by Sidney Sweeting DDS

This tongue-in-cheek piece with a large dose of reality is done with apologies to Charles Dickens.

National Insurance was introduced to this country in 1974 and by 1990, just sixteen years later, the Government of the day – the same one that introduced NIB, realized that rather than borrow money from a bank, as the average citizen or company would have to do, it was decided to "borrow" the funds from NIB to balance the books at some of the Corporations that were being run so inefficiently that they could not turn a profit.

It has become apparent that the money which was "loaned" would not be paid back so it has been predicted that sometime in the next decade or two NIB will be bankrupt.

Now just wait a minute! How about another cash cow. We can call it a National Health Plan which will be administered by the NIB, the one that is going bankrupt, so the money can be just transferred and we will not have to even call it a "loan". What a brilliant idea.

• Tax his land
• Tax his wage
• Tax his bed in which he lays
• Tax his ties
• Tax his shirt
• Tax his work
• Tax his dirt
• Tax his bills
• Tax his gas
• Tax his booze
• Tax his beers
• If he cries
• Tax his tears
• If he hollers
• Tax him more
• Tax him ’till he’s good and sore
• Tax his coffin
• Tax his grave
• Tax the sod in which he lays
• Put these words upon his tomb
• "Taxes drove me to my doom"
• And when he’s gone,
• We won’t relax
• We’ll still be after the inheritance TAX

So they have finally figured out that instead of doing things right they can just stumble along like the besotted vagrant and follow the advice of Fagan in Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist: "You’ve got to pick a pocket or two."  As everyone wants labels we can call it the "Fagan Economics"

Brilliant!!