The Variable that Liberals Try to Ignore

President Obama's obsession with "income inequality" seems to be spreading around the globe.  This ideology leads proponents to enact policies that take money from those who earn it and redistribute it to those who are less fortunate and/or less industrious.  I can't help noticing, however, that these ideologues don't seem to redistribute their own wealth. They only want to use other people's money.

It would be wonderful to have everyone making good money and having a high standard of living, but this is not likely to ever happen.  People are equal in the eyes of their Creator and should certainly have equal opportunity to become successful.  People, however, differ in their levels of intelligence, ambition and personal discipline.  For these reasons, equal opportunity can never assure equal outcomes.

Why don't wealth redistribution and socialistic policies work?  These are things that might be good in theory, but in reality have unintended consequences.  Throughout human history, there has been one thing that has remained constant and unchanged.  It's also the variable that liberals try to ignore:  human nature.  The human race has a certain number of "slackers", those who don't pull their own weight.  I'm not referring to those who can't work, I'm referring to those who won't work.  If the government is taking money from those who produce wealth and giving it to those who won't work, it essentially is giving the slackers a reason not to work.  Why work for money if you can just have it handed to you?!

On the other hand, the drive to work hard and earn a good living is dampened by the knowledge that the government is just going to take a huge chunk of it.  Thus, both earners and takers end up losing the incentive to become productive and in the end, wealth and power become concentrated in the hands of a few, while the great mass of people are poor and miserable, albeit equal.  

Human nature is not going to change.  It's normal for people to want to keep what they earn and, unfortunately, it's also a human weakness to want things to be easy.  The goal should be to provide ample opportunity to everyone and educate people to the fact that dependence on government will never provide financial security or true freedom.