The Daily Citizen, Dalton, GA

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September 2, 2010

Letter: Government forsaking private business

“Doors are locked, Value Fresh is closed, 55 jobs lost” read the article in the Aug. 24 edition of The Daily Citizen.

A taxpayer is closed down. This is followed by the Aug. 25 headline, “Labor Department office bringing 45 jobs to Dalton.” New jobs all right, but at taxpayers’ expense.

My opinion is that more time and expense should be directed toward private industry’s ability to stay in business. That would be far better than efforts to spend more taxes and expenses for the very entity that raises our taxes and forces business to lay off workers or close up shop. I am reminded of the following quote from Kate Nowak: “We determine whether something will be a blessing or a curse by the way we choose to see it.”

We already have a sizable employment office here, and it is filled to capacity handling provisions for the unemployed. Sometimes I think we have things backwards. Constantly, we place heavier burdens on business by the increased cost, taxes, regulations and record keeping. On top of that, they must compete for employees with government’s pay scales and benefits. This has a negative impact on profits, growth and expansion in private business employment.

This is the road to socialism where the government owns it all and all work for the government. We are already in the first stages. The government is picking and choosing who gets benefits, grants, etc. This government has grown so large that it now spends nearly 30 percent of the GDP. That’s 10 times what it spent in the early 1900s. Will this nation, which proudly defended private enterprise and was the envy of the world with our standard of living and moral capacities, succumb to controlling bureaucrats?

Our school taxes are going up in these bad economic times? Our public schools operate at twice the cost per student of private schools, and the government is bent on keeping it that way. Why? Could it be to control what is taught and even, if necessary, to change history, truth and morality?

Odell Cochran

Dalton

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