Dan Henninger's excellent February 10 WSJ Wonderland column entitled "Is Egypt Hopeless" clearly explains the problem with Egypt, Tunisia, & all of the rest of the MENA countries of the Middle East & North Africa such as Jordan, Yemen, & Algeria - anywhere from 35% to 50% of the working population in these countries is employed by the state - in other words only a small percentage of entrepreneurs may actually be left creating wealth or anything else of value. In such an economy you sooner more than likely than later run out of money to pay the government workers no matter how hard or responsibly they seem to work.
Now this statist-bureaucratic formula for failure has been the topic of numerous messages on this blog as it pertains to America. In light of all of this trouble in Egypt it is pitiful that earlier this past week in Washington the President of the American Federation of Government Employees Union and his members were recorded protesting against reining in federal spending including their huge pensions.
Doug - Thanks for passing along this article. This has clearly pointed out to me one obvious omission I have made in discussing the need for money to come in to an economy from outside its economic sphere. What I had said, I guess, sort of implies that government workers paying taxes to employ other government workers certainly does not build an economy any more than us serving one another hamburgers and selling one another products made in China.
ReplyDeleteThis article only goes to further fuel my fire to champion our last hope for saving the American economy and the American dream, and that is the FairTax.