Top marginal income tax rate should be fifty percent

[Minarchist]

89. The Greek government was in cahoots with the bankers; thus, they facilitated the crisis.

For years, the left and the right, who took turns running the country, borrowed as if there were no tomorrow. Through mismanagement and nepotism, they drove their country to the brink of bankruptcy. The Greek people reacted to all of this by creating a shadow economy that accounts for 25 to 30% of the nation's economic activity. That is indeed the Greek model.

I do not advocate for small government or large government; rather, I insist on an honest and competent government. In discussing these matters with family, friends over the holidays, there was a common thread of agreement: No one objected to paying taxes to support public services and safety nets; rather, the objections were to government waste, fraud and outright theft of tax payer $$$.

Regarding Banks and Government Power: The original US colonies printed their own currency, which resulted in a powerful growing economy, free of the poverty and unemployment, which at the same time, crippled England. UK bankers, were horrified by the American approach and saw it as a threat to their deeply cherished belief that bankers should control all the wealth of the world. Thus, the Bank of England lobbied King George III to impose the Currency Act on the colonies, which forbade them to use their own currency and instead, required them to borrow their legal tender from the Bank of England, at interest.

Subsequently, the formerly prosperous and productive colonies experienced the poverty and unemployment typical of Charles Dickens' London.

All of the above is why I favor a devolution of the central government to the state or local levels. IMO, that is the key to ensuring that governments can be held accountable by the electorate and provide the necessary services without being ripped-off by politicians and their cronies.