Hume: Obama Doesn’t Understand that Before Wealth Can Be Spread, It Must Be Created

Hume: Before You Can Spread Wealth, You Must Create It (RealClearPolitics)

BRIT HUME: The poor condition of the economy is an important cause of the poor condition of our politics. That’s because a surging economy means a surge in tax receipts. That takes pressure off the federal budget because there’s enough money to finance both federal spending and other things while keeping tax rates low. That’s how things were during economic recoveries of the 1980s and ’90s. You could make a budget deal because there was enough money to go around. But the booming recovery of those days have given way to the feeble rebound we have seen since the so-called great recession that ended more than four years ago.

Yet President Obama is fixated on wealth inequality, as if that’s what’s holding back growth. Indeed, Democrats at times seem almost to prefer everyone be equally poor than unequally rich. That’s an exaggeration of course, but it holds a kernel of truth. Republicans tend to worry about the health of the goose, Democrats about the distribution of the golden eggs. Democrats seem to think spreading the wealth more equally will create more of it. After four years of weakness, you may think it would dawn on them that it simply doesn’t work that way. It’s fairly uncomplicated. Before you can spread the wealth, you have to create it. The government doesn’t create wealth. It absorbs it. The private sector creates it. Policies that encourage that can make some people outrageously rich. But they make a lot more people simply richer.