Tax and Spend

Nobody should be surprised that government workers work less than private sector workers.

"The report found federal employees work on average of 38.7 hours a week, compared with 41.4 hours per week in the private sector. That difference adds up to 3.8 fewer weeks per year that feds work compared with private sector workers. "
"Heritage found state and local government employees work even fewer hours — 38.1 hours per week or 4.7 weeks less per year than private sector workers.
Heritage used data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics' American Time Use Survey to reach its findings."

Why not? They get paid with money stolen from tax payers. They don't have to earn it. Check out this entitlement mentality.

""Private sector averages are low because so many private, non-union employers provide absolutely no paid time off. No sick leave, no vacation, no holidays. That is the disgrace, not the fact that public sector employers recognize that all workers need some paid time off," said Jacqueline Simon, public policy director for the American Federation of Government Employees, in an emailed statement."

Paid time off. In other words, employers must be forced to pay employees even when they're not working.

Here's what's wrong with the arguments being made about the looming "fiscal cliff":

"We suggest that the goal of fixing the budget deficit as such could be an erroneous policy. Ultimately what matters for the economy is not the size of the budget deficit but the size of government outlays — the amount of resources that government diverts to its own activities. Note that, because the government is not a wealth-generating entity, the more it spends, the more resources it has to take from wealth generators. This means that the effective level of tax here is the size of the government and nothing else."

All government spending is a tax. It must be paid for by taking resources from others. While tax rates have a psychological value, spending is the real tax we have to cut.

"For instance, the government outlays are $3 trillion, and the government revenue is $2 trillion — the government has a deficit of $1 trillion. Because government outlays have to be funded, the government would have to secure some other sources of funding, such as borrowing or printing money, or new forms of taxes. The government is going to employ all sorts of means to obtain resources from wealth generators to support its activities. What matters here is not the deficit of $1 trillion but that government outlays are $3 trillion. If government revenue from higher taxes were $3 trillion, then we would have a balanced budget. But would this alter the fact that the government takes $3 trillion of resources from wealth generators?"

I wouldn't have ended this paragraph with a question. Regardless of the government's revenue, $3 trillion of wealth is still stolen from the economy.

"We suggest that a cut in government outlays should be seen as great news for wealth generators. It is of course bad news for various artificial forms of life that emerged on the back of increases in government outlays."

Spending cuts boost the economy because it leaves more wealth in the economy for productive people to build on. It means there are more trucks, more steel, more concrete, etc. for people to use to create new wealth.

"What about the fact that we will also have an increase in taxes as a result of the expiration of the Bush tax cuts? To the extent that government outlays are going to be curtailed the increase in taxes should be regarded as a monetary withdrawal from the economy. In this sense it is like a tight monetary policy. A tighter monetary stance in this respect should be seen as positive for wealth generators since it weakens various bubble activities that sprang up on the back of past loose monetary policies."

But this ignores the psychological effects. Some people may get fed up and leave the country, taking their wealth with them. People will save even less than they do now because they have less in their own pockets to save. That's a bad thing.