Hard as it is to believe, the New York Times today actually has a long article criticizing “a disturbing pattern” of excessive government control of the wealth created by entrepreneurs and other private businesses, a developing pattern in which the “government is eager to control more of that wealth — even if that means running roughshod over private companies.”
The surprisingly hard-hitting article quotes a professor of finance at Yale who argues that the government “is smothering the private sector,” concluding that “[w]hen the government is involved in business, it’s hard for private companies to compete.” Similarly, the article continues, other economists “are warning of the potentially corrosive effect of an approach” that favors over-regulation of the private sector and government support for politically connected companies. If the government “doesn’t deal with this problem and strengthen the private sector,” one of the economists warned, “this country’s growth is not sustainable.”
Amazing? Shocking? Well, it would be if “this country” were this country, but it’s not. It’s China, and the familiar-sounding policies being criticized are those of the Chinese communists, not the similar ones the New York Times supports, in editorials and news stories, here at home.
