George Will is out with a piece that panhandles for the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The NIH is a government agency that is responsible for health-related research.
The fact that this is a government agency should enlighten readers right away as to what the NIH is: yet another giant government bureaucracy. It's another sinkhole for your hard earned money. All medical research should be carried out by private corporations and funded with private investments.
Not according to George Will though. He writes:
...to see the federal government at its best, and sequester-driven spending cuts at their worst, visit the 322 acres where 25,000 people work for the National Institutes of Health.Will, no doubt, is trying to impress by throwing out large numbers indicating the size of the bureaucracy. All he's really doing though is displaying the size of the waste.
Will then tries to breath life into the bogeyman "sequester" cuts (that aren't cuts at all). You know, the cuts that Maxine Waters said would cause 170 million Americans to lose their jobs.
The colossus NIH is necessary, according to Will, because:
In the private sector, where investors expect a quick turnaround, it is difficult to find dollars for a 10-year program. The public sector, however, with its different time horizon, can fund for the long term, thereby drawing young scientists into career trajectories and collaborations impossible elsewhere.What a bunch of nonsense!
In a free market (which sadly, we're far from living in) private sector investments are determined by the amount of savings available. If an abundance of savings exists, it signals to entrepreneurs that consumers have decided to restrict their spending, and that the time is ripe to begin long-term investments. There is no basis whatsoever to believe that in the private sector "investors expect a quick turnaround."
If such a situation exists, perhaps Will should examine if the government is creating the environment for it. Maybe Will should take a look at the Federal Reserve, which not only discourages savings, but artificially manipulates interest rates to kill them off.
Perhaps Will should also take a look at the massive U.S. Military Empire that tramples all over the world. The resources to sustain it do not magically fall from the heavens. They are siphoned off from the private sector. The Fed and Military Empire literally eat the American Pie, and whatever crumbs are left over, entrepreneurs have to use to solve our everyday problems.
Will falsely accuses the private sector for short-term thinking, when he should be blaming The State for distorting our lives.
In yet another slap in the face, Will thinks that a government bureaucracy has some kind of ability to think long-term. First of all, morality is tossed out the window, since one group of people receive money that is stolen from others. Second, there is no market test to see if what is going on at the NIH is actually desired by consumers. And last, government uses no profit or loss signals to decide how money should be allocated.
Should money go to the NIH?...or NASA?...or to Schools?...or to the Military Empire, etc...etc...
Who knows? They don't have any market gauges to tell them. So it's all done politically. Votes and crony favors run the show.
Shut down the NIH and give us our money back.
George Will is way off!
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I would like to see him throw a ball again.
ReplyDeletego to 4:22
http://www.hulu.com/watch/3519