Thursday, January 16, 2014

Obama & The Cronies Strike Again

By Chris Rossini

The New York Times reports on the latest crony boondoggle:
With less than two weeks till his State of the Union address on Jan. 28, Mr. Obama hastened to make good on a pledge from last year’s speech, announcing the creation of a high-tech manufacturing institute aimed at creating well-paying jobs.
First of all, in the real world, businesses are not begun to create "well-paying jobs". The goal is the satisfaction of the consumer. And not just any satisfaction, since there are no limits to wants; but to the most urgent or most intensely desired. The price system, coupled with profits & losses, give all the signals necessary to ensure that resources are not wasted, and that the most urgent desires can be easily identified.

Government, being the destroyer that it is, operates totally differently. First of all, in this case, it wisely teams up with universities. Gotta get those kids when they're young you know:
Speaking to 2,000 students at North Carolina State University, which is leading a group of universities and companies that established the institute, Mr. Obama said it was the kind of innovation that would reinvigorate the nation’s manufacturing economy. 
“We’re not going to turn things around overnight,” Mr. Obama declared, referring to a decade of lost jobs in homegrown North Carolina industries like textiles and furniture making. But, he said, “we are going to start bringing those jobs back to America.”
The real way to "bring those jobs back to America" is for the government to repeal, slash, and abolish the unimaginable number of laws and regulations that chase businesses away. The other day, Gary North shared a picture showing the size of The Federal Register. Take a look:


If Obama really wants to "bring jobs back", he can start by getting rid of those 80,000 pages of regulations!

Sadly, government doesn't shrink itself. It instead sets up bogus "institutes" to further waste our money and resources.
White House officials defended the time it took to announce the first manufacturing institute, saying these ventures require extensive planning and are chosen through competitions.
Ok...buzzwords above. Whenever you see "extensive planning," think of this saying: "how much, for how many?". In other words, "How much money do you need? And how many votes can we get in return?" That's what "extensive planning" means in government speak.

Here's the crony mixture that was spawned from this case of "extensive planning" (my emphasis):
This is the first of three such institutes the White House plans to announce in the coming weeks. It will be financed by a five-year, $70 million grant from the Department of Energy, which will be matched by funding from the consortium members, including the equipment maker John Deere and Delphi, an auto-parts maker.
If there's one thing those 2,000 students at North Carolina State University can take away, it's this: You're not a true player in the business world unless you're playing with taxpayer money.

Finally, we all know that "you don't sell the steak, you sell the sizzle".

Well, here's the sizzle:
The institute will use advanced semiconductor technology to develop a new generation of energy-efficient devices for automobiles, consumer electronics and industrial motors.
Obama & the Cronies strike again!




Chris Rossini is on TwitterFacebook & Google+

3 comments:

  1. "since there are no limits to wants"

    If money is the means to get what you want - & I'm sure you Miseans won't deny that to get what you want, you pay for it - does it not follow that there are no limits to the demand for money? If there are no limits to the demand for money, what does this mean for the supply? How does this fit with the theory that money is just another economic good?

    You Miseans need to reassess your support for the quantity theory of money.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The tone of your comment shows how sure you are.

      Delete
  2. What does your phrase "demand for money" mean, Scruter? How does one go about "demanding" it? By purchasing it? By pointing guns at people?

    ReplyDelete