“The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money.” – Margaret Thatcher, former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
Baroness Thatcher’s words have never been more appropriate as we face multi-trillion dollar deficits in Washington and a multi-billion budget shortfall here in Texas. I’ll leave the policy prescriptions for Washington’ to others at the moment, but for Texas, the path forward is clear.
We can start to reduce spending by reducing or eliminating the government programs and agencies that are taking money out of the pockets of Texans who need the money and putting it into the pockets of others who don’t need it. Like corporate subsidies.
But just as wasteful and unneeded is the regulation of prices of homeowners insurance (at the Texas Department of Insurance), electricity, and telephone service (at the Public Utility Commission of Texas). In the competitive markets we have in Texas, consumers regulate the price of these services just fine, and don’t need to be paying people in Austin to check up on their efforts.
Both corporate subsidies and regulation of prices have been promoted as programs designed to help people. But the people seem to have spoken up recently to say, “No thank you. We can do without this kind of help.”
– Bill Peacock