Government takeover
Cry Wolf Quotes
An excess profits tax is not in keeping with our competitive enterprise system. It suggests that government can decide how much profits should be, which profits are excessive, and which are not excessive. If this is possible with the energy producing segment of the economy, then is it not possible with other segments of the economy? Where do we stop? What will be the shortages next year and the next, and which businesses will be subjected to government regulation and control of their profits?
In 1989, sympathetic members of Congress got the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act amended to force banks to collect racial data on mortgage applicants; this allowed various studies to be ginned up that seemed to validate the original accusation… bank regulators required the loosened underwriting standards, with approval by politicians and the chattering class. A 1995 strengthening of the Community Reinvestment Act required banks to find ways to provide mortgages to their poorer communities. It also let community activists intervene at yearly bank reviews, shaking the banks down for large pots of money.
If we sell too many big cars in any quarter in 1978, we’ll have to hold back our product mix and we’ll have to ration or allocate cars. The law is final now, but if enough people complain when they can’t get a big car, maybe the government will revise its legislation. To meet 27.5 m.p.g. by ’85, the average weight of cars will have to be about 3,200 pounds versus 4,000 pounds now. That means every car would be a compact, subcompact, or smaller. The new law implies that we must get better fuel economy between 1980 and 1985 then between 1978 and 1980. That’s unlikely.
I am speaking first because I am a home owner, and every member of my family has been a home owner, and my home is not a failure. I say that if this bill goes through that my home will be a failure, and every other home built in America on materials that have been used for 1,500 years, and I say that the United States should not be an experimental agency for those who wish to have them exploit scientific houses. I say further that the American home can be protected by Congress, and Congress only, and if this Government is to survive as a democracy, for God’s sake, kill this bill.
