"You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it."
~~~~~ Dr. Adrian Rogers, 1931 - 2005 ~~~~~
5 comments:
I think that is true. It removes all incentive all the way around to work and be successful.
We're just going to have to learn from our mistakes and fall hard sometimes to be healthy.
Good quote. While I don't wish for any poor among us, I do think there is a right way and a wrong way of distribution.
On the other hand, there is this underlying assumption that work = wealth, each being the measure of the other.
If this is true, then major league baseball players must be some of the hardest-working Americans the world has ever seen, just below Oprah.
And since Picasso and Mozart died in poverty they must have been lazy bums for most of their lives.
If it were true, that honest hard work = a decent wage, and honester harder work = a luxurious salary, then I would be all in favor of your quote.
What about the elderly, or sick or disabled? Just because they can't work should they not have what they need?
There have to be some adjustments made for those people obviously. So the quote is intended for whom?
Maybe work doesn't equal wealth, but ingenious use of talent tends to produce wealth. The baseball players may not be hard working in the factory labor style, but they hit, catch, and throw at a high enough skill level to provide entertainment that lots of people are willing to pay for. Picasso and Mozart weren't terribly hard workers (in the factory labor style) but had then better at promoting their genius they may have enjoyed more of the fruits of their labor. At some point in our past a person's worth and wealth were extended into his family, so that when that person wasn't able to carry on the family could pick up the slack. Today families are much smaller and more disconnected. I would really feel sorry for myself if I couldn't work anymore and couldn't move in with Thad and let him take care of me.
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