Say the federal
government taxes a rich guy $10,000 and hands out $1,000 to each of ten poor
people. That will help reduce the gap between rich and poor, right?
Wrong, not in
the long run.
Here’s why: Poor
folks need all of their income to support themselves. Rich folks spend only
part of their income and invest the rest. Those investments generate on-going jobs.
Over the long pull, the jobs raise the income of the ten poor folks more than
the one-time $1,000 they would otherwise have received.
With our
gigantic federal government, only a small portion of new revenues actually
reach the poor. Some goes to prosperous crony capitalists. Some pays the
salaries of federal bureaucrats, whose average income, including benefits, is
way higher than that of average Americans.
Legislators
should attend to the people’s long-term interests, not the short term. Low tax
rates for everyone, including the rich, eventually make everybody better off.
Sent
to many papers on September 4, 2017. Published by the Concord Monitor on September
10, 2017.
