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As of late, I’ve heard many different ideas of what the purpose of the United States government is. The most worrying of these theories is that the one, central goal of government is to make money. Our government was not created to be a business and make a profit, on the contrary, it was formed to help and benefit the people. Our founders wouldn’t have wanted to ‘establish justice’ or ‘promote the general welfare’ if the only purpose was to make money. We wouldn’t have a democratic system that demands having elected officials if the purpose was to make money. We wouldn’t, as a country, work to be international peacekeepers if the purpose was to make money. We wouldn’t have been founded on the basis of helping and benefiting the public in the particular and extremely important manner of securing ‘life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness’ of our people if the only purpose of our government was to make money .
The first point brought against the idea that our country should be run like a business is that, left to their own devices, purely financially driven institutions would not care about civil justice and liberties unless it helped their bottom line; therefore, if the government was purely financially driven, we wouldn’t be overly interested in justice and the good of the people. We, clearly, at least try to be involved in proper justice and the well-being of our citizens, therefore negating that specific principle.
Another argument opposing this corporal view of government is that businesses do not hire CEOs and officials on a vote, they hire them according to their credentials, their knowledge in the specific area they are being considered to head, and their ability to make the company more money We elect officials without demanding their credentials. To gain power, the person running for office simply needs to have the most support within the population. They can do this with or without the appropriate accreditation.
Yet another mark against this idea is that businesses do not try to help other businesses unless they can somehow profit from it. Businesses don’t do anything unless they can somehow profit from. In contrast, the United States has a serious reputation of meddling in the affairs of other countries, even if it causes us to lose money and resources--which is, of course, the exact opposite of the purpose of a business.
Finally, the reason this country was founded was an underlying dissatisfaction with the lack of representation and public say in the workings of government; the same lack of representation and public say that mirrors that of a major corporation. We were created as a country that had a system that gave voice to the people, the purpose of that system is not to ignore those people for the petty sake of capitalism.
Which brings us here. The purpose of government is not to achieve a bottom line, but it assist the people subjected to that government, and if the purpose of government is to help those under their authority, the government should be doing their very best to achieve that goal, meaning we should be following a few certain ideals: making healthcare and higher education services as easily accessible and affordable as possible, doing everything in our power to reduce violence and death within our nation, and doing our best to eliminate social injustices facing any particular community within the population.
The role of government is to aid its constituents, and one of the most obvious ways to help people is to make sure they are in good health, and one of the best ways to do that is to guarantee that health care services are cheap and accessible. Higher taxes on the upper class to pay for universal healthcare is a fantastic way to make sure that those services are provided. Higher taxes on some may seem unfair, but occasionally helping the most people sometimes means taking things from those who have a surplus, aka, the Robin Hood Effect.
Another way to assist citizens in this nation is to provide inexpensive opportunities to gain a college education. At this point in history, higher education is all but necessary to ensure a prosperous and long lasting career. Higher education in citizens also allows for further advancement and progress in both social and technological issues. Providing a basic, free or low priced chance at a college education benefits not only the individual but society as a whole. Even if the means of paying for such a system seems unfair, the outcome is a better functioning nation.
Fairly obviously, you can’t help or benefit a population if the population is dead due to gun violence. Civilians don’t need weapons of war that were specifically made for killing other humans. Mentally ill people do not need weapons, as they are not stable enough to be trusted with them, and no one with a criminal record should be allowed to own a gun; therefore, background checks should be necessary for everyone, everywhere, every time. The idea that you would just trust someone with a weapon is absurd, and yet when you don’t background check someone, that is, essentially, what you’re doing. Furthermore, people do not need weapons on school grounds; children shouldn’t be around guns all the time, and if no one has a gun, no one needs a gun to defend themselves. All in all, guns should be harder to buy than a head of lettuce. Not only are they not necessary for survival in the civilian world, they are incredibly dangerous, and should be treated as such. And as for opposition to these stances, the founding fathers didn’t have assault weapons, therefore didn’t take them into account while drafting the second amendment. Had they known of the extent of mass shootings in recent years and the deadly nature of modern weapons, they would have certainly put restraints on the ability to acquire a gun.
If we are trying to help people and ensure justice, liberty, safety, and peace, we should make sure that everyone has the right to those things. Something as petty as the color of your skin, the person you love, your religion, or your genitalia shouldn’t determine any part of your lot in life. That is not just , that is discriminatory . The government was created to care for its population. That means caring for the less fortunate, not looking down your nose at them and expecting them to naturally achieve the same things you have. If ‘All Men Were Created Equal’, people should not be born with special privileges, and if they are , they should recognize it and use it to elevate others. This means eliminating wage gaps between genders and race, reducing the use of fatal force within police forces, actively working to counter racial bias, getting rid of the stigma that surrounds poverty, and allowing LGBTQ+ members of society the same rights and privileges as any heterosexual.
The purpose of the government of this nation is to help its population, and in order to do that as well as possible, certain ideas and programs should be implemented. If we do these things and acknowledge these ideals, we will be setting ourselves up for a more peaceful, prosperous future. If we center ourselves on helping others instead of a bottom line, the world around us will become on that we all truly wish to live in.