Dealing with the System

A comment from Susan offers some food for thought:

It is irrational to believe that anything will change when those empowered to effect change have elected not to do so.

It is irrational to expect that ‘disgrace’ is a factor among those empowered to reward themselves at a level which insulates them from any ill effect of ‘disgrace’.

“Disgrace” can only be a factor when those recipients of benefits perceive value in maintaining good opinion of the society in which they function.

Empowered individuals may perceive value only in the good opinion of only those who maintain symbiotic sustenance from the system of taking from the many by force in order to disproportionally benefit their own narrow circle of interest.

They do not function (in my opinion) in any way meaningful to themselves in the society of those whose resources they are extracting.

I believe this observation is supported by past performance of empowered individuals in Illinois, as evidenced by 4.6% property tax rates and billion dollar pension deficits.

Other States have different history.

It is rational to surrender.

Taxpayers must admit defeat and now direct all efforts to avoiding paying into the system which rewards those empowered to skew it toward their own narrow benefit.
Tax House + Dollars
As a practical matter, that means economic boycott.

Individual taxpayers must make conscious economic choices which ‘punish’ those individuals who are in position to profit by manipulation of the legal/political system toward their own narrow benefit.

On a State and national level this may be impossible.

On a local level it may be somewhat effective; many insider benefits are insulated from public impact by virtue of being grants or contracts awarded as a function of insider access.

Homeowners who cannot afford to ‘vote with their feet’ have only the self defense mechanism of being unable to spend money locally.

This may not actually ‘punish’ those empowered to create this economic environment, because as home values crash it becomes profitable for investors to buy foreclosures and rent out at a reasonable return.

Renters who are subsidized by dollars from outside the local economy enable foreclosure-investment-for-rental to be profitable even at 4.6% property tax rates.

Investors may be supportive of those empowered to create such favorable (to investors) conditions.

So if local citizens want to ‘vote with their wallets’, what can they effectively do?

Officeholders are largely insulated, when the government is their main client, or is empowered to create anomalous profitable circumstances directed toward some private citizens but not others.

The only rational conclusion is to decide to emulate the only conditions which are not odds-on losers:

  1. Obtain government direct employment
  2. Obtain government funded second-order employment (compete, if possible, for grants, tax abatements, and public money giveaways or government outsource contracts for legal or financial professional services)
  3. Obtain government social service awards as a beneficiary

This will eventually create a system which is wholly dependent on outside sources of funding.

When the outside funding dries up, the system may collapse and rebuild in a rational, self-supportive fashion.


Comments

Dealing with the System — 4 Comments

  1. Susan writes “other states have different solutions” but the so called right to work states especially down south takes the most welfare money and Illinois is a donor stat which means we get less back for every $1 we pay in taxes and other states get part of our money. In other words we subsidize the right to work states.

    http://wallethub.com/edu/states-most-least-dependent-on-the-federal-government/2700/

    Second social security is an insurance program not an entitlement like republicans like to say.

    It is going broke mainly because of fraud in disability and people getting on it for back pain or mental problems which other people deal with and go to work.

    Judges especially down south have reversed social security rulings denying people disability.

    Third good luck getting a government job with sequestration.

    Government workers are at an all time low in regards to the population.

    Also one of the reasons for welfare programs in southern states is more military bases and this is a shame for our country.

    Other countries pay for bills when they are passed into law but not us.

    Lawmakers promise veterans benefits and the companies get rich from wars while the soldiers and families suffer.

    Shame on us.

    The biggest welfare program in US is the military and we are not even supposed to have a standing military only in times of war and that is why they keep getting into wars.

    Can you imagine the jobless claims if all the military shut down? We export weapons and planes and things for war as our biggest export and sadly this country prospers on war.

    Also I agree with you that grants and giveaways should be done away with.

  2. Karma, you pointed out that there is “fraud on disability” and people get on it for “back problems”

    You should know that it was Bill Clinton who started the moving of people from pure “welfare” which was need based and perhaps temporary, to permanent medically justified disability.

    Likewise, right wingers need to know that under the current system, states hire private contractors to move people from state finaced welfare to federally financed SSI.

    There are corporations, hired by the various states, that make good money by getting people to see “the right doctor,” establishing that paper trail that ultimately results in SSI benefits.

    Both parties here see and hear no evil of their own.

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