The Free View-- weblog of a presidential candidate

Penalizing Success

So today I'm supposed to talk politics. Let's get to it.

It is none of my or your business how a businessperson runs his or her business. Let me add a qualifier to that- I don't mean that businesspeople can break the regular rules that everyone has— don't hit people, don't kill them, don't take their stuff. And there can't even be "business" without the presumption of the contractual agreement, so businesses can't cheat people, lie to them, or break their contracts.

That being said, I find it utterly absurd that we (through our bully-friend the Government) have made up zillions of rules about how any given person MUST run their business. I mean, noted exceptions excluded, what business is it of ours how a businessperson decides to do their thing?

Here's an example: once it gets past a certain number of employees, a company falls under many new laws. Most of the federal laws about workplace discrimination, etc., don't kick in until a company reaches a certain size-- 15 employees, in most cases. Now think about it- how arbitrary is that? Someone somewhere down the line picks this number (a committee probably picked it), and all the sudden it stratifies the business world.

Before, the 14-employee businessman and the 15-employee businessman were basically the same thing. But then, voila!, some committee pick the number, and those two guys become as different as can be. One of them can be subject to devastating federal lawsuits, while the other one can only be subject to devastating state lawsuits. And what for? For not hiring someone, or for firing the wrong person, or something like that.

That's the funny part right there (to me, at least). Mr. 15-employee businessman (or Ms......woman) never had to open up his (or her) company in the first place. For those 15 jobs to even exist is the result of that person's work and choices. He or she created those 15 jobs, where before there were none. That point bears rephrasing: if the businessperson hadn't chosen to make it so, those jobs wouldn't even exist.

So, this person goes from supplying the world with 14 jobs, to supplying the world with 15 or more, and we reward them with a set of encyclopedias worth of new laws. That's a great example of our twisted view of the businessperson— "The more you succeed, the more tools we have to tear you down with."

I'm running off at the mouth now— I got myself riled up thinking about poor Ms. 30-employee businesswoman (or Mr....man))— so I will close with a quote from Ayn Rand about businesspeople: