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Politics : Right Wing Extremist Thread
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To: Neocon who wrote (15544)9/4/2001 10:42:22 AM
From: TimF  Read Replies (1) of 59480
 
Neocon, there is a difference between high taxes and high salaries for CEOs. No one is forced to pay CEOs high salary under threat of death or imprisonment.

Just looking at the different requirements of the 19th century military and a modern military will show a lot of the reason for the rise in the price of government. We are now supporting several times the original number of Congressmen and staffs; congressional oversight is now much more extensive, and requires much greater committee staffing, than at mid- century; there is an extensive array of national parks and wilderness areas to administer; and so forth.

The majority of the increase in federal spending falls in none of those areas but rather in social security, medicare, medicaid and other transfer payments. The congressional staff has increased a lot but it is not a significant factor in the overall budget and to the extent that there is any legitimate need for this expansion it is because the rest of the government has expanded so much. The military is much bigger but so is the population and our per capita GDP is also much larger. The cost of the military as a % of GDP may be larger then it was for most of the 19th century but the increase is much smaller then the increase of the rest of the budget, and the % of GDP for defense is much smaller then it was for most of the post WWII period. The national parks and wilderness areas cost only a small part of the government budget and it can be argued that the extent of government ownership of America's land is itself a sign of reduced freedom. The increase of regulatory control over the land the government does not own is more clearly a sign of reduced freedom.

Tim
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