– Obama’s ‘Socialism’ Experiment Brought Home (ZeroHedge, Nov 8, 2013):
Submitted by Martin Armstrong via Armstrong Economics,
An economics professor at a local college made a statement that he had never failed a single student before, but had recently failed an entire class. That class had insisted that Obama’s socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer.
The professor then said, “OK, we will have an experiment in this class on Obama’s plan”.. All grades will be averaged and everyone will receive the same grade so no one will fail and no one will receive an A…. (substituting grades for dollars – something closer to home and more readily understood by all).
After the first test, the grades were averaged and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy. As the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too so they studied little.
The second test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around, the average was an F.
As the tests proceeded, the scores never increased as bickering, blame and name-calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else.
To their great surprise, ALL FAILED and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great, but when government takes all the reward away, no one will try or want to succeed. Could not be any simpler than that.
Here are possibly the 5 key points about such an experiment:
1. You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity.
2. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving.
3. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
4. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it!
5. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that is the beginning of the end of any nation.
Or in graphical format…
Good article. I recall when I was in college, we had a people pleasing professor. At the end of the class, he gave all “A”s. Many of us who were serious students were greatly offended and lost all respect for the professor, while the deadbeats also sneered at him, and he won nothing from them in the way of good opinion, either.
The best feeling comes from earning or building something good.
On another note:
A while back, I visited a church I raised my daughter in years ago. At that time, I started a food drive for the hungry. In those days, it was not a big problem we still had the cheap food policy, but my focus was on foster children. Children left with the state because their parents were irresponsible, not due to their behavior. We started a drive for good clothing for them as well; it is awful not to have decent clothes to go to school.
35 years later, that program is still going. Nobody knows who started it (that is the least of it, in my book), but they still do it. That is really rewarding. Helping those too young to fend for themselves, and keeping people helping others makes them feel good. Win win.
When it becomes the social system, that is when it fails. Everyone needs a hand up sometimes, but not forever.