The Walking Trees

In my younger days, I used to tell a story, usually when I had been drinking. I don't know the exact origin of the story. May have been something I read or maybe it was just the result of alcohol delusion. The one thing I do remember was that it always pissed my wife off when I started to tell it. The story went like this:

Once, many years ago, there were no people, only trees. Back then trees were not rooted in the ground. They walked around as people do today. Gradually there became more trees and more trees until finally there was no room for the trees to walk around. They put down roots and stayed in one place. Now there are people. At first there were not many people but gradually there are more people and more people.

That is where the story always ended. I can't remember for sure if that was because there was no more to it, or if that is when my wife would say "would you stop telling that stupid story."

What my story represented was a saturation point. A point where a process can no longer go in the direction that it has been going. This morning I have read some articles that go me to thinking about that story. First I read Dr Donald Miller's story about global warming and then I read an article about proposed congressional legislation to outlaw incandescent light bulbs. Both of these stores brought to mind the need for additional bureaucracy to administer the changes they call for. We already have no dearth of bureaucracies in this world so it would seem that a couple of more would probably go unnoticed. But, like the trees in my story, they reach a saturation point. With bureaucracies, its not a question of not being able to move around, but more a question of where does the money come from to pay for them?

Our county has been and is loosing jobs and industry. I read the other day that 40% of all income in the United States is from the government. Either direct government jobs or indirectly from contractors to the government. Since the government produces no money of its own, that means that the 60% of the workers that are productive are having to cover their own costs and also pay the cost of the other 40% paid by the government. When you add a couple of more bureaucracies to handle ration cards and light bulbs, and loose a couple of more manufacturing plants to Mexico and China, the percentages slip somemore. Pretty soon 50% of the people will be paying for themselves and also paying for the other 50% working for the government, then 40% will be paying for themselves and also paying for the other 60%... etc. etc. etc.

It has taken this country 231 years to get to this point although most of this has happened in the last 94 years (since 1913). I suspect that the process is speeding up, like a snowball rolling down hill. How much longer do we have before 100% of the people are dependent upon the government for all their income and where will that money come from?