems that there are some in society that have attained a disproportionate amount of abundance, it is even more unkind to extinguish all hope that the others may ascend to the same level of accomplishment. Notions of social justice sound utopian, but as often true of Government promises; they seldom deliver and create massive destruction as a result of their implementation. Having different and unequal results in society should be viewed as a gift that facilitates a better life for all of us. Allowing a system that rewards effort and accomplishment will rightly keep America’s arrow pointed up in the future, anything to the contrary will guarantee an outcome not even worthy of a dismal participation trophy.

The more plausible objective of the social justice movement is the unspoken goal of achieving income redistribution, a concept centered on equal result instead of equal opportunity. The concept of justice is asserted to portray the belief that some citizens among us rightfully deserve the same result as other more prosperous citizens and society has not delivered on that conviction, thus it is seen as an injustice that needs to be remedied. What makes this so attractive is that is requires no responsibility for one’s standing in life, it is too easy to play the victim proclaiming how unfair everything appears while expecting financial resolution under the pretext of justice. Equally disturbing to this thinking are the proponents of this mindset that actually believe this to be legitimate and expect one to compensate another only because they have attained wealth. The results are not perceived to be equal in our society, thus the remedy of reallocation is needed, and this can be accomplished while proclaiming it to be about equal opportunity. If it was really about equal opportunity and not equal result, then why is it not labeled social opportunity or something similar? A question that comes to mind is if all the money was equally redistributed tomorrow, would there still be a social justice movement in search of opportunity? If the answer is no, then ask yourself how long would it be before it resurfaces again. The answers are obvious and easily illustrate the true objective of social justice however malicious and absurd it may be.

The Government will continue to propagate this type of crude scrutiny, but do not be lulled into their simplistic and disingenuous judgments. These are the same people that blamed Short Sellers back in the fall for the drop in the stock market; even going as far as banning short selling for a period only to find it made no difference in the end because once again they also are just market participants positioning an investment while other participants are positioning against them. Pointing a finger and clamping down on one participant in the market and not another simply has the effect of reducing liquidity to the whole market, and having robust investing on both sides of all trading is what makes the market discover its true value. The law of supply and demand will be the true determinant in the pricing of assets, and it is important to remember that in the short run it is simply the “perception” of that supply and demand that is likely the cause of any temporary price aberrations.

Many prominent figures in our history had an obvious distrust for Government, in fact, our Founders wrote the Constitution with the thought in mind to bind the hands of Government. Any person that understands the true nature of Government will realize it is an extremely blunt instrument, so any public solutions should be taken with extreme caution to minimize the destruction that will certainly be unleashed. This is a concept understood and illustrated with these few selected quotes by the men that held the highest office within our Government.

Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.
-George Washington

Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms of Government those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.
-Thomas Jefferson

I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the Government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.
-Thomas Jefferson

Where an excess of power prevails, property of no sort is duly respected. No man is safe in his opinions, his person, his faculties, or his possessions.
-James Madison

The essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse.
-James Madison

I have accepted a seat in the House of Representatives, and thereby have consented to my own ruin, to your ruin, and to the ruin of our children. I give you this warning that you may prepare your mind for your fate.
-John Adams

A Government big enough to give you everything you want is a Government big enough to take from you everything you have.
-Gerald R. Ford

The most terrifying words in the English language are: I’m from the Government and I’m here to help.
-Ronald Reagan

How many of these quotes sound relevant to the Government we are witnessing today? With beliefs such as these from former Presidents, we should give some serious thought about why we believe Government can be relied upon to offer solutions to us as citizens; they have a terrible history of solving issues and a long history of creating them. If these men held such an obvious distrust in the Government’s nature and its abilities speaking from their executive positions, then why should we place our faith in this institution? All we have to do is seek the council of our own history to clearly see that this is indeed a foolish path to travel. America became a great nation because its Government minimized its own intrusion thereby allowing its individual citizens to prosper. Unfortunately, that is not the case anymore with our invasive Government that is emboldened by public apathy which will undoubtedly have the opposite effect. As this continues to unfold, it will ensure that the race to the bottom is proceeding as warranted.

Unions in a nutshell are simply nothing more than labor socialism, and being such makes it very difficult for them to be competitive. In a Union, as in any large group, there are going to be highly productive individuals as well as the average and below average people with protected jobs and pay based on seniority. Not using performance based criteria results in the best performers having to cover for the performance of the laggards which results in the collective being average at best. The optimal method would be to reward the highly productive, purge the laggards, and motivate the average workers to become better, only this will ensure an improved workforce and higher productivity. Union members also must pay dues for the privilege of being a part of this created and protected “average” collective. It exists by building worker dependency that will ensure those dues will continue to roll in for management so they can keep cashing their nice paychecks. The strategy employed is to keep the workers subjugated so they can be used as pawns for the ultimate goal of securing money and power for the privileged few. This sounds precisely like another institution we are all familiar with as citizens known as our Government. Hmm!

