Social Security, Medicare and the Tragedy of the Commons

We know farmers work their own land while shared publicly owned land suffers; men work to their own advantage first. Common ownership removes motivation, that’s the famous Tragedy of the Commons in economics, the failure that collapsed the Soviet Union and the failure that’s now collapsing government welfare programs. Any cure awaits a change in basic human nature. Social Security was fine when 32 workers supported one pensioner in an expanding workforce. Now, there’s a pensioner for a little over every two workers in a shrinking workforce and an expanding retiree demographic of baby boomers with a worst-case yet, lengthening...