EXACTLY what DEMOCRATS do to Americans....it is their goal! Otherwise they would have NO JOB!
Significantly, Smith's work came at just the time colonists in the New World were discovering that their little corner of the globe was outstripping England in wealth creation, to say nothing of freedom and opportunity, as Edmund Burke pointed out to the Parliament in his "Speech on Conciliation."
Burke provided a detailed account of the productivity of the Americans, as compared with that of his own nation, as part of reasoning for "conciliation."
Individual enterprise was, and remains, the creator of wealth for a family or a nation. The political elite know this, and that is why they must find ways to regulate and confiscate the earnings of that individual labor, all the while they are enslaving those whom they claim to represent in Washington.
America's Founders warned us of the dangers of allowing power to our representatives, knowing that "a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take everything you have." Of course, it's not going to be an efficient operation either!
PING!
Who else but government can harm people in ways that are both highly visible and illegal, and get away with it? I suppose some public enterprises may manage that sometimes, but I think government is better at it.