By Dennis Richardson, Magic Valley Publishing
[EDITOR’S NOTE: I found this in my news feed on one of the social media sites and thought how practical a lesson this would be. Even I would have learned from it as dense as I am].
TEACHER FAILS ENTIRE CLASS: An economics professor at a local college made a statement that she had never failed a single student before, but had recently failed an entire class. That class had insisted that socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer.
The professor then said, “OK, we will have an experiment in this class on this plan.” All grades will be averaged and everyone will receive the same grade so no one will fail and no one will receive an A…. (substituting grades for dollars – something closer to home and more readily understood by all).
After the first test, the grades were averaged, and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset, and the students who studied little were happy. As the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less, and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too so they studied little.
The second test average was a D! No one was happy. When the third test rolled around, the average was an F.
As the tests proceeded, the scores never increased as bickering, blame and name-calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else.
To their great surprise, ALL FAILED, and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great, but when government takes all the reward away, no one will try or want to succeed.
These are possibly the five best sentences you’ll ever read and all applicable to this experiment:
- You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity.
- What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving.
- The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
- You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it!
- When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that is the beginning of the end of any nation.
The Law of Close Encounters: the probability of meeting someone you know increases dramatically when you are with someone you don’t want to be seen with.
Opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and sometimes those of another person that the author wishes to pass along to our readers. This newspaper welcomes guest columns so go ahead and let it be known what your thoughts are.
And…remember to read this newspaper regularly. Better yet, subscribe so that you won’t miss a single issue.
Dennis Richardson is the CEO of Magic Valley Publishing, Inc., which owns the Chester County Independent
