AUSTRIAN ECONOMICS ADDICT

We’ve been told that Government workers and bureaucrats are public servants. The stories below show that these public servants aren’t really interested in helping us, there more interested in helping themselves. Government regulations and licensing laws should be done away with because they set up road blocks for individuals to freely exchange on the market. It creates a hampered market. These laws are set up to increase Government power over the individual. What do these laws actually do? Here is a short list,  1) They raise money to fund the bureaucracy through fees and fines. 2) They protect the incumbent businesses from competition. 3) They allow bureaucrats to wield power over the masses.  These interventions in cities and towns across the country is a miniature version of the crony capitalism that happens on a larger scale at the federal level.

BEGGING IS PROTECTED, SELLING IS ILLEGAL

Watch this video below of an 11-year-old girl who was trying to sell mistletoe to help raise money for her braces. The authorities told her she could beg for money but not sell her mistletoe for money. Read article here.

GOVERNMENT IS AN UNWANTED BUSINESS PARTNER

In this video the cops shut down the lemonade stand of 3 girls trying to raise money to go to the water park. They are supposed to have a business license, along with food and vendors permits to operate a lemonade stand. These permits and licenses would cost these girls $50 dollars a day plus $180 dollars a year. How much lemonade do you have to sell in a day just to cover the cost of complying with the bureaucratic rules. These girls didn’t know that they had a not so silent business partner.

 IT’S LIKE A MAFIA PROTECTION RACKET

This creative entrepreneur finally closes the doors on her viable business. Why?  Because the harassment by Chicago bureaucrats was too high a cost to pay for the “privilege” of doing business in Chicago. I don’t think the bureaucrats understand the private sector is what funds their ability to do stupid things, like harassing businesses to the point that they close their doors. Paying bribes to bureaucrats is a consequence of too much regulation. In third world countries paying bribes is considered a cost of doing business. I saw This story at Mark J. Perry’s Carpe Diem Blog.

How the young kids in these videos will be affect by their run in with Government will not be known for many years. They will see Government as an instrument of force used to take their individual liberty away. The question is, will they fight for their individual liberty, or will they go along with Government intrusion just to get along. Actually that is the choice we all have to make. Either stand up and be counted or stay seated and don’t make waves.

In this Related Article by Walter Block, How the Market Creates Jobs, And The Government Destroys Them, he talks about licensing laws and how they affect employment. Here is an excerpt. “When the government bestows legal status on a profession and passes a law against competitors, it creates unemployment. For example, who lobbies for the laws which prevent just anyone from giving a haircut? The haircutting industry—not to protect the consumer from bad haircuts, but to protect themselves against competition.”

This entry was posted on December 16, 2013 at 12:46 am and is filed under Government and Politics. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments.

Tags: Bureaucrats, Crony Capitalism, Government Intervention, Licensing Laws, Mark J. Perry, Public Servants