It is easy to see why the Union model is failing in this country and it will continue to do so unless it can begin to seriously focus itself to compete with the intention of winning in the marketplace and not just surviving for maximum entitlement. In the absence of this kind of motivation, the more ambitious, focused, and disciplined competitors around the world will be happy to bury them. Competing in the marketplace is crucial because it determines success and failure, and it will be very hard for them to accomplish considering the entitled environment created by the Union mindset. This labor socialism is obviously going to be at a major disadvantage because it does not motivate its workers to excel and there is little individual responsibility expected. The marketplace will continue to require more efficiency from the producers that are willing and able to deliver it, and the rest will slowly erode away. Extorting a mediocre manufacturer for better pay and benefits while ignoring global competition is destined to fail, instead maybe they should focus on why they are “mediocre” to begin with and be more proactive with that issue than with demanding any more concessions.

Business is not an altruistic entity that exists solely for the employment of people with total disregard for the risk investors assume. It does not even make it to the planning stages without someone willing to risk their money on the endeavor. In essence, there is an implicit contract established that labor will offer their services and investors will offer their capital and if profits are attained then both parties may continue such pursuit. There are a lot of things that have to be done right in operating a business before it can earn a profit and it is here that the true value is represented. It requires a product to be produced that the public will buy in sufficient quantity to maximize the revenues into the company, and all aspects of that product must be planned and managed. It also requires that the entire operation of the company must be applied efficiently to contain the cost for the revenue that is generated. In short, profit is a number that captures the effectiveness of employing people and resources to produce a product by focusing all aspects of operations into a measurable goal that either justifies its existence or not. Making statements proclaiming that now is not the time for profits is dead wrong because it is always the right time for profits since that is what keeps business sharp and focused hence making it as efficient and competitive as possible.

It is the profit motive that differentiates private industry from the Government, and it is the reason why private industry is so much more productive and efficient. The Government does not care about such things as revenues or costs, making a payroll, or any other component of profitability. They simply do whatever they desire and the cost is just something that is the taxpayer’s problem. They have no appreciation for optimizing all the various functions that must happen to produce a profit. It is easy for our Government to tell business to ignore profits because that is the simple world in which they reside. Selling their distorted judgment to the public is all too easy by simply tagging it with the image of greediness. However, as one can see it entails much more than that, it is both necessary and important in the business community to ensure the competitiveness of their companies around the world. We should have a greater understanding for the essential role that the profit motive serves in our society, for it certainly is not about fat-cats getting rich at the expense of the little guy as the Government would have you believe.

A question worth pondering arises by considering the amount of pain that will be created to work this program back into solvency, what is the Government willing to do to accomplish it? What if they increase the withholding and the eligibility age and drive the benefits down only to find they still have an unsustainable solution remaining? A solution that has such miniscule benefits for the masses of baby boomers that will be drawing upon it that it will be politically suicidal. There will be a delicate balance between how much higher the withholding can increase versus how much the benefit to recipients can be driven down, and there will be definite limits to both choices which may not be enough to fully solve the issue going forward.

With any potential shortfall looming alongside what is surely to be a healthy dose of governmental incompetence and inefficiency, it leads me to an obvious target that may be plundered in order to augment the public system. That target being individual IRAs, 401ks, SEPs, or any other contribution-based accounts that individuals use to invest for their retirements. Since these accounts only exist because the Government provided for them in the tax code, would they possibly consider them to be an alternative to social security thus sweep them over into the public system and away from the individuals? Would they dare appropriate personal accounts to bolster a failed public system, perhaps by adding some type of credit in excess of the normal calculated social security benefit for these individuals even if it will be insufficient compensation for a lifetime of personal contributions? Another method that would accomplish the same thing is excluding people with personal retirement accounts from receiving social security benefits until their personal accounts have been exhausted using a prescribed withdrawal schedule, only then would they be eligible for social security benefits for their remaining years. The Government would essentially exclude, thus penalize, all the lifetime savers so benefits can be paid to the ones that did not provide for their futures. Does this sound familiar in our world today? You may be thinking to yourself “they would not do that,” or “they can’t do that.” My reply to both is a simple one word question. Really? I have seen many things recently they “could not do” and they did them regardless without hesitation or much resistance. Making an assumption that they have any integrity when it comes to their agenda at hand seems laughable based on recent events and their demonstrated arrogance. Whatever your mindset is concerning our Government’s integrity, it is a thought worth considering.

A place where you are permitted to be successful provided you share an ever-increasing amount of that success with the masses of people that failed to achieve or have chosen to not even try.

A nation of citizens clutching to nothing more than “hope” that they will not be crushed by the massive debt amassed by the few to acquire and maintain political power at the expense of many.

A country perceived with such wealth that its citizens commonly choose to remain uninformed and uninvolved yet they still expect the entitlement of that wealth.

An unconcerned populace expecting a prosperous future while blatantly disregarding all perils since they have never proved ruinous before. Assurance is bestowed by the impression that government cares about its citizens more than itself.

Anybody that proposes increased taxes to be paid by others, while excluding themselves or some other segment, is simply doing nothing more than freeloading in our society. Apparently, their upbringing never offered the lesson that they should pay their own way in life and not pass it on to someone else. A better message would be to encourage individual responsibility that does not expect the Government to provide a living for one by the fleecing of another. This simple change of philosophy will have the astonishing outcome of reducing governmental expenditures by converting dependent payees into productive payers into the system, which then reduces the need for more taxes. Limiting the size of our Government is the only viable solution that will be sustainable, because no amount of other people’s income will ever be sufficient to pay for the ever expanding crowd that just prefers to be a sponge.