Doing good, equality and individual freedom

27 Mar 2011. It turns out that 3 February 1913 was a poor day for individual freedom. In the name of doing good and achieving equality, the 16th amendment to the Constitution was ratified. How are we doing? In the ensuing 90-odd years we have created the most efficient and lucrative tax taking system the world has ever seen. The amount of cash available to governments was, is, will be breathtaking. What’s the government’s record on improving quality of life? In my opinion, it’s not good. Have we eliminated poverty or created a permanently entitled underclass? After many trillion dollars of expenditures to eliminate poverty I would say the picture is dimmer now than when individuals were primarily responsible for sheltering, feeding, clothing and caring for themselves. There is a distinction between caring for those who cannot care for themselves and arbitrarily defining the downtrodden via an income level and then bestowing all manner of benefits on them. Has the government affected health care in a positive way? I think not. The imposition of the employer health insurance mandate during the World War II brought the first of many distortions to the market of health care. While no one wants the sick, injured and dying to go without care, yet in the name of this good we have created a most coercive scheme of tax takings and restriction of individual freedom. When government says you must buy insurance, not buying it becomes a crime. Never in our country’s history has not doing something with your own earnings been a crime. Welcome to the land of equality -- everybody forced to accept the same outcome independent of individual effort.