America Needs a Great Reset

by Laurence M. Vance

For several years now, and especially since the beginning of the COVID-19 “pandemic” fiasco, we have been told that the world needs a “great reset.” World Economic Forum (WEF) executive chairman Klaus Schwab famously said in June of 2020: “The COVID- 19 crisis has shown us that our old systems are not fit any more for the 21st century. In short, we need a great reset.”

He challenged the world to “act jointly and swiftly to revamp all aspects of our societies and economies, from education to social contracts and working conditions.” He called for every county, “from the United States to China,” and every industry, “from oil and gas to tech,” to be transformed. The need of the world is a “‘Great Reset’ of capitalism.” This will require “stronger and more effective governments” to “implement long-overdue reforms that promote more equitable outcomes,” make “large-scale spending programs” to “advance shared goals, such as equality and sustainability,” and “harness the innovations of the Fourth Industrial Revolution to support the public good, especially by addressing health and social challenges.”

When you dig a little deeper, you find that the “great reset” of capitalism includes such nefarious things as reducing global population, medical tyranny, drastic and detrimental reductions in carbon emissions, the imposition of carbon taxes, and the gradual “transition away” from meat, fossil fuels, coal, and the internal combustion engine — all in the name of combating climate change and saving the planet from humans.

In the United States, there is talk of the need for “stakeholder capitalism,” “smart cities,” “build back better,” and a “green new deal.” On the eve of the recent UN Climate Conference (COP28), the White House referred to climate change as “the existential threat of our time.” But as former NYU professor Michael Rectenwald has explained:

Everything evil under the sun is deemed causally connected to climate change, including war and genocide, terrorism, poverty, inequality, inclusion, the condition of women, and population growth.

“Climate change” functions as a catch-all phrase for sequestering the world’s problems under a single, global crisis rubric. As such, it is believed, a global governance system must be put in place to address it.

The economics of climate change catastrophism involve global centralized planning and interventionism on a scale hitherto unexampled.

The real crisis

The real crisis in America has nothing to do with climate, capitalism, cattle, coal, or combustion. The real crisis in America has everything to do with the monstrosity known as the federal government.

According to employment numbers released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the number of people employed by federal, state, and local governments in the United States has now surpassed 23 million. In 2023, government at all levels added an average of 56,000 jobs per month. Leading the way, of course, is the federal government, which contains hundreds of agencies, bureaus, corporations, commissions, administrations, authorities, offices, and boards organized under 15 departments. There is also the alphabet soup of independent agencies of the federal government (EPA, SEC, FTC, etc.) and the federal corporations (TVA, CPB, Amtrak, etc.). According to a report on the federal workforce by the Congressional Research Service, over 2.1 million federal civilian employees work for the federal government. And this doesn’t include the Postal Service (about 580,000 people) or the legislative and judicial branches (about 64,000 people). And then there are the 1.4 million active-duty uniformed military personnel spread out all over the world.

It wasn’t that long ago (1987) that the entire budget of the federal government was “only” a trillion dollars. It didn’t reach the $2 trillion mark until 2002. For fiscal year 2024 (Oct. 1, 2022, to Sept. 30, 2024), President Biden’s proposed federal budget is a whopping $6.9 trillion.

When government spending exceeds revenue, the result is a budget deficit. To pay for the deficit, the federal government has to borrow money by selling marketable securities (bonds, bills, notes, and securities). In fiscal year 2023, the federal government spent $6.13, but only collected $4.44 trillion in revenue, resulting in a budget deficit of $1.7 trillion.

The U.S. national debt has also reached a terrible milestone. Federal debt (the total of outstanding government borrowing since 1835 — the last year the federal government was not in debt) has now surpassed $34 trillion. The national debt was “only” $1 trillion in 1981, and it took 27 years to reach $10 trillion in 2008. By 2017, it was up to $20 trillion, and by 2022, it eclipsed $30 trillion. Going deeper in debt is a bipartisan occurrence. After campaigning on a promise to pay down the national debt “over a period of eight years,” President Donald Trump presided over a $7.8 trillion increase in the debt, and this was with a Republican-controlled Congress for the first two years of his presidency. The national debt has increased by $6.2 trillion under President Biden, and he still has a number of months left before his term ends. The debt is now at its highest level relative to the economy since the end of World War II.

