And they wonder why they keep losing....

Via Mike at Cold Fury comes this post by lefty blogger Matthew Yglesias in which he "discusses" repealing the estate tax. One statement in particular evokes memories of a post a while back by another lefty blogger regarding the four contractors who were killed and whose burned and dismembered bodies were strung up on a bridge:

Speaking of which, fuck the small businessman.

The context of this sentence is the argument that the estate tax has a tendency to cause inheritors of small business to sell the business in order to pay the estate tax. Here's more:

I might be an earnest, hardworking dude who works in the store. And somebody might die and give the store to me. The store may be worth millions and millions of dollars. If so, I ought to pay tax on it. Why? Because I've just inherited millions and millions of dollars, that's why. That I'm earnest and hardworking, and that my riches came in the form of a valuable store rather than a heaping plate of gold matters not a whit. What about those sad folks forced to sell the family business? Don't cry for them. Here you are, you inherit a store worth $X. You owe $Y in taxes, with Y being less than X. So you are "forced" to sell the store, and accept "only" $X-Y as your inheritance. Note that X is a figure in the millions, and Y a small proportion of X.

Okay, fine, but what about the people employed by that business? If the business is liquidated as a result of this, they're out of a job. What if this is a business that has been in the family for a couple of generations? Doesn't that count for something? I guess Matt thinks that the inheritor and seller of the business should just be happy he has the money. After all the government was gracious enough not to take everything so he should be grateful, sit down, and shut up. Sorry, no, there is more to life than just money. If my parents spend their lives building a business, and especially if I help them do so as I'm growing up and after I become an adult, then asking me to sell that business once their gone and be satisfied with the money left over after taxes ignores and trivializes the investment of time, effort, blood, sweat, and tears that we all made in the business in order to help it grow.

To his credit, Matthew presents a possible alternative:

The government ought, perhaps, to facilitate some kind of lending arrangement so that people who prefer to keep the store and pay the tax down over time out of operating revenues can do so.

In the end, however, he reverts to type:

Repealing the estate tax is dumb. Putting it back in place would be a good idea. But a serious program to combat inequality or reduce poverty would be better. Ressentiment, my comrades, will only get you so far.

Note that he doesn't present any ideas on what such a problem would look like. Of course, we can guess: Soak the "rich" and give the money to the poor. Welcome to socialism 101. Simply taking money from those who have it (most, though not all, who earned it through hard work and smart choices) and giving it to those who don't doesn't help. The old cliche is appropriate here: Give a man a fish and he'll eat for a day. Teach him how to fish and he'll never be hungry again. I'm all for programs that help the poor, preferably funded through private charities. However, to be effective, it must teach people how not to be poor. Simply throwing money at them is a short-term solution at best and, since it teaches them how to be dependent on others and not themselves, a catastrophe at worst.