Free national parks admission today

Not that I despise anything free, but is this the same government that says that we have to raise taxes because the government doesn’t have enough revenue? Given how expensive everything else is to visit, these seem like very token amounts to pay (not that the National Park System is actually self-supporting – likely these prices are way too low for the reals costs involved). If this were a private business concerned with raising enough money to pay their expenses, they would be advertising how great the National Parks are, how cheap the admission is, and doing everything they could to get as many people to visit as possible. But then a private business (that wasn’t “too big to fail”) would have gone bankrupt and gone out of business 14.3 Trillion Dollars ago.

So I guess, go enjoy the parks. Who knows how long the bankrupt country will be able to keep them open at this rate.

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man, you really gotta be broke as a joke to get excited about this. don’t forget about the $20 in gas you’ll spend to make the round trip.

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MM – I guess you are one of those folks who actually believe in the free lunch. They are not offering anything for FREE. Whatever the government doesn’t get through fees such as this they STEAL from everyone else either through taxation or through the hidden tax of inflation (when they print money out of thin air).

When a private business chooses to offer something for free they are taking the risk that their revenues may not be sufficient to keep them in business. They might also be taking the risk that it might generate future increased revenue, etc. The bottom line is that what is being risked is the COMPANY’s money, not the taxpayers. Every penny that the company earns (except for the parasitic freeloaders that make their money off government contracts, bailouts, subsidies, etc.) its earns through voluntary means, rather than THEFT as the Feds do. These national parks are not run like a business as they always have the taxpayer to fall back on.

I am sorry, but as someone who is almost always on the receiving end of the government’s benevolent thieving hand, it ticks me off when they are not collecting appropriate user fees to cover their costs. User fees are one of the only appropriate mechanisms for funding government operations. When 15 trillion dollars in debt hangs over the country’s collective head (and nearly 100 trillion in unfunded liabilities from SS, Medicare, Part D, etc.) any loss is inappropriate.

There will be no review of the effectiveness of this giveaway. This is not about drumming up business but about vote-buying as are all government giveaways. I am cynical because I have the past 110 years of US government history on my side.

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