P.J. O'Rourke on Why "Closing the Wealth Gap" is a Bad Idea

P.J. O'Rourke explains why efforts to close the "wealth gap" are a a bad idea and destined to fail, as they have everytime they've been tried. This gets to the heart of the matter:

But proposing to close the "wealth gap" is worse than silly. It entails a lie. The notion of economic equality is based on an ancient and ugly falsehood central to bad economic thinking: There's a fixed amount of wealth. Wealth is zero-sum. If I have too many cups of tea, you have to lick the tea pot. But wealth is based on productivity. Productivity is expandable. Otherwise there wouldn't be any economic thinking, good or bad, or any tea or tea pots either.

Read the whole thing.

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Paul Ryan's Speech to the Heritage Foundation

Congressman Paul Ryan gave a speech yesterday at the Heritage Foundation in which he called President Obama (the post-partisan President) on his increasingly strident and divisive class warfare rhetoric.

But instead of working together where we agree, the President has opted for divisive rhetoric and the broken politics of the past. He is going from town to town, impugning the motives of Republicans, setting up straw men and scapegoats, and engaging in intellectually lazy arguments, as he tries to build support for punitive tax hikes on job creators.

The transcript is here if you prefer to read it.

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What Profit Represents

Quote of the Day:

" Profits are not deductions from the sum of the public good, but the real measure of the social value a firm creates."

Kevin D. Williamson at National Review, writing about  the late Steve Jobs' contribution to society.

Read the whole thing.