The Business of Government

In a way, the government is like a business, it's just that it's a non-profit business. As the name implies, a non-profit business isn't supposed to make a profit, but that doesn't mean it can't have a budget surplus. A budget surplus does not become a profit until it is paid out to the owners or the shareholders. Any business can operate at a loss indefinitely as long as somebody is willing to keep pumping money into it. With a profit making business, that is not likely to go on forever but, with a non-profit business, it theoretically can. Many non-profits do charitable work, so people don't mind donating to what they consider to be a worthy cause, but people are not likely to willingly donate to what they consider to be an unworthy cause. The government can compel people to donate, but those same people can also alter or abolish the government if they become sufficiently disenchanted with it. Governments can also borrow money indefinitely, as long as somebody is willing to loan it to them but, when nobody is willing to do that any longer, the party is over. The federal government can also create its own money, but there are limits to that too. If they flood the market with too much cheap money, you get hyper-inflation, which adversely impacts the economy and really pisses people off.

When you started talking about populism, I thought you were in favor of it. You know, the empowerment of the downtrodden masses, and all that stuff. It now appears that you are against it, or are you only against it when the Republicans do it?  I looked it up on Wiki last night, and they said that calling somebody a populist can either be compliment or an insult, depending on whether or not you like the person and what he stands for.

I think that most American politicians are populists, or at least they pretend to be. If they were to campaign on the promise of advancing the interests of the elite at the expense of the downtrodden masses, I don't think they would be elected. It's not currently fashionable to talk about the downtrodden masses any more, though, now it's all about the middle class. Apparently they believe that most people consider themselves to be middle class, so that's the group they play to. My former colleagues at the paper mill didn't like to think of themselves as the middle class, that was for doctors, lawyers, and small businessmen, they preferred to think of themselves as "working class", which was somewhere between the middle class and the people who lived on welfare. All that class stuff is just in people's heads anyway, you are whatever class you think you are.