A Brief History of American Welfare State

According to deficit forecasts in President Barack Obama’s latest budget, the national debt will surpass $20 trillion by 2016. If this occurs (and it is almost certain to occur), then Obama will add more to the national debt during his presidency than all prior presidents combined, despite collecting projected record-high tax receipts each year of his last term in office. --snip-- The federal government has essentially become a wealth redistribution center, for it collects enormous sums of money through taxation ($2.45 trillion total in 2012), and then distributes this money to select people in countless “payments for individuals” ($2.3 trillion spent in 2012). The leftover money isn’t nearly enough to pay for the interest on the national debt, not to mention the other government functions that must also be funded,

Entitlements purchased the 2012 POTUS election.
As long as they can keep making that work, it won’t change.

What I can’t predict is when the Baraqqi/Bernake/Geithner/Lew minibucks will implode. That’s when TSHTF.

Laws are making it harder and harder for poorer, less educated people to make it in life. For example, 20 years ago, one could get a street vending license in a certain city for $35, then there was a complaint that some vendors were not paying their taxes. So, instead of bringing people in and showing them how to do their sales taxes, the council voted to require a $250 fee for the license and $1,500 per year as a Fee in Lieu of Taxes. One needed to gross $26,000 for the sales tax portion of this to equal the FILOT. Many poor venders who worked part time or sold in poorer locations only grossed $10 or $15,000 per year. Many of them were forced out of business. Are they working now or collecting welfare?

Then the city decided to have a moratorium on granting new licenses. Vendors who had survived the first attack but had to drop out to care for sick family members or other problems were not able to renew their license. I know one person who paid 4 years, $6,000, to keep their license while not selling, and caring for sick relatives. Finally they gave up and turned in their license. Now they can’t get a new one. Big business interests were primarily responsible for these law changes.

It is very clear the problem in America is this horrible union of big business and big government.

We no longer have a market economy where competition exists. We have big business, who buy off politicians during the election cycle, who then are able to push for regulations and taxes which benefit them (see internet sales tax) and cripple compeition.

In order to enforce what big business needs, gov’t must expand (see Obamacare)

The average American is hurt, and you see more potential entrepruners unable to compete and ending up on the welfare dole.

91 percent of the workforce is non-unionized now. Commie Unions are on the ash heap of history.

The NEA. I blame W for giving them additional power with his horrible expansion at the federal level with No Child Left Behind.

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