Thursday, September 1, 2011

Celebrate Risk Taking and Change Your Life

How many of you drive home from work wishing your day job was something other than what you just spent the last eight hours working on? Why do those lingering thoughts never motivate you in a new direction? What prevents you from taking that leap of faith into the unknown in pursuit of your dream? Are you grudgingly satisfied just to collect a pay check every two weeks? There could be various reasons to play it safe, but one of the biggest motivating factors is an aversion to risk. With new ventures comes the possibility of failure. Failure in business usually means substantial loss of income, reputation, and downsizing of lifestyle and so you play it safe.


Over the past few weeks I’ve been chatting with several friends about how much I love writing on current events and political issues. I’ve been bemoaning not figuring this out twenty years earlier at the ripe age of eighteen. I could have majored in journalism or writing instead of accounting and, my theory goes, be spending more time doing what I really want instead of moving from one dull spreadsheet to the next every day. The trouble is, I have never considered myself an entrepreneur or somebody excited by the thought of ‘starting over’ in my late thirties and so I balk. It’s daunting to consider the amount of time, energy, marketing, and money needed to turn this new obsession into anything other than just an every other day blog.

Isn’t this the picture of what America offers each of us? We all make decisions to press forward or remain secure in the background. America remains the land of opportunity, but we often must move beyond the risks to experience true fulfillment, both personal and monetary. So many times fear of failing stops people from living a happier life. Let’s face it, when you start a new business there are lots of things that can go wrong. Many fail in their first few years, and the ones that succeed often are not profitable for just as long. Such is the lot of the entrepreneur. Fortunately, there is need for both entrepreneur and average Joe to keep our economy humming. Each has a role to play.

Why then do those individuals who succeed get so much criticism heaped on them by the media, the left, and an ever larger share of the general public? The perception is rich people just wake up one morning rolling in their money. This is largely untrue. Many successful business owners toiled, borrowed, and sacrificed time with family and friends to get their ventures off the ground. Sure they might be out golfing several days a week now, but haven’t they earned it? We should celebrate their success not sit back in envy of it. If we are not willing to put ourselves out there and take big risks, we should not point fingers at those who do and succeed.

You have only one earthly life to live. If a dream keeps dancing in your head, take some chances and see where events take you. Pursue your passion with every fiber of your being. Work hard and see where the opportunities take you. And stop along the way to congratulate those who took chances before you and came out successful. Theirs is a story we should keep telling and keep repeating.

Monday, August 29, 2011

Hurricane Irene: Our New Stimulus?

In a perverse assessment of last weekend’s tragedy, some in the media now report 4th Quarter GDP could rise by a full percentage point as a result of clean-up and infrastructure rebuilding. We are told the markets rallied on the news. This knowledge should provide us comfort during a very difficult time for many. At least through the tragedy something positive will come out of it is the implication. The billions of dollars in property lost to Irene’s wrath are going to lead to a construction boom. Somebody should check in with Louisiana and Mississippi to see how much money Hurricane Katrina brought in.


It would appear many journalists, already desperate for a third stimulus, will now use this event to triumph new jobs and root for a much needed recovery in time for President Obama’s 2012 re-election. In a bizarre, twisted, measure of thinking, Irene’s torrents of rain along the East coast are somehow a precursor to economic revitalization. Taking this to its logical conclusion, minus the human suffering and loss of life which nobody wants, more future natural disasters could be our lifeline out of this economic stalemate. It would appear the bigger the disaster, the more rebuilding needed and higher our future growth prospects. This is modern-day Democratic thought.

The logic behind this fake stimulus comes straight from the heart of John Maynard Keynes. This man’s destructive economic model keeps rearing its ugly head. Keynesian economics is our government’s “demand creating” machine at work, and the modern day Democratic Party takes most of their economic agenda straight from his playbook. In short, Mr. Keynes believed an economy’s demand determined its long-term structural employment. It doesn’t matter where the demand comes from just so long as there are dollars chasing goods. If the private sector experiences decline, the government should artificially inflate things by priming the pump with as much spending as is necessary. Instead of letting the free market run its course through natural highs and lows, government is the spender of last resort even if it has no money to spend. Where Keynes and most Democrats part ways is the endgame after this artificial demand is created. Keynes advocated government paying off the newly created debt at its first opportunity to do so. Democrats just continue spending.

In a similar vein, many on the left sounded the call for increased unemployment benefits last year as another means of spurring growth. Apparently, more unemployment benefits beget higher GDP. Maybe the government should just print each household a check for $100,000 and demand us to spend it all? Can you imagine our economic vitality then?

We need to be about the business of making things again in this country. When we stop giving credence to the notion that spending equals GDP, we can begin a process of putting together effective policies to encourage making more things others in the world actually want to buy. Only then will we have real GDP without the scourge of runaway debt, and I fear shortly, rampant inflation. Capitalism does not champion government spending. Just as people can’t spend their way out of debt, governments cannot either. The Tea Party understands this. I wish President Obama and his friends did too.



Sunday, August 28, 2011

Birth Control Nation


Free prescription birth control pills are coming to an insurance plan near you courtesy of our federal Department of Health and Human Services. HHS wants to force taxpayers to subsidize the entire cost of birth control along with controversial abortion drugs as a means of saving health care dollars. Apparently, the U.S. government believes it would be better off spending money on free pills than on free pregnancy services to mothers with little or no insurance. What’s next free crack pipes to drug addicts?

Assuming their math is correct, which I’m pretty positive it is not, I am appalled that personal responsibility is being tossed aside yet again at the altar of emotional arguments. Why do I have to take responsibility for my own actions while subsidizing the poor choices of other people? Then, if I balk at having even more of my hard-earned dollars taxed to pay for these services, I’m the bad, inconsiderate,and uncaring person while their poor behavior continues unabated.

If HHS wants to save on free pregnancy care they should be telling poor people not to make themselves even poorer by having sex with strangers. Or, they could be encouraging people indulging in illicit sex to run out to their local pharmacy and buy contraceptives with their own money. I realize abstinence outside of marriage is a concept all but lost on today’s youth, but this remains the best solution very few educators or legislators dare discuss. Heather Has Two Mommies is fine with the NEA but telling kids to keep their pants on is a radical and outdated notion.

Ours remains a somewhat free society so go ahead and indulge your cravings, but then please either deal with the consequences yourself or find some family, friends, or neighbors to chip in on the remedy. The government has no business picking our collective pockets to provide others with free contraceptives because they are unwilling to do so themselves.

As with so many legislative attempts to curb bad behavior, this one promotes more of the same. The answer to spiraling uninsured pregnancy costs lies not in encouraging more of the same damaging behavior, but in asking people to consider the potential consequences of their actions before moving ahead with them.

Outside of the moral argument, HHS also doesn’t understand simple supply and demand. If the government begins making prescription drugs available for nothing, you’ve instantly increased demand. Everybody will be out to get these freebies. How long will it be until birth control manufacturers are bilking the government ridiculous prices for these “free” pills because they can?  As with every item billed to federal coffers, taxpayers pay infinitely more than fair market value. And as with every other entitlement, costs will be exponentially higher than originally estimated leaving no actual savings but much more expense.

Let’s start telling the truth instead of putting band-aids over bad behavior. The sooner we get back to promoting individual freedom, personal responsibility, and local problem solving the better off our country will be.