Critical Mastiff has a post in which he recommends ending the tax deduction for mortgage interest, a position I agree with 100%.
But what's more interesting in his post is his brief comment about lobbyists:
[Author Jonathan Rauch] takes great pains to avoid demonizing the lobbyists; after all, they are only acting rationally, given the high costs for a single group not to lobby Washington when everyone else is. If you don't get in on the action, you're left screwed.
Lobbying is yet another example of rent seeking behavior, behavior designed to benefit the entity doing the behavior even though it has a negative impact on the economy. Because people are greedy, they will engage in rent seeking behavior whenever it’s advantageous to do so.
So yes, it’s not fair to demonize lobbyists for doing what everyone else is doing: trying to make money and increase their status. We need to blame the system that allows people to make big money performing tasks that don’t add anything to the economy.
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