How Government Begets Government In Three Levels of Insanity

Back in August, I wrote about the Congressional legislation that reduced the fees banks could charge to merchants, and how Wells Fargo was fulfilling predictions that banks would make up for those fees in other ways. Now Bank of America has jumped on board, and they are blaming the government that they have to charge consumers for something they used to charge to businesses.

None of this is surprising to libertarian economists. One of our favorite phrases is unintended consequences. Government tries to arbitrarily restrict costs in one area and then acts surprised when the same fundamentals cause more costs to pop up in another area. That’s the first level of insanity. It’s like a guy whacking you upside the head with a board because he thought he saw a mosquito and then expecting you to be happy that the mosquitos gone. Or something like that.

Now its annoying enough when government causes a problem by trying to fix another problem. But the levels of insanity don’t stop there. Oh no. After government creates a problem with its first solution, it uses that new problem to justify the need for its other solutions. Obama says “you don’t have some inherent right to.. a certain amount of profit.. if your customers are being mistreated, as if charging consumers a fee for providing a service is mistreatment. So he says this new fee proves the need for the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. How government grows: 1) Cause problem 2) Offer solution 3) repeat. That’s the second level of insanity. It’s like a guy whacking you upside the head with a board and then telling you that you need him because he has a special medicine to make your headache go away.

But wait, it gets better! The levels of insanity don’t stop here, either. Not only does government use solutions to create problems that justify more solutions that will probably cause even more problems needing even more solutions, but government figures out a way to blame its political opponents while doing it all. Obama can’t appoint a director for the new agency because enough Republicans in Congress are in opposition, and he says its frustrating that they don’t want to prohibit any practices for financial companies.

Yes, thats right. Obama is blaming his political opponents because they won’t let him try to fix a problem that he created by trying to fix a problem in the first place! That’s the third level of insanity. It’s like a guy whacking you upside the head with a board and then telling you that it’s all his sisters fault that your head hurts because she wont give him the special medicine to make your headache go away.

You can’t make this stuff up…