Moral Hazard? Let Them Fail? Let Our Tax Dollars Decide.

I am an American. Relatively typical. I am married. I have a kid. I own a house and with it a huge mortgage. I have a job. I have some achy parts and have a few regrets. AND, I’m responsible for all of it. If and when things go wrong and something often does, the buck stops with me, and I’m fine with that. It’s the way the world should work.

What I don’t understand is how US businesses feel that the same approach does not apply to them. That somehow they’re entitled to a bail out. A sense of entitlement is one of the few things that actually can piss me off. Just ask my 2 year old! That these businesses argue that they’re too big to fail is simply ridiculous. That the US economy would fail because they are so important does not jive with my experience of how Americans truly live. In my own family, I also am too big to fail. I generate 100% of the income and if I were to fail, the entire Slug economy would fail. Does that mean I deserve a bail out if times get hard? No way. It means I suck it up and find a way or I file for bankruptcy. The same goes for US businesses in my eyes. Suck it up and find a way or file for bankruptcy, but do not come to me looking for a hand out, especially for my tax dollars.

It would be interesting if the IRS added one final question to the 1040 for this year. It would read “What percentage of the taxes we collected from you should we apportion to the financial bailout of large corporations?” Then, the IRS compiles the data, and that’s the amount set aside for saving big business. Let the citizens speak.