Thomas Sowell on Greed

Paul Ryan: Making Sense on the Economy and Why OWS is Wrong

Rep. Paul Ryan

Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin shares some economic wisdom in an interview with the American Enterprise Institute.  He explains well why "wealth redistribution" only makes people poorer, destroys opportunity and increases misery.

His solution to poverty and unemployment:

...our answer is upward mobility — not begrudging people who become successful, but making it easier for people to find success, to bring those rungs of the economic ladder within reach of people who’ve never scaled it before. Grow the pie versus redistribute slices of a shrinking pie. That’s what our society has always prided itself on. That’s the American system we’ve had. … It would be a shame to get rid of it and transform it into a social democracy model like you have in Europe, which simply means bitter austerity and shared misery.

On why redistribution is not the answer to poverty:

I’m just saying look at the complete picture. And the complete picture is that our transfer programs should be aimed at the people who need them, not people who don’t. Our tax system should not have as its primary, guiding principle redistribution. It should have growth as its primary principle so you can accelerate mobility. When you have a tax system aimed at redistribution and narrowing disparities, you end up slowing down growth and slowing down mobility.

 On government "fixing" income disparity:

As a person in government, I don’t see it as my job to try and micromanage the outcome of people’s lives. I see it as trying to advance the premise of equality of opportunity and getting people as much opportunity to improve themselves as possible. … The whole premise of this argument is wrong. The economy is not a zero-sum system. One man’s gain does not necessarily come at another man’s loss. … Wealth is created. Steve Jobs started Apple in his garage not by taking from somebody else but by creating and inventing something. Wealth and growth are organic and don’t necessarily come from somebody else’s loss.

On Barack Obama's "class warfare" strategy for reelection:

There’s far more anxiety in society because the economy is so bad. … It’s easier to find a scapegoat than address the root causes of these problems. But obviously [President Barack Obama] is banking his reelection on this tact. … He doesn’t have a good record to run on. The results are abysmal. He’s clearly not going to triangulate like Bill Clinton because … he’s far more ideological than Bill Clinton was. … So all he’s got left is to take all the anxiety that is building in America and try and tap into it and channel it toward class resentment. These are powerful emotions — fear, envy, anxiety, resentment — very powerful emotions but dark emotions. They are extremely divisive. But it seems to me that’s the plan.

 Ryan imparts a lot of insight and wisdom.  Read the whole interview here.

Let's Redistribute High College Grades to Lower Performing Students!

American Power has a post today that features a video of graphic characters having a discussion.  The characters are discussing college students' grades, i.e. how the GPA of higher performing students should be redistributed to those with lower grades.

The film eerily reproduces the attitudes and arguments of the anonymous college brat whom I engaged in debate yesterday.  This video applies his own arguments to himself, except that instead of redistributing wealth, we are redistributing college grades.  The analogy is apt:  both scenarios involve taking something away from those who have earned it, to give to someone who has not. The film even provides the same lame rationalizations.  See the video here.

Strangely enough, there is an ongoing petition drive at U.C. Merced to do just this:  redistribute grades.  There isn't much enthusiasm for the drive.  American Power reports:

And don't miss William at Pirate's Cove, who has video from the petition drive at UC Merced to redistribute grades. Not going over too well, (un)surprisingly: "Libs Love Redistributing Everything But What Is Their Own."

This could be a trend.  Let's redistribute beautiful women to uglier guys!  It isn't the latter's fault they were born with bad looks, and keeping all beautiful women for handsome guys just isn't fair.  Or, we could redistribute handsome men to uglier women for the same reason.   Let's give gold medals to Olympic runners who come in last!  Why should all gold medals be given to "the privileged" who are faster runners due to their unearned access to good genes?