The greedy hand of government

Well, here they go again: the government’s grasping hands lunging for more of the private sector’s hard-earned money. This time some rapacious, plundering legislator wants to go after our scuba diving industry by imposing an arbitrary “licensing” fee.

They will not come right out and say it, though. They will not admit to their base intentions. As usual, the government plunderers will resort to some false pretext or other. They will no doubt invoke the public good or claim that they are levying a tax for the victim’s very own good.

Naturally, the government will want to appear as benevolent as possible. But in the end, the result will be indisputable: a theft will have occurred. As Chapman University philosophy professor Tibor Machan explains in a recent John Stossel interview: “Government is never charitable, never generous, never benevolent, because what is involved in government giving is government taking.”

This profound statement of Professor Machan is something many of our local politicians probably will never understand. They cannot understand that government giving necessarily involves government taking. Our “leaders” cannot appreciate this point because they are the takers, not the “takees” or the “takens,” as it were.

Just as a burglar probably could never appreciate the inherent injustice in the crime of theft, many of our legislators cannot appreciate the inherent injustice and tyranny of excessive, arbitrary and unreasonable taxation. After all, most of our elected “leaders” have never had to meet a private payroll or compete based on merit in the private business sector. They simply use the government to take, take, and take from the private business sector, which is decidedly not mostly comprised of local indigenous folks (which probably makes the act of “taking” a heck of a lot easier, politically, since most foreign investors cannot vote or influence the vote).

Contrary to the views of most liberals, the mostly expatriate CNMI business community is not in conspiratorial cahoots with the local government. The local business community–the SGMA, the HANMI, the Chamber–has limited political influence. To this day, they cannot compel the local government to abandon the three-year labor limit. To this day, they cannot compel the local government to abandon the highly restrictive labor moratorium, which is essentially a cap on economic growth. The CNMI business community could not deter the local government from passing the “Foreign Investment Act of 1997,” with its absurd $100,000 “security” deposit.

The CNMI government–particularly the present administration–is not friendly toward investment; in fact, they are often hostile toward market economics. And when it comes down to foreign investment, what they often practice is taxation without representation–or takings.

Strictly a personal view. Charles Reyes Jr. is a regular columnist of Saipan Tribune. Mr. Reyes may be reached at charlesraves@hotmail.com