Benefits and Costs

mt-st-helens

Every government program benefits someone…or it’s unlikely it would be proposed or exist. The question not generally discussed is, does it generate net benefits. This discussion (“Gov. Bobby Jindal’s volcano remark has some fuming“) is a good example of the failure to understand the idea of opportunity costs, or the profound insights of Frederic Bastiat’s great essay “What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen.”

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