-Our budget systems drive people to spend money, not to make it. We have 15 million trained spenders in American government, but few people who are trained to make money.
-People such as librarians, social workers, police, etc. believe they are doing “God’s work.” They are awarded by public opinion.
-Olympics in Los Angeles: The Montreal Olympic games had accumulated a public debt of 1 million dollars. But Los Angeles raised the money through sponsors, recycled old facilities, and got volunteers to work everything. They made a profit of $225 million.
Turning the Profit Motive to Public Use
-The question to ask before actually solving a problem is “how could it profit us?”
-Most cities do a project and see what the expense is. To be successful though you have to figure out how much money we can make.
-In the age of fierce resistance to taxes, the government cannot look at itself as a nonprofit organization.
-Men’s softball league: they paid $25 a team to play when it was actually around $140 per team to run the league. When the price was raised to $90 the players were angered, but when the price was raised to $400 they were pleased because they realized that they could get sponsors to pay the amount. The city profited $260 per team which they used to invest in a girls’ softball league and recreation for senior citizens.