As everyone who has ever taken out a loan knows, with debt comes interest. The interest on the national debt in fiscal year 2023 was $659 billion, a $184 billion increase over 2022. Interest is now the fourth-largest government expenditure — behind only Social Security, Medicare, and “defense” — and, thanks to higher interest rates, is also the fastest growing government expenditure.

The Federal Register is the daily depository of rules and regulations of the federal government. At the end of 2023, it had added 90,402 pages for the year — the second highest tally of all time.

To fund the monstrosity known as the federal government, Americans are quadruple taxed — and that is just on their income. First, there is the federal income tax. Second, on that same income, they pay Social Security taxes, and if they make over a certain amount, their Social Security benefits are taxed. Third, on that same income, they pay Medicare taxes. There is an additional Medicare tax of .9 percent that applies to income over $200,000 ($250,000 for married filing jointly). Fourth, on that same income, there is state income tax in 41 states. And then there are all of the other taxes that Americans pay to federal, state, and local governments that are not based on income.

The invasive and intrusive federal government now gets away with justifying all manner of tyranny in the name of “public health,” “national security,” “national emergency,” “existential threats,” or “equality.” Government powers have been expanded at the expense of individual freedom. As constitutional attorney John Whitehead has well summarized it:

Since 9/11, we’ve been spied on by surveillance cameras, eavesdropped on by government agents, had our belongings searched, our phones tapped, our mail opened, our email monitored, our opinions questioned, our purchases scrutinized (under the USA Patriot Act, banks are required to analyze your transactions for any patterns that raise suspicion and to see if you are connected to any objectionable people), and our activities watched.

Government eyes see your every move: what you read, how much you spend, where you go, with whom you interact, when you wake up in the morning, what you’re watching on television and reading on the internet.

Every move you make is being monitored, mined for data, crunched, and tabulated in order to form a picture of who you are, what makes you tick, and how best to control you when and if it becomes necessary to bring you in line.

He concludes: “There is not a single person in the U.S. who is not in some government database or another, and these databases are increasingly being shared between agencies, fusion centers, and the police.”

And on the economic front, it is because of the bad economic policies of the federal government and the Federal Reserve that housing costs are the highest in 40 years, Americans are carrying more debt than ever, more consumers are delinquent on their debt payments, more formerly middle-class Americans are becoming impoverished, and homelessness is rapidly increasing. Although Americans think that they live in the freest country in the world, the United States only ranks number 25 on the 2023 Index of Economic Freedom — behind even the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.

America certainly needs a great reset in many areas, but what kind of a reset? Should the federal government be given more power to intervene in the economy and society? Should the federal government be given more tax dollars to spend? Should the federal government institute more rules and regulations? The great reset that America needs can be summed up in two words: federalism and libertarianism. Federalism ensures that the federal government does only what it is authorized to do by the Constitution, with everything else left up to the states. Libertarianism ensures that government at every level be strictly limited to the protection of life, liberty, and property and not the violation of these natural rights.

The great reset: federalism

The United States was set up as a federal system of government under which the states, through the Constitution, granted a limited number of powers to a central government. Federalism is simply the division of power between the national and state governments. The first three articles of the Constitution delegate, not surrender, certain powers to the three branches of the national government. There are about 30 enumerated congressional powers listed in the Constitution, with everything else reserved to the states. As James Madison so eloquently explained in The Federalist, No. 45,

The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the Federal Government, are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State Governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce; with which last the power of taxation will for the most part be connected. The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects, which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties and properties of the people; and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State.

This means that in order for the federal government to follow its own Constitution and plan of government envisioned by the Founders, a great reset is absolutely necessary.

As much as millions of Americans want it to be so, the federal government has no constitutional authority to have a retirement and disability program, job-training programs, welfare programs, farm programs, health care or health insurance programs, an unemployment compensation program, or energy assistance programs.

The federal government has no constitutional mandate to defend any country but the United States.

The federal government has no constitutional authority to spend one penny on education, public broadcasting, space exploration, scientific research, or the arts.

The federal government has no constitutional authority to institute a minimum wage, prevent discrimination in housing and employment, combat “disinformation,” operate a railroad, make student loans, provide airline security, license certain occupations, set fuel-economy, emissions, or packaging standards, protect consumers, collect data, spy on American citizens, hinder companies from merging, or regulate broadcasting or the stock market.

The federal government has no constitutional authority to prohibit or regulate alcohol, medical or recreational drugs, tobacco, food, or drinks.

Therefore, a great reset of the federal government must include the complete elimination of whole departments and agencies.

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