I guess I was in high school when it first occurred to me about folks drawing paychecks directly from the government. Many more draw their pay indirectly from the government, such as working for companies deriving the majority of their income from the government.

Many will ask why it should make a difference. Others will suggest it is a good and honest way to make a living. I guess to some degree both are true. However, I like to consider it scaled down.

Consider, a town of 100. Would it be a good thing that 50 of them draw paychecks from the other 50? Is it a good thing that only 50 of them do productive work?

I am being extreme, of course in making my point. It just is that with the small numbers, it is easier to comprehend what happens when someone draws a government paycheck.

The fact is, big government is expensive. Extremely big government is extremely expensive.

I look around and what I see, is extremely big government. To some, it might not seem so but we must remember, every person deriving a paycheck from the government means more taxes. That is to say, the others of us must provide for them, food, shelter, and so forth.

Certainly, some things must be done by governments. Consider The Department of Education. It has 4400 employees and a budget of 68 billion. Why? How many of them stand in a classroom and teaches… or makes a measurable contribution. I truly suspect that if the entire department went away, hardly anyone would notice. Well the National Education Association to be sure. The two of them are joined at the hip.

The thing is, it doesn’t stop there. There is no telling how many people work in each state for some kind of education department. Let’s multiply that by 50 fifty and we’re talking a bunch of people.

Then each county and each major city has their education system. At this point we are likely talking a bunch of folks who make their living educating our children and none enters a classroom.

Actually The Department of Education is a relatively small department. At every level, city, county, state and federal governments we have, law enforcement, courts and lawyers, again multiplied by fifty.

As an aside, what physical product do the lobbyists produce? Oh. That’s right, none. They’re in essence a bunch of parasites making a fortune in bribery. Going back to our little 100 person community, just what purpose would they have there?

Yet, if we ask every government employee at every level to justify his job, they would all be ready with an answer. Well, almost all of them.