Whose Money Is It?
Seems worthwhile to remind folks of something. The government has no money. They’re spending our money.
That came back to the front of my mind in light of two weeks of vandalism across the country, with some of those committing the crimes saying the property owner had insurance so they would be taken care of.
The first problem with that is that many of those store owners did not have insurance because they were already trying to do business in a high-crime area and could not get, or could not afford, coverage.
More importantly though, insurance companies get their money from the premiums we pay. If there are a lot of claims, the business model suggests that premiums will go up. Try having an accident in your car and see what happens to your rates.
In a broader sense, all of this talk about how government needs to infuse the economy with money forgets the basic premise that government only has the money we as taxpayers give it.
Sure, the federal government can, in essence, print money–but there is an end to all that, as evidenced by the ever-increasing deficits.
Nothing is free, including government payments. At some point, those of us who pay taxes will have to foot the bill for those. What sounds like a good idea at one point gets pretty expensive at another.
