From: lhughes@b11.b11.ingr.com (Lawrence Hughes)
Subject: Re: Nightline and Presidential Cantidates
Organization: Intergraph Corp. Huntsville, AL
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 14:53:23 GMT

In article <1992Nov19.080921.10505@mr.med.ge.com>, bednarek@picard.med.ge.com (Dennis Bednarek Mfg 4-6971) writes:
> 
> Well back on to the general subject of the economy.
> 
> First lets look at the difference between an unemployed
> American and a gainfully employed American.  An unemployed
> American cost the government over $10,000 a year in unemployment
> and additional benifets he/she receives, and does not have
> any income to pay taxes on.  A gainfully employed American
> making a minimum of $21,000 a year pay at least $4,000 in
> taxes.  That makes a difference in goverment dollars of
> at least $14,000 dollars for each American that can be taken
> off the welfare rolls and become productive.  If Clinton
> can force private industry to hire 1,000,000 unempolyed
      ^^^^^
> Americans at a living wage that means the goverment would
> have an additional 14,000,000,000.00.  
> 
> dennis

And if buffaloes had wings...

I think we have a pretty clear reading of the political persuation of the
author of this fascinating bit of drivel, from the highlighted word. I can't
call him a FASCIST, since that means that the government both CONTROLS and
OWNS the means of production. However, a SOCIALIST thinks that the
government should totally CONTROL the means of production, leaving the
"ownership" in private hands (easier to justify taxes that way, and besides,
the "private hands" can't do anything you don't want them to anyway - you
completely CONTROL them, right?).

So where are these million jobs supposed to come from? And overnight, at that,
just from Fuhrer Clinton's DECREE (In the beginning was the word, and the word
was TAXANDSPEND). Contrary to the simplistic world view of the reality-
challenged socialist, "jobs" are not a natural resource "hoarded" by those
nasty old capitalists who aren't willing to "share" them with the noble,
deserving poor... they are a natural outgrowth of the legitimate pursuit of
business PROFIT. Every kind of government intervention (e.g. minimum wage)
can only DECREASE the number of jobs. Each new tax on business eliminates some
of the money that might otherwise go to pay new, or higher salaries. Each man
(that is not a business owner, which almost anyone that really wants to CAN
become in this country, you just have to be willing to take horrendous risks
and work like a dog, only to have the government tell you what to do and take
most of your profits for committing the crime of "initiative") can market his
own work, knowledge, and skills to the business owner of his choice that has
a NEED for such a worker, and assuming he continues to give good worth in
return for the wage he is paid, what you have is called a JOB. The government
does not CREATE wealth in ANY way (although there are some theories that 
Desert Storm (tm) may well have yielded a profit) - it is a parasitical
organism than can only grow and prosper at the expense of its host organism
(guess who), until it consumes the host (with too much taxes and regulations).

Suggestion: before you expose yourself to further public ridicule with your
simple minded platitudinous blatherings, try reading a book on economics, by
a REAL economist, not a leftist hack such as Keynes. I recommend a little book
called "Economics in One Lesson" available at any quality bookstore. This
delightful little volume explains in terms simple enough even for the poster
of the above rot to understand, exactly what money and wealth are, what jobs 
are, the real effects of government intervention, exactly what socialism and
its direct and indirect effects are, etc. It explores the real ramifications
and secondary effects of things such as import duties, minimum wage laws, etc.

Larry "didn't you get a LITTLE hint from what happened to the USSR?" Hughes