Yesterday in the local paper there was a short article about the school district buying 60 iPads to distribute to some of the students.

Leaving aside such issues as how 60 iPads can be divided among several hundred students or whether iPads, in and of themselves, can actually aid students in actually learning (which I doubt), my main take away from the article is the economic ignorance on display.

As reported in the July 19, 2013 Caledonian Record:

School officials initially planned to purchase the iPads with taxpayer money and budgeted for it, he said. [ed: he is School Director Bruce Corrette]  Officials though quickly learned about the state grant and removed the iPad expense from the budget before it was approved at annual town meeting in March, he said.

“So instead of using taxpayers’ money it was money from the state,” Corrette said. [ed: emphasis mine]

One has to wonder where Mr. Corrette, who is a CPA, thinks the state gets its money other than from taxpayers.

Sadly this sort of thinking is becoming more and more common.  Local papers love to run stories about how our Senators or Representatives “bring” money to the community, be it “federal” money to the state or “state” money to the town.  Few appear to stop and think about where that money came from and what individuals and communities are essentially being robbed in order that our community can receive the “free” “federal” or “state” money.

Today’s front page has another example, touting Senator Bernie Sanders for helping to get a $5.2 million grant for building a 15 mile bike path from St. Johnsbury to West Danville.  This is planned to connect to a 1.5 mile section that was to have been completed a year ago.  The construction cost for the shorter section is listed as $3.5 million though the actual cost was likely much higher given that it was being planned for 20 years with who knows how many revisions, studies, assessments and so forth.  According to WCAX.com, the funding for construction was 80% federal and 10% state money.  I guess it is a good thing that only 10% was “taxpayer” money.

It should never be forgotten that the only sources the government has for money are the citizens via 4 possible methods:

• Taxes, which are essentially theft.
• Borrowing, which is essentially taxing, stealing from, the future
• Printing, which brings about the hidden tax, theft, via inflation
• Voluntary donation, which likely doesn’t happen very much currently but should be the only means of funding government