INVEST v. MANAGE v. SPEND
Saturday, July 24, 2021
Of the people, by the people, for the people …
The principal role of every democratic government is to collect money and then spread it around in providing service to citizens and taxpayers and redistributing that money.
Whether managing natural resources, building schools, operating roads, or weaving a social safety net, that’s who look to – to do it for us, to do what we are not organized collectively to do for ourselves, we citizens delegate those roles to our governments.
Consent of we the governed is the requisite foundation of this element of our society, but I’m rethinking my consent …
Sure, they make laws and run administrative departments to enforce them – they mainly collect money and distribute it.
If we take away taxing power, and you take away borrowing power and spending power, we’d be left with an empty deflating balloon of largesse with nothing left to do.
Yet, we need that largesse.
Modern society begs and pleads for spending in industries, communities, causes and is shamelessly begging for stimuli. All that, when we know that government does a slower and poorer job of everything.
Most government administrations/civil service decisions are rooted in the non-partisan delivery of programs and legislation put in place by lawmakers.
But every lawmaker is, in every moment, a partisan panderer for support and donations – proving for sure that humans can both suck and blow at the same time.
In the run-up to an election, as we are witnessing every day in Canada, Liberal cabinet ministers are flitting all over the country to announce, or to re-announce, funding for every imaginable purpose. Each announcement is explained as solving a problem, stimulating the economy, relieving suffering in some form, and most announcements of projects magically address all of those.
By contrast, take any government recently elected or re-elected – they explain little, spend less, and drag their feet on decisions, often blaming the economy, some other government or the previous leaders as the reason there is not enough money.
This pendulum of spend, or not, is perpetual.
I wonder if there has ever been a government that called itself ‘democratic’ that didn’t do this brand of double-talk to buy our votes with our own money?