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I don’t oppose government spending because it’s immoral, I oppose it because it generally does not work. The majority of public spending does not pay for true public goods like roads, public safety, national defense, etc. The majority of public spending is in the form of hand outs to special interests.

There is an article in Explore Howard today about how the food bank (a private charity) is experiencing 10% decreased food donations, but requests for food are up 25%. This seems like a reasonable problem that government may be able to address, but instead government is looking for cuts in the budget. In fairness, government does have some programs (welfare, etc.) to help the poor, but these programs pale in comparison to other forms of government spending.

Take a look at the plans for the new $30 million library in Ellicott City. It has a water feature, a stone wall built to look like a bridge, a room shaped like an iPod and a healthy dose of liberal nonsense like an organic garden and special parking for hybrid cars. And I am not picking on liberals, of course. Conservatives have their own brand of nonsense that we are all paying for. Is this library really needed? Is it really filling a need that cannot be met by a freed market? Is the $100+ million dollars budgeted to be spent on libraries in Howard County over the next couple of years really the best use of those resources?

There are market failures (externalities, monopolies, etc.) associated with freed markets, but these are the exception and not the rule. Democracy, in contrast, is one giant market failure in itself. Due to rational ignorance of voters, our tax dollars and regulatory system are not used to help the truly destitute or prevent the few problems associated with capitalism. Democracy simply selects for officials who give our tax dollars to concentrated interests. Yay.