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Politics : A US National Health Care System? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Road Walker who wrote (13579)	2/25/2010 2:59:00 PM
From: TimF	Respond to of 42652

Government pays for the function, private industry does the function. An an increase in what government pays for, and how much it pays, is bigger government. Does having fewer government employees mean government is smaller? Its one measure but not the only one. Also the number of government employees has grown over time not shrunk. What government departments would you privatize? Its not just privatization. Some functions might not be done at all, and thus would not be done by the private sector, (but that's probably mostly smaller functions), others should probably be the responsibility of the states. Others probably shouldn't have been started, at least not the way they are, but couldn't really be eliminated now; and for me the most important thrust is avoiding further expansion in the government's role and size, not necessarily quick wholesale slashing of the current government. But I'll give some examples of programs, laws, or regulation, I'd eliminate or reduce Farm subsidies, almost any form of trade barrier, most "corporate welfare" (I would perhaps say all, but the term isn't very well defined), most bailing out of companies, "Cash for clunkers" (the program itself has ended, but any revival, or anything similar), Davis-Bacon, BATF, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, TARP, some of, perhaps much of what the departments of Energy, Commerce, and probably Education do, a lot of the Indian/Native American programs, any forms of price controls that remain (not very extensive, and mostly at the state level now), cutbacks in disability payments, a lot of the pork construction and transportation projects, federal drug laws (at least against marijuana, and perhaps other drugs as well) and with them perhaps the DEA. That should do for a start. In dollar terms the big thing is to reform entitlements in such a way as to reduce their future spending.