Who Would You Rather Spend? "Elites" or Government?

Sebastian Mallaby sure hates "elites."

It doesn't matter if you are liberal or conservative, Democrat or Republican. There is no possible excuse for doing what Congress is poised to do this week: Abolish the estate tax. ...

If the abolitionists succeed, some other tax will eventually be raised to make up for the lost revenue. So which tax does Congress favor? The income tax, which discourages work? A consumption tax, which hits the poor hardest? The payroll tax, which is both anti-work and anti-poor? Really, which other tax out there is better?

The non-existent, we-cut-spending-instead lack of tax is better.

Repealing the estate tax is like erecting protectionist barriers around the hereditary elite. It is anti-meritocratic and unfair -- and antithetical to this nation's best traditions.

I'll ignore, for the sake of this post, the odd idea that the government, which has already taken taxes out of the deceased earnings during his lifetime and would now like yet another bite, is somehow more entitled to one's estate than one's heirs.

Mr. Mallaby, when these members of the horrible hereditary elite inherit this money, what do they do with it? They invest it, they start businesses with it, and they spend it. This creates jobs and industry. This allows us lowly to work towards becoming part of the hereditary elite.

What does the government do with the money? They dole it out to non-productive members of society and encourage productive members to become non-productive. They waste it on silly pet projects in the least efficient manner possible. They force all of us into ridiculous schemes like Social Security where they provide us with a paltry return of less than 2%. They begin outlandish entitlement programs to buy our votes.

Whose expenditures do we trust to uplift society as a whole? Expenditures by private citizens who have a vested interest in using the money wisely and growing businesses out of it? Or expenditures by bureaucrats who have no vested interest in the money and who use failure as an excuse to ask for even more cash?

I think that's an easy one.