The American Dream was built on the concept of freedom of personal property and
ID: 450561 • Letter: T
Question
The American Dream was built on the concept of freedom of personal property and the free market system. And most Americans dream of finding that key to a profitable business. Yet, It seems that when we lean of business profits or see business take their production overseas in order to reduce labor costs and improve the bottom line, we get the hue and cry that government should prevent that from happening. When the oil companies report record profits when gasoline prices are climbing above $3 a gallon no one stops to realize that the oil companies only realize a profit of a new cents per gallon of gasoline sold. It is the huge volume of sales that creates the record profits, not gouging the consumer. Now we have a new massive bailout plan where there will be strings attached and government controls. The following is from an email I recently received: "Do we BAIL EM OUT! Back in 1990, the Government seized the Mustang Ranch brothel in Nevada for tax evasion and, as required by law, tried to run it. They failed and it closed. Now we are trusting the economy of our country and our banking system to the same nit-wits who couldn't make money running a whore house and selling whiskey." Do not need government controls or keep government involvement to a minimum?Explanation / Answer
If we go through and analysis the Mustang Ranch Brothel case then we found that Contrary to what is claimed, the federal government did not attempt to operate Mustang Ranch after it was seized in a bankruptcy proceeding in September 1990. It means that its correct that government owned the company for approximately three months but it didn’t run it or operate it.
It's true that the feds had planned on keeping the business going until the brothel could be sold at auction (a scheme that became the butt of numerous jokes on late-night TV), but a U.S. judge refused to allow the bankruptcy trustee to assume the Ranch's business license. Instead, the IRS foreclosed on the property and auctioned it off a few months later.
Various sources persist in claiming that the IRS itself ran the brothel in the interim, though the available evidence suggests otherwise. Just two weeks after the government took possession of Mustang Ranch, county commissioners banned prostitution there, saying they were tired of the "circus" surrounding the case. The ban remained in place until the business reopened in December 1990 under "new" ownership (unbeknownst to officials at the time, the original owner, Joe Conforte, had repurchased the Ranch under an assumed name).
So, while it's accurate enough to say that the federal government "owned" Mustang Ranch for approximately three months in 1990, the claim that government officials tried to run the brothel and failed appears to be unfounded.
From the above case, this question arises that whether we need government controls or keep government involvement to a minimum. While from the above case also the fact is that yes any government would not want to close any business, its objective should be to run the business, to support the business but the business should not be illegal like in this case prostitution was going on there. Government controls are required hugely as to protect the interest of not only businessman but also of investors, customers, bankers and complete nation and world itself. But the government must not interfere into the business i.e. it should not try to operate or run the business because that is the job of the businessman only and he knows about the business 100 times more than the government and it is his establishment. Government is more required to control the overall industry policy as to protect the interest of all the stakeholders involved. Government role is to see the overall things not just a particular entity or a particular orginisation. Yes, it can provide the managerial support also to a organisation in form of experts if they require so. But in the name of running the business they can not justify the illegal things or affect the interest of other stakeholders.
So finally concluded that government controls are required for a industry as a whole not for a particular business or specific business and so therefore it should not have control over the particular businss or organisation.
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