A Quick Lesson in Economics An economics professor at a local college made a statement that he had never failed a single student, but had once failed an entire class. That class had insisted that socialism worked; that no one would be poor, and no one would be rich, a great equalizer. The professor then said, "OK, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism. All grades would be averaged, and everyone would receive the same grade; so no one would fail, and no one would receive an A. After the first test, the grades were averaged, and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset, and the students who studied little were happy. As the second test rolled around, the students who had studied little studied even less, and the ones who had studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too, so they studied little. The second test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around, the average was an F. The scores never increased as bickering, blame, and name-calling all resulted in hard feelings, and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else. All failed, to their great surprise, and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great; but when government takes all the reward away, no one will try or want to succeed.
Most excellant post! True story? snopes: "legend" but its still a great parable.. http://www.snopes.com/college/exam/socialism.asp
And a lighter look at the stimulus scheme -- A Stimulus Story It is the month of August, on the shores of the <st1lace w:st="on">Black Sea</st1lace>. It is raining and the little town looks totally deserted. It is tough times, everybody is in debt, and everybody lives on credit. Suddenly, a rich tourist comes to town. He enters the only hotel, lays a 100 Euro note on the reception counter and goes to inspect the rooms upstairs in order to pick one. The hotel proprietor takes the 100 Euro note and runs to pay his debt to the butcher. The butcher takes the 100 Euro note, and runs to pay his debt to the pig grower. The pig grower takes the 100 Euro note, and runs to pay his debt to the supplier of his feed and fuel. The supplier of feed and fuel takes the 100 Euro note and runs to pay his debt to the town's prostitute that in these hard times, gave her "services" on credit. The hooker runs to the hotel and pays off her debt with the 100 Euro note to the hotel proprietor to pay for the rooms that she rented when she brought her clients there. The hotel proprietor then lays the 100 Euro note back on the counter so that the rich tourist will not suspect anything. At that moment, the rich tourist comes down after inspecting the room and takes his 100 Euro note after saying that he did not like any of the rooms and leaves town. No one earned anything. However, the whole town is now without debt, and looks to the future with a lot of optimism.... And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how the United States Government and the States of California, <st1lace w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">New York</st1:city>, <st1:state w:st="on">New Jersey</st1:state></st1lace>, etc. are doing business today.
