Stopping the Motor of the World

Unless you've been living under a rock recently, you probably noticed that Obama finally had his way with the healthcare system. Now, according to his plan, everyone will have access to affordable health care, and those who can't afford health care on their own will receive subsidies provided by fellow citizens. As far as I'm concerned, this is possibly one of the worst things you could do in office.

Rather than explain why I'm opposed to Obama's new bill, I'll illustrate my thoughts instead. What Obama is doing remarkably resembles the world of the looters than Ayn Rand creates in her novel Atlas Shrugged. At one point in the novel, readers are told the story of Twentieth Century Motor Company, a motor factory that decided to change its pay tactics. The powers running the factory felt that it would be better if everyone was paid based on need instead of the work they did. That way everyone in the factory would, in a way, take care of each other by continuing to do the same allotment of work but allowing their pay to be redivided in such a way that those who needed it more would receive it. Everyone who worked in the factory was convinced that this new system was for their own good, and so they accepted it.

However, it wasn't long before the work ethic of the factory changed. The workers realized that no matter how hard they worked, they wouldn't receive any additional compensation for it. In fact, they were in a worse position for doing so. Those who were noticed to be considerably talented were made to work longer and harder to improve the productivity of the factory, and yet they failed to take in any more pay.

As soon as everyone noticed this, their productivity made in turn in the opposite direction. Each worker strove to be no better than the guy next to him so that he wouldn't be labeled as extraordinary. In fact, many worked hard to be the worst worker in the plant in order to keep their work to a minimum.

And of course there was a problem on the other end of the spectrum. People soon began amassing needs in order to garner more pay. Poor relatives arrived from out of town to live with them, medical bills appeared out of nowhere, needs began piling it up.

In a nutshell, the situation was like this: the needs were growing and the work was shrinking because nobody wanted to work if he wasn't going to be fairly compensated. The system ran the Twentieth Century Motor Company into the ground as everyone deserted the factory and left to find lives elsewhere. However, the factory didn't close before a young worker rebuked the system and announced to his fellow workers that he would stop the motor of the world. Sure enough, the motor of the world slowly came to a halt as the nation's economy froze completely.

In Ayn Rand's world, the mentality of the Twentieth Century Motor Company had also slowly become prevalent throughout the entire country. Everyone was expected by law to help everyone else, and soon everything collapsed entirely. The young worker had lived up to his word: the motor of the world had been stopped. Even more incredible, he never had to do a thing, nor did he. Watching the attitude of the nation shift, he could predict it before anyone else did.

Now, stepping from fiction to the fabric of real life, Obama has granted America a system in which each citizen will be expected to provide for the needs of those who cannot afford to do so. This may be a fine attempt on Obama's part to make sure everyone is watching out for everyone else, but what's going to happen when everyone begins amassing needs in order to milk the system? Slowly, those who work hard are going to lose their reward to the looters of society, those who realize they can get something by doing nothing. Eventually the looters may outweigh the workers, and the motor of the world, at least as far as our nation is concerned, will come to a stop.
T.H. Excellence