On Sep 21, 9:48*pm, F. George McDuffee gmcduf...@mcduffee-
associates.us wrote:

Someone must pay for the infrastructure improvement and
maintenance, e.g. roads, bridges, canals, ports, airports,
sewers, water, etc. *Someone must pay for "education,"
especially for free, universal compulsory education, which
is required to keep the whole thing running. *Someone must
pay for the military force to defend the country. *Someone
must pay for the emergency/public safety services we all
take for granted such as police, fire, and EMT. *Someone
must pay for the courts, land registeries and prisons.
Someone must pay for clean food and effective drugs. Someone
must pay for the social services and "safety nets."


Unka' George

A long time ago I lived in Madison County, Alabama. The taxes were
fairly low, but those that worked for the county actually worked. And
were paid realistic wages. They had adequate pensions, but not gold
plated ones. At the time Madison County was the only county in the
U.S. that had every road in the county paved. And the roads were in
good shape. Not the pothole pocked roads that exist around here.

So yes all those things have to be paid for, but the total wage packet
for public workers should be about equal to the total wages in the
private sector. What has happened in most places is that the state
and county workers have unionized. And the union has been able to
bargain for better pensions and better healthcare than exists in the
private sector. This happens because those that approve the wage
contracts have no incentive to keep costs contained. If they approve
gold plated pensions, the public workers vote for them. So the
politicians prosper by approving wage and benefit increases.

This ends up requiring higher taxes. Which increases costs for
businesses, and leads to jobs going overseas.

We can afford all the government we need, but can not afford
government that gets paid more than the private sector.

Dan