BECKLEY— In this CATO Institute blog they point out several million of $90 billion in Federal spending that the Department of Transportation has recently given out.
They follow up with a warning from a 1932 book, Congress as Santa Claus, written by Charles Warren:
The continuance of this practice of shifting to the National Government responsibility for payment for matters which formerly were dealt with by individual initiative, by community cooperation, by voluntary organizations, or by local or State governments – the continuance of this practice of making drafts on the National Treasury to carry out purposes not within the enumerated or implied powers of the National Government will inevitably have two results.
So far as these Government donations consist of direct appropriations for private or local interests, they will deaden and finally destroy the eagerness or willingness of State Governments and local communities to pay for their own needs. So far as they take the shape of the so-called Federal Aid laws for local projects to be matched by local appropriations, they will have ‘a tendency to induce excessive expenditures by State and municipal governments, with top-heavy bond issues and oppressive local taxation.
Yet, else where in the exact same blog they have the following interesting chart:
It seems we may already be a little late having ignored that 1932 warning!
TennesseePaul
Stephen VanNuys
Brooklyn Daniel
The Freedom Thinker
Yup, it is why we are in the boat we are in and why Boston has the Big Dig at the cost of every other US taxpayer outside of the state of MA. What a waste of money – it eliminates hardly any of the issues of driving North to South – just buried them under the ground so that the horizon could be appealing.
Didn’t the big dig result in a concrete panel falling from the ceiling and crushing a car?
West Virginia loves that Federal money too.
That reminds me…make sure to fill out your census form so your community gets all the federal funds it is entitled to!
Ha ha – yeah – I got my census letter today.
…I also got my Social Security statement a few days ago.
The one that tells me by 2035 Social Security will be largely insolvent and will only pay out 75 cents on the dollar in benefits during that year. It flagrantly warns me that I need to save more money on my own.
I wish at the end of the SS statement it showed a picture of the Dems in 2006, cheering when GW announced in his State of the Union address that he was unable to reform SS to keep it solvent.
Hey Chuck,
Looks as though that will be the only way that I can ever get any tax refunds for the foreseeable future.
Look at the one dip in that chart. And tell me who was president?
Reagan is the only president in the last 50 years who openly and vigorously fought this trend.
What an absolute hero that guy was….
You know, another great point here is look at how many states are in terrible financial health. That excerpt is prescient. Illinois for instance is on the verge of bankruptcy and has basically no excuse. At least California had a massive property bubble. Illinois has nothing to explain its phenomenal deficit- other than miserably poor policy and an entrenched Democratic establishment…
[...] their layoffs, people are feeling more secure, and spending has gone up. What has changed? State’s are mostly insolvent. Bank’s are still giving out loans to those that can’t afford them. We’re [...]