Blank Cheques and the Whirlwind

I am not commenting here on the merits of this particular case, but on the precedent it sets:

In the 5-4 ruling, the Supreme Court ruled on Monday that the Navajo Indians and several other tribes must be paid in full for the services they provided in 1994-2001, including education, environmental protection and security.

It said that it was not the fault of the tribes that Congress had imposed a ceiling on such payments because of the lack of funds.

"The government was obligated to pay the tribes' contract support costs in full," the court said in the ruling.

The federal payments reportedly covered between 77% and 92% of the costs, depriving the plaintiffs of hundreds of millions of dollars.

The verdict is a major victory for the tribes, the BBC's Paul Adams in Washington reports.

But the decision also has implications for contractors in general, as the court said the government has to abide by its promises, our correspondent says.

If a service had been performed, the court said, then it was not good enough simply to say the money was not there.

Emphasis mine in the last sentence. I'm no lawyer, but in all civilized places contracts are taken seriously and they should be. The problem is twofold; promises and expectations

Promises first. Politicians/governments make these as a matter of course, and I don't see any end coming to that anytime soon so I guess I'm done with fold 1. Fold two is really the crux, as democratic governments cater to voter expectations via the promises mentioned above. Again, this case seems pretty straight-forward, but the final sentence shows the road to socialist penury that many nations are already on.

The general consensus (right wrong or wherever in-between) on how the EU PIGS got where they mostly (but Greece and Spain in particular) are today is a tale of unreasonable expectations. It's nice to retire at 50 on a secure pension, but not reasonable since you will not likely have put enough money aside for the next 25-40 years of your probable life. If this is the case, whose responsibility is it to pay your way? On what basis is this liability assigned, your "rights"?

In Canada we like our health care system, at least when we're not complaining about wait times and what it doesn't cover. As a society we have decided overwhelmingly that the taxes required to ensure that people aren't bankrupted by the birth of a child or an emergency appendectomy are worthwhile. You pay taxes (more accurately, are a citizen), you are covered, and nobody, not even cynical contrarians like me complain about it until non-citizens are seen to be sponging services that haven't paid into.

Even that is merely a bug in the system. People get the government they deserve, and if that's the case the Greeks in particular are in aggregate a lazy, grasping bunch. "Austerity" is the buzz-word these days, and people are voting against it all over the place, France most recently kicking Sarkozy and his belt-tightening to the curb in favour of Hollande's socialists. Apparently the French think there is still a vein of other peoples' money to be tapped for their short workweeks.

I am lightly slandering entire countries but have no fear, I don't play favourites and will dish it to my motherland should it become appropriate. At this point I will point out the forgotten detail of Austerity: it is merely living within your financial means.

Who is to blame for the current state of perpetual imminent collapse of the international monetary system (again)? The Rich? They may have influence, but the 1% are still only 1% of the electorate and the ballot box balances that influence, if enough of the other 99% choose to use it. OK then, the government? Pusillanimous politicians and parties only concerned about their political survival indeed heed the siren call of the electorate as long as it'll keep them in power, so I'll lay some blame here.

That incidentally is the best argument for rich people with a sense of national service (hereditary or otherwise) being politicians; if they don't need the money and the pension plan they are more able to make difficult/unpopular decisions. Since that is a fantasy of days gone by, the bulk of the blame for people getting hosed by government policy is indeed the people themselves. Yes, we don't know what's good for us in the long run and suffer for all the easy-credit bubbles and Ponzi schemes.

This is no surprise since by definition (Statisticians, leave me alone on the terminology) half of the population is of below-average intelligence by whatever measure you choose to use. Of the right side of the curve, a lot are mentally and/or physically lazy, just plain greedy or entitled because they are too smart for their own good. It is the job of the productive class (crossing IQ divisions) to keep the system going despite various disincentives (e.g. taxes) from entitlement-minded members of the political and electorate class.

The argument for low taxes is that it incentivizes people to live and work in your precinct. To the eternal consternation of commies of all shades, places with low taxes are typically the places closest to a balanced budget. This is because the low taxes mean that the Socialists haven't taken over, and people are still spending their own money, and not other peoples'. Don't give your government a blank cheque that your taxes can't cover. It's your fault if they overspend for more than one term of government, if they sow the wind you'll reap the whirlwind.