John Stossel:
Hernando de Soto taught me that the biggest difference may be property rights. ....I first met de Soto maybe 15 years ago.
Huh? Stossel met Hernando de Soto? Wow, he must be really really REALLY old.
Excellent post
An old man once told me, "You can't take people out of poverty until you take poverty out of the people."
Sorta like, The fruit of my labor belongs to me. The fruit of my creations belong to me. What a novel idea. I like it.
Thanks for posting this. So simple, but so easily taken for granted - the importance of property rights. We do, indeed, need to be reminded of what our “grandpappy” knew.
First post I’ve read this morning and it has the potential to be the best of the day.
bttt
John 12:8 “The poor you will have with you always...”
In the USA poor means you can't afford both Direct TV AND Highspeed internet for the 3 TVs in you 2500 square ft. plus McMansion you are buying and late on the payments because you have two late model SUVs you are also trying to make payments on while paying for your unlimited texting plan on all the famiiy member's cell phones...
However the answer to your question is easy and my Grandpappy answered it many years ago when I asked him the same question:
"Poor people have poor ways..." ---Paul Henry Gettles
bfl
De Soto’s is a simple premise. When living in a “culture of corruption” folks don’t see the point in expending effort towards obtaining resources that will simply be taken away from them.
This guy doesn’t seen to understand something about history.
Yes, back when our country was founded and settled people actually owned their private property.
Today, no individual in the United States owns their own property.
Don’t think so? Just fail to pay your property taxes and you will find out who REALLY owns your property!
In this age we simply lease our property from the local government, the state and the federal government depending upon the local tax structure.
Many people forget that if you have “owned” your house for more than 30 years, the monthly bill for property taxes today far exceed the monthly payments you made for those 30 years. So......for 30 years you paid both the bank and state and now that it’s paid off to the bank, you will NEVER finish paying the state.
It applies to more than just skyscrapers and factories. It applies to stock markets, which only work because of deed-like paperwork that we trust because we have the rule of law.
What came to mind was when Obama took over GM and left the share holders high and dry, and handed the company to the union. He seized property and destroyed the rule of law in one fell swoop.
Tell that to the GM investors...
One of the better posts I ever read.
Clear, concise and hits the nail on the head.
Jesus said the poor will always be with us!!
John Stossel:
Hernando de Soto taught me that the biggest difference may be property rights. ....I first met de Soto maybe 15 years ago.
Huh? Stossel met Hernando de Soto? Wow, he must be really really REALLY old.
Add in the debate between Ferdinand Lassalle and David Ricardo over the Iron Law of Wages in the modern economic context, immigration trends that begin as a follower to perceived economic progress in a region and then smother that potential in an unrealistic human tsunami, and short-term political expediency by ruling classes that benefit from maintaining an economically stagnant underclass to the subject of the article, and you begin to see just the shadow of the huge, malicious elephant in the room...
The problem is that we are slowly letting the rule of law slip in this country. Trends contributing to this include: judicial activism, tolerating illegals, subjectively enforcing laws, or creating laws that are either incomprehensible or unforceable (to name a few). Within another 20 years, I predict we will be a country of men and not laws. The law will be whatever a Judge or Bureaucrat says it is—at that moment.
For a civilization to thrive it must have 4 things ( minimum):
1) Secure borders.
2) Honest courts and police to enforce contracts and to put criminals in prison.
3) Secure and dependable property rights.
4) A morally well-grounded and honest people with the good will to make it work.
By the way,...No one in the U.S. owns property any longer. We are instead renters to the government. If we fail to pay our property taxes, the government will evict us.
And....
A major part of all property taxes is a MASSIVE and bloated collectivist government school system that is dedicated to indoctrinating our nation's youth into worshiping godless government communism.