Most professional politicians love to say they are for helping the poor, yet so many of their programs create more poor people. Why do you think that is? I do NOT think the proven ignorance of professional politicians is the cause of their damaging programs. Rather it is clear that the root cause of those damaging programs that create more poor people is because professional politicians need to be reelected over and over until they want to retire on taxpayer-paid pensions. The surest path to reelection for a professional politician is to “broaden his base,” that is find more voters who believe they need what the politician is promoting.
Since professional politicians who are for helping the poor will get the poor people’s vote, the simple mind of a professional politician will invariably lead him to the conclusion that he must create more poor people! Voila! The trend of the poor getting poorer is explained! That is exactly what professional politicians want to happen! (Never mind that they say they want the opposite, the Great Saul Alinksy has taught us that lying is completely justified by the ends.)
It takes a bit more wisdom and understanding of human nature than most professional politicians have to see that “creating wealth” yields better results for society than “helping the poor” does.
Oh I hear the screams now. “Creating wealth” is claimed by professional politicians to be code for creating more wealthy people who will take advantage of the poor. Of course I agree that the coercive power of government can indeed be used to take advantage of the poor while benefiting a different class of people. But I claim that in every situation where that happens IT IS THE PROFESSIONAL POLITICIANS WHO ARE TAKING ADVANTAGE OF THE POOR.
Professional politicians see the world through the lens of power. To them power as a finite resource that cannot be shared. A professional politician keeps his constituency dependent on him by force of law so the constituency cannot go anywhere else. In contrast, wealthy people see the world through the lens of wealth. To them wealth is an infinite resource that is realized only as it is shared. An eccentric woman who has tons of cash hidden in her closet does not realize her wealth. But if she buys goods and services with it she realizes the value of her money and helps fuel demand for wealth created by others.
In my previous post I concluded, “the next logical step would be to empower the lower class to become the upper class.” That was a poor choice of words, because professional politicians’ hearts leap at the concept of power. I should have said that the next logical step would be to “unshackle the lower class to allow them to become the upper class.” Freedom of self-achievement is always the solution to poverty. Coercion by professional politicians never produces more wealth, it only produces more poor voters.