God Bless Jon Stewart

But I think he has this one wrong.

My friend posted a short video from the amazing Jon Stewart. I love Stewart and I think he’s a national treasure. But on this particular issue, I think he has it exactly backwards. Here is the video:

I would suggest, this isn’t a problem of corporations. Definitely not ALL corporations.

Let me explain, last week I closed a business that I founded called Open Install Alliance. I tried it, I lost some money, and it failed. I had to pay $890 to the government last week just for the privilege of closing the company (Dissolution).

This cost no one else anything. So point 1 is just clearly wrong. When a corporation closes, we don’t get to socialize the losses. It’s not corporations that do this. Not, ALL, corporations socialize their losses.

What Mr Stewart is referring to is NOT a problem of capitalism or corporations. It is a problem of too much regulatory control by government.

He says that it is “big corporations” that privatize their losses, yes, that’s right in some cases and it’s gross.

But how do corporations do this? By lobbying the massive government to do things that enrich the politicians themselves, the individual corporation, and in most cases at the expense of the common taxpayer.

It’s wrong. It should be stopped.

But I would suggest that the data is clear, it’s not the Corporation’s that are the problem. It is the bigness of government that is the problem. It is the fact that government has its tentacles into every single area of our lives.

To test this is rather easy, if you were to remove the government from the equation and let’s say GM (a company I so love) was faced with another 2008 financial crisis, what would happen?

GM would have been forced out of business, or sold to another competitor at a discount. It was only the fact that they were able to influence Government that they were able to socialize their losses.

Without government, GM does not have the power of coercion to force all Americans to pay for their mistakes or socialize their losses as Stewart points out.

What Stewart advocates for is expanding government more. This is precisely the wrong direction.

If instead we reduced government, became more capitalistic, we would have a more dynamic and vibrant economy.

But it would be messier!

It inherently means that companies would go out of business more frequently, it would mean that people and corporations alike would be forced to confront the difficult circumstances that their own choices produced.

BUT ultimately, it would be better for everyone and it would make us all richer.

You can see this if you look at America at its founding vs America today. How long did it take the build the Empire State Building? How long does it take to fix a road today? It took about 7 years to build the first transcontinental railroad in the United States. How long would it take today?

We have made well intentioned tradeoffs over the years that we didn’t know would create these outcomes. But now we must be forced to reckon with the reality in which we now live.

Now let me say it more clearly: Government is important. But it must be limited to the things it does well and are necessities.

Examples:

• Government Necessity: Providing Justice.

• Not a necessity: Limiting what lightbulb you’re allowed to buy.

• Government Necessity: Resolving Bankruptcy.

• Not Necessity: Giving money to a company to prevent its bankruptcy.

Side note: I think it’s funny how Stewart says “wealthy people” without acknowledging that he is one…

God bless America. God bless Jon Stewart. I just think he has this one a little bit wrong.