Well the Prime Minister or Minister of Finance or acting Minister of Health or Mr. Christie which ever personality he is this week has released some thoughts on the new NHI tax.

The catch to introducing the new tax now is the government will "do nothing to disrupt the economy of the country", but if they release the rate of the new tax they'll "ensure that the economy is not unduly disturbed by any rate or tax we impose." (More in the Nassau Guardian…)

So in the worst economy The Bahamas has experienced in decades another new tax will be implemented but the intellectual fire power will figure out a rate that won't hurt the economy further. Pretty good.

Of course the economy could be booming and some people that will be taxed will be worse off than others. That's another danger with intellectual economics where people sit in a room and "think" they won't harm someone with a tax. What is forgotten is taxes are paid by individuals, not economies.

In any event the usual red herring, that people with concerns about a system like this are being selfish will be bandied around, but I would submit, thanks to a friend, that the only selfish folks are those that refuse to improve educational system and continue to restrict economic growth through over regulation and taxes and spend and borrow leaving future generations with an unconscionable debt burden.

Yet for some reason so many people believe in the intentions of public policy and don't really give a damn about the results.

But as we see in the referenced article, the waves of verbiage from the Prime Minister can be counted on to confuse things further.