Money for Nothing (Jim Fedako)

Jim Fedako says the easiest way to tell that the state is a fraud is by looking at how it tries to do accounting:

If you want to expose the absurdity of the state, think governmental accounting. Really, there is no better way to show the impossibility of a government solution to scarcity than by reading the annual audit of any governmental entity.

Goethe considered double-entry bookkeeping — the essence of accounting — to be "one of the finest inventions of the human mind." For without accounting, we lose the ability to calculate, and without the ability to calculate, modern civilization is impossible.

Accounting lets the entrepreneur know whether he earned a profit, utilizing scarce resources in order to produce something of greater value. Accounting also lets the entrepreneur know whether activities he performs are better outsourced, or, conversely, whether he should expand into new orders of production. In essence, accounting directs the entrepreneur toward activities that satisfy the wants of the consumer.

Government accounting is a true oxymoron. We can determine the cost of government, but what about the value produced? What is the product? What is its value? What is the bottom line? Of course, these unanswered questions do not stop government from playing business, pretending to create value and profit for society.

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