- Competing World Views

My buddy Gary sent me the above image at a frighteningly early hour this morning. Even if you don't know already, it's not hard to figure out that it is a depiction of how the world works in the mind of a socialist. But Gary had a very different spin on it. He thought that this might be a more accurate depiction of the world if you imagine the bag of money as a burden instead of a blessing. From his note:

Ironically I think it could easily be viewed as representing the increasingly massive burden the public sector is placing on the private sector, including reinterpreting that big bag of "evil profits" to instead represent the burgeoning government liabilities (unfunded as well) incurred by deliberately myopic politicians whose planning horizon
only extends to the next election.


I think he has a point.

But the problem with the socialist world view is that it does not include any reward for risk taking. In the real world the future is uncertain and rife with risks. The free market world view allows people to benefit from risk taking or to bear it's burden themselves. that provides each individual with an incentive to manage risk correctly. But the socialist world view relies on the people at the top taking away gains made by some people and giving them to others who haven't made any. So there is no incentive for anyone to take a risk let alone to take it wisely.

That's more or less why the concept needs to be purged from how their world works. For socialists (including virtually all of the modern Democrat party) they would prefer a world where there are no risks at all. And that position permeates their every policy view from retirement plans, to medical care, to career advancement. Where 'collectivism' is the goal, risk cannot be discussed.

It's their hope that this leads to a more 'equitable' world where there are no big losses. But in reality, what their policies lead to is a world where the leaders make all the decisions about risk without any real incentive to make them it correctly. Then the burden of their mistakes are shared across the whole spectrum of the people they rule.

In the meantime, since the first concern of every politicians is maintaining enough political support to keep power, they end up doling out the benefits of their successes to specific political classes or key support groups like unions, big business, civil servants, or other rent seeking entities.

So while they promise a world where everyone gets an equal share, what they really deliver is a worldview like this one:




Please forgive my crappy artwork. This was thrown together in about 5 minutes - I have a real job after all.

Anyway - all this matters since it's the debate we're having now. Do we want people to be rewarded for successfully managing the risks of being alive - or do we want to reward them for having close ties to a politician with power?

This is what we need to decide.