Contrary to popular belief, both Hoover and FDR responded to the 1929 crash by being proactive and introducing stimulus and intervention into the economy. The result that was a depression that lasted well over a decade. Wouldn’t it be better to imitate the policies in place for a depression that ended in months instead?

Take the time to listen to this presentation; it’s well worth it.

We are constantly under a barrage of calls for government intervention on a whole host of fronts that have to do with our safety and even convenience. Here is an excellent point from Hayek:

… there is little question that almost every one of the technical ideals of our experts could be realized within a comparatively short time if to achieve them were made the sole aim of humanity. There is an infinite number of good things, which we all agree are highly desirable as well as possible, but of which we cannot hope to achieve more than a few within our lifetime, or which we can hope to achieve only very imperfectly. It is the frustration of his ambitions in his own field which makes the specialist revolt against the existing order. We all find it difficult to bear to see things left undone which everybody must admit are both desirable and possible. That these things cannot all be done at the same time, that any one of them can be achieved only at the sacrifice of others, can be seen only by taking into account factors which fall outside any specialism, which can be appreciated only by a painful intellectual effort – the more painful as it forces us to see against a wider background the objects to which most of our labors are directed and to balance them against others which lie outside our immediate interest and for which, for that reason, we care less.  (Hayek, The Road to Serfdom: The Definitive Edition, ed by Bruce Caldwell, p. 98)

All of the above is another way of saying that we live in a world of scarcity (on this, read especially Thomas Sowell’s magisterial Basic Economics). As difficult as it is, there will be no utopia in this life, and every effort to create one will end in totalitarianism sooner rather than later.

This is not at all to say that we should not seek to alleviate injustice. But in order to alleviate injustice, we must first identify precisely what we mean by the term, and we must also prioritize, since no human agency (or all human agencies collectively, for that matter) has the power to rid the world of all injustice.

Suffering is an evil that has resulted from the fall of man. God addresses suffering in the ministry of Jesus – a ministry of healing. But that does not mean that all suffering must be addressed by any and every means. The obliteration of suffering is a function of the final inbreaking of heaven and earth. When men attempt to impose that divine act by human means (usually governmental), they of necessity must cripple and destroy all human liberty; and even then they cannot succeed in their stated intentions.

Nowhere is this better seen than with the failed communisms and socialisms of the twentieth century. Despite the obvious fact that the lessons have not been learned, these socialisms, while intending to eradicate poverty, instead virtually universalized it. The State is not God, and when the State plays God, it can only do so as a very failed deity.

As a sampling of how this little piece hits home:

Why do Christian parents, contra St. Paul’s clear admonition in 1 Corinthians 7, encourage their young adult children to delay marriage, sometimes for years past the time it would take to discern whether this union would be of the Lord? Why do we smilingly tell them to wait until they can “afford” it? It is because, to our shame, we deem fornication a less awful reality than financial hardship. [Emphasis mine.]

Must reading.

The survey lists five suggested areas of “economic stimulus” that you are supposed to rank, and also offers a sixth option, where you will be allowed to suggest your own priority on the form’s next page.

What I did was make my own priority #1, then listed the rest in the order of what I felt were most legitimate/least threatening to long term stability, and the least redistributive. The substance of my #1, of course, was that the government not attempt to artificially stimulate the economy, as every effort to do so requires moving assets (in the form of taxes etc) from society as a whole, or from more productive sectors, in particular, to those which are least efficient and represent the most drain on the economy.

I then ranked the others like this:

(2) infrastructure (just to acknowledge that at least some infrastructure is legitimate and necessary for government involvement);

(3) build strong sustainable labour markets and training incentives (my intention here is that Canada be promoting international trade, and the free market can take over);

(4) invest in housing (I don’t believe government should be doing this, but at least real estate usually doesn’t depreciate and the investment wouldn’t be a complete waste);

(5) support traditional and emerging industrial sectors (I read this primarily as “bailout the industries,” which rewards inefficiency and steals from other sectors which have learned to function productively in the current market);

(6) improve access to credit (my argument is that artificial intervention into the area of credit with lead to serious issues down the road – think of what happened in the United States when the bubble burst).

Aside from the ranking of stimulus priorities, the form also asks what can be done to help keep the economy moving. What I stressed is that clear taxation rules and low tax rates, combined with balanced government budgets, offer stability and make an economy inviting for foreign investment.

Take the survey and say no to the implicit national socialism that undergirds the drive for government-invented “economic stimulus.”