just some thinking out loud about:"Takers" not "Makers"

 After I read this piece and just some thinking out loud about:"Takers" not "Makers" I decided I wanted to share it.  I think it speaks to a major situation in our country today and sheds light on some of the reasons for the divisions in our society.

We have become a nation of "Takers" not "Makers," so says Stephen Moore, senior economics writer for the Wall Street Journal. Sometime back, a friend sent me an article written by Mr. Moore, dated April 11, 2011, in which he outlines in very vivid detail why many states in our nation are teetering on the verge of bankruptcy. As a general rule, when any business or a government goes bankrupt, it means that expenses exceed income. If this situation continues for long enough, an organization of any kind is insolvent and has no other choice but to declare bankruptcy.
It's kind of like that fellow I heard about one time who was making it for $3 and selling it for $1, but they said he was making it up on volume. From a practical standpoint, when a ship starts sinking, you know the first thing that happens, don't you? The captain and crew begin to throw everything overboard that is not nailed down to lighten the load. This is what states that are on the verge of bankruptcy must also do, but it's very painful.
If you want to understand better why so many states - from New York to Wisconsin to California - are going bankrupt, consider this depressing statistic. Today in America, there are nearly twice as many people working for the government (22.5 million) than in all of manufacturing (11.5 million). This is an almost exact reversal of the situation in 1960, when there were 15 million workers in manufacturing and 8.7 million collecting a paycheck from the government. It gets worse. More Americans now work for the government than work in construction, farming, fishing, forestry, manufacturing, mining and utilities combined.
Here is the real rub and why we must reverse the trend if we are to survive. Nearly half of the $2.2 trillion cost of state and local government is the $1 trillion-a-year tab to pay the benefits of state and local employees. Is it any wonder that so many states cannot pay their bills? In his article, Mr. Moore gives a number of state-by-state examples, but it all adds up to the same thing, as already stated - unless the trend is reversed - we will not survive..

Read more: http://thesouthern.com/lifestyles/faith-and-values/is-your-state-going-bankrupt/article_7598a740-335d-11e1-a968-0019bb2963f4.html#ixzz1i7YKwQr2