Priced Off
By: Anthony Bialy
Tags: Wealth Transfer, Inflation, Economy, Debt, Handouts

Unseen costs are the most expensive. That ironic economic trick seems mean enough that we should get a Ouija board and ask Adam Smith what’s up. But invisible burdens weighing down wallets are the only way anyone pays attention to an otherwise endless bill. Politicians proclaiming what you use is free sure creates a lot of debt. Enjoy a timeshare lunch that prospective rubes can’t decline.

Just put it on the tab. Pushing off payment to later means getting things now for free. And nobody seems to be calling us on our rather luxurious spending, so order more mimosas now. Another trillion freaking dollars in debt is rung up before the mustard needs to be replaced. Returnig to merely being broke seems impossible, so why even try? Making the number unfathomable so adding to it is shrugged off is one way of expanding state power. Government’s lone accomplishment is excusing failure.

People still have to explain what a tax refund is if you wonder why government never shrinks. It’s apparently never okay to presume everyone’s up on the basics. In case anyone’s learning or could use a review, a purported refund is what you overpaid returned to you.

Getting back what’s yours is accompanied by zero interest, of course. But why bother giving a little extra for held money when recipients are so grateful? Throw cash around at Five Guys like you’re the sixth.

The simple and sinister act of withholding means those fleeced never see just how much is confiscated. There’s a reason politicians would never replace the emblematically monstrous IRS with, say, a national sales tax that showed up on every receipt. Seeing just how much our stupid capital spends on stupider programs would be the best way to get smarter. Suddenly ticked taxpayers would want to keep more of the full salaries they receive.

The surest way to limit health care is to make it a right. Sanctimony doesn’t cure illness as hoped. Someone compelled to do work for you is totally not slavery, so get the notion that forcing doctors to cure you by law is a violation.

I suppose we could just buy the services we need and watch what must be exchanged to get new items fall naturally as voluntary employees offer them. But lowering how much we spend by order sure seems official. The compulsory monetary surrender drop is bound to work just like gun control stops every criminal who obeys the law.

Other than the dire philosophical and practical consequences of trying to engineer economics so we can get things free, it’s a good deal. Not thinking about the source of what consumers use is bound to make prices disappear. Cast a spell like the one with funds that go into a pot we were assured magically filled itself with currency. Acid melted through the cauldron’s bottom, to the detriment of those just now learning Harry Potter was fiction. Wannabe warlocks can’t fill it fast enough with money taken from the useful.

Look at the raises never given. Wait: that’s tricky. The problem with ruining something is never seeing good things that could’ve come from not setting money aflame.

An evil corporation forced to subsidize a government that incinerates cash can’t pay more naturally. Raising the minimum wage is nothing more than a way for arsonists to compensate for destroying what could be voluntary with coercion. And forget the skyrocketing personal budgets from artificially increasing wages, as noticing effects is for right-wing haters. Consider grave unforeseen results a premium for the privilege of government caring about you.

Noticing what’s missing thanks to confiscated opportunities is the same and also the opposite of a changing economy’s signals. People see the mall store close and lament what ordering products to the ether has done to commerce. It’s especially glaring to those who kvetched that centralized indoor shopping centers drove Mom and Pop both out of business. Regardless, what’s not visible is the savings of consumers who appreciate every item they could want brought to the doormat. The place where you hung out with crimped hair during your teens if you’re in your 40s can’t do that.

Thinking government spending doesn’t subtract anything is so dumb that adherents might have to run for office. Recipients are not billed themselves, so math and reality must say it’s complimentary. Someone picking up your tab means dinner was free, which will be a surprise when you’re dropped off.

Those planning to eat the rich will starve rather quickly. All this oh so efficient cash tossing is subsidized by confiscating from some wealthy bastard. Jealousy is surely healthy in every way. Someone more successful than you owes you. Also claim they’re unproductive for economic prosperity and personal peace.

It’s time to have that difficult discussion about where money comes from. Reviewing simple concepts is only patronizing if everyone comprehends them, The prevailing sense that life wouldn’t make us broke if only Congress cared enough to ban them indicates that’s just not so. Pretending anything is handed out at zero expense explains why debt is deep into 14 blasted figures.

There’s a swell deal ahead aside from the government’s inherent inefficiency while buying garbage nobody wants, punishment for success, presumption that paved roads are the key to individual prosperity, class warfare resentment, and murdered initiative. On the other hand, recipients can pretend there’s no bill. You’ll never believe how much $1,400 costs you.

Notice what you get for what the government buys for you, which is not much. But it’s impossible to keep receipts. Every single one of the quadrillions of pennies constitutes necessary spending, which is why the entity responsible for everything spends them. If government does something, it must be lawful.