When Congress cut tax rates for all taxpayers, it was a wholly
benign act. There were no victims, period. Congress did not -- by cutting
everyone's tax rate -- unjustly take money from anyone. Nor did taxpayers
whose top rate dropped from 36 percent to 33 percent, allowing them to keep
more of their own money, commit an act of aggression -- financially or
otherwise -- against taxpayers whose top rate dropped from 28 percent to 25
percent.
But what about in the financial fiasco? Are there are unjust
aggressors and true victims at the core of this crisis?
Absolutely. But the dividing line is not an income bracket,
because people of all incomes are on both sides of this conflict. If you
want to know which side you are on, just answer this question: Are you
getting bailed out? Or does the government expect you to bail someone else
out?
On one side are Americans who rely on themselves. On the other
side are Americans who rely on the federal government -- and politicians who
exploit that reliance to gain and maintain political power, and corporate
bureaucrats who exploit that reliance to get money.
On one side are Americans who exhibited the ancient virtues of
hard work, thrift and prudence. The people who never bought -- and never
would buy -- a house they could not afford. These people will pay for the
bailout.
On the other side are Americans who exhibited a core vice of the
welfare state: wanting something they did not earn. They took out a mortgage
they could not afford, or from a position of government power pushed public
policies promoting mortgages to people who could not afford them, or
profited within some corporate bureaucracy from wholesale commerce in such
mortgages. These are the people who will benefit from the bailout.
What is the solution? Roll back government dependency in all its
forms. As long as the federal government maintains a welfare state, there
will be politicians in Washington, D.C., who have an interest in increasing
the number of people who will need bailouts and decreasing the number of
people who pay.