… is from page 267 of Thomas Sowell’s 1999 book, Barbarians Inside the Gates:
It is one of the pathetic signs of the “me generation” that some people think it is a defense of some government policy to say, “I benefitted from it.” Nazis benefitted from Hitler!
DBx: Yep.
I cannot count the number of times I’ve heard or read someone who, after correctly identifying Ms. Smith and Mr. Jones as workers who would lose their jobs if tariffs are cut, asserts that ‘therefore, cutting tariffs is an unjust, harmful economic policy.’
The mature person recognizes that he or she is not the only person in the world. The sober grown-up recognizes that he or she is entitled to the same rights, but not to more ‘rights,’ as are possessed by everyone else. Yet most pleas for protectionism rest on the implicit presumption that the individuals who stand to benefit from protection are more deserving than are the many other individuals who are harmed by protectionism.
