After I Make Enough Money, I’ll Give The Rest Away!

Barack Obama recently said that “at some point you have made enough money”. Who says? Obviously one man with an over inflated ego and a bent on the destruction of capitalism and “trickle down” wealth. Regardless of whether you or I think someone else has made enough money, why should a third party get to decide?

It angers me to no end when I hear friends and relatives sitting around bemoaning someone’s wealth. I don’t get it. Is this because of jealousy, resentment, disrespect or what? And of course in these flip conversations comes out the profound that anyone who made money did so by screwing their friends and neighbors. We know this is not true. (Exceptions to everything, so give it a rest.)

Why can’t people be honest? Have you ever sat down and seriously considered how much you and I have benefited from other people’s wealth? We all have and I’m willing to bet some people don’t even realize it.

To seriously give voice that we should limit the money anyone can make might even sound intriguing to some but unless you spend some time thinking about how this would negatively affect us all, you will never fully appreciate the actual benefits we all share.

Thomas Sowell writes, “The moral bankruptcy of the notion that third parties can decide when somebody else has “enough” money is matched by its economic illiteracy.”

Think of the everyday benefits we all share from other people’s wealth. Has anyone you’ve known ever received a scholarship made possible through an endowment? How about a walk in a park made possible by the wealth of someone buying and donating that park? There’s always a chance to spend an afternoon on the town common, listening to a band played on the gazebo that was made possible through generous donations of others’ wealth. Probably instruments in the band came from donations.

Most of us own cell phones and computers. What has happened to the price of those over the years? And why has the price fallen? Those companies we like to dump on made money and as such had money to devise ways of manufacturing products and getting them into our hands in a less expensive way, forcing the prices down. Have we not all benefited from this kind of wealth before?

Or how about something as simple as your job?

The next time you get ready to open your mouth to put down somebody and the money they have made, ask yourself just what your life would be like without it. And then ask yourself what it would be like around here if Obama got his way and began telling you and I and all the great philanthropists of this nation, how much money is enough.

Go out and enjoy that museum of fine art this weekend!