This article was first published by News24/City Press on 21 September 2025
Most modern states are high on their own supply. They’ve convinced themselves that budgets are magic wands, that bureaucracy is a form of intelligence, and that debt is just a scary-sounding word with no real-world consequences. This isn’t just foolish, it’s fatal.
This isn’t about poor fiscal choices. It’s about a civilisational death spiral dressed up in jargon and press releases. The kind of spending we see today isn’t policy; it’s self-destruction on autopilot.
Beneath the buzzwords, it’s just looting
When a state spends, it’s not “investing” in anything. It’s not “lifting people out of poverty” or “stimulating growth.” It’s doing one thing: taking resources from those who made them and giving them to those who didn’t. Period.
They’ll call it everything from “social justice” to “infrastructure” to “national defence,” but strip off the language and what’s left is this: political looting. A kind of legalised confiscation, cloaked in good intentions and backed by the full force of law.
Every time a society buys into this illusion, the actual engines of prosperity – hard work, trust, ownership – get weaker. You’re not fuelling growth. You’re eroding its foundation.
The fairy tale of the rational spender
There’s this charming fantasy among bureaucrats that they, of all people, know how to “allocate resources efficiently.” You’ll hear phrases like “equitable development” or “strategic investments.” Don’t be fooled. None of these people face consequences for being wrong. None of them have skin in the game.
There’s no price mechanism, no accountability, no way to know if what they’re doing is even remotely productive. When a government spends, it’s not betting on outcomes, it’s throwing darts in the dark with someone else’s paycheque.
So, we get white-elephant projects and dying industries on life support. If a private company tried this? Bankruptcy, but when the state does it? “Policy success.”
The rise of the permanent parasite
Every time the government rolls out a new program, it doesn’t just spend money, it creates addicts. Not just the usual suspects – welfare clients or subsidised companies – but whole ecosystems of people whose livelihoods now depend on government checks.
We’re talking career bureaucrats, think-tankers, defence contractors, “academics”, etc, all jostling for position at the taxpayer trough. And once they’re in, they DO NOT leave quietly. These people aren’t productive – they’re professional siphons.
Over time, these vested interests get stronger, more vocal, and more organised. Good luck trying to cut spending. You’ll be shouted down as cruel, backward, or “anti-democratic.” Reform becomes impossible. The parasite class protects itself better than any endangered species.
Illusory progress
To the average person, it all seems productive. There’s movement, ribbon-cutting, and things get built; but here’s the catch: those resources had to come from somewhere, and chances are, they were yanked out of something far more efficient.
Government doesn’t create – it diverts. It takes money that could have gone into a startup, or savings, or expanding a small business, and dumps it into projects that have no feedback loop, no returns, no future.
This is wasteful. Real capital – the kind that builds civilisations – isn’t just money. It’s what happens when people save, plan, risk, and build. Government spending disrupts that entire process by introducing artificial signals, fake demand, and incentives that reward politics over performance. It’s economic sabotage with a smiling face.
Printing poverty
It gets darker. Eventually, taxpayers can’t keep up. The responsible thing would be to cut spending – but they don’t. Instead, they fire up the money printer, ruining us further.
Inflation isn’t just some inexplicable coincidence, it’s theft – quiet, gradual, and deniable. Taxation takes your money by force. Money printing takes your wealth without asking. Like counterfeiters, the state gets to spend without earning. Your savings shrink. The disciplined get punished. Real investment turns into reckless gambling. Long-term planning? Out the window.
Worse, it poisons trust. In money. In institutions. In each other. As prices rise and wages lag, the middle class – the glue of society – starts to crack.
The state? It doesn’t care. It keeps spending and Buys applause, then points fingers at “greedy businesses” for the chaos it caused.
Eating the seed
One of the most dangerous side effects of nonstop spending is cultural, not just economic. When the state rewards short-term consumption, people stop thinking about the future.
Why save, plan or invest in your own education, or start a business or raise a family, when you can just wait for the next stimulus check or subsidy?
Over time, this changes everything. Societies that lose long-term vision start to decay. Families weaken. Entrepreneurship declines. Culture shifts from resilience to entitlement. Everyone’s waiting for someone else to fix it.
And once you get there, the collapse is baked in.
What collapse looks like
It’s not always spectacular. Sometimes, it’s slow, but the pattern’s the same:
- Spending balloons.
- Taxes rise.
- Inflation.
- Trust vanishes.
- Institutions buckle.
By the time collapse is visible, it’s already too late. The real safety nets – free markets, voluntary exchange, property rights – have been torn apart. All that’s left is bureaucracy and broken promises.
The architects – mostly untouched by the effects of their policy continue to deceive the masses with meaningless words like “inclusion”, “diversity”, “cohesion”, “equity”, “sustainability” and “growth” while society crumbles.
Reform won’t help
You can’t trim your way out of this. You can’t “audit” or “streamline.” That’s lipstick on a pig.
The only way out is a full rejection of the idea that government should be running the show.
- Wealth is built by individuals, not institutions.
- Prosperity comes from voluntary exchange, not forced redistribution.
- Real economic health requires restraint, not compulsion.
If the state keeps growing, you will keep shrinking. Your freedom, your earnings, your options – all squeezed by the machinery of spending.
Starving the beast is the only sane response.
Let people keep what they earn. Let markets operate freely. Let society relearn the values of savings, ownership, and responsibility.
Anything less is just a slower path to the same cliff.
You’ve been warned.
