Have you ever had the impression that the government is a bit more complex than it needs to be to do the job originally asked of it? Take the graduated income tax, for example. If we had a flat tax, we could be doing our income taxes on the back of an envelope and be done with it. No deductions, no audits. The government wouldn’t loose any money, more people would be employed. The accountants could do something more fulfilling, perhaps helping all those employed people to not be dependent on Social Insecurity in retirement. The really good ones can become one of Dave Ramsey’s investment ELPs.

I have the unsettling feeling today that we are caught between two unsavoury forces.  On the one side are the parasitic moochers, who have finally ascertained that they can sell their votes to simplify their lives.  On the other side are those in government willing to buy the votes, and create a complex system to control the sellers.

In the end, people are searching for ultimate safety and stability, so they work to transform the government into the perfect host.  The government looks for the same stability, and attempts to control the masses. This leads to a bad place.

A people must impose parsimony on their government and allow a bit of complexity to creep into their lives, or complexity will creep into their government which then will impose the parsimony on the people’s lives.