This is one of the reasons why I’m so concerned about Senator Cruz’s proposal for a value-added tax. Even though he wants a VAT for good reasons (to finance lower tax rates and also to reduce the tax bias against saving and investment), my fear is that the statists will say yes, then quickly use the VAT to finance a big expansion of the welfare state.

Which is exactly what happened in Europe.

Some folks think I’m being paranoid, to which there are two responses. First, there’s the old joke that even paranoid people have enemies.

But the second and more serious response is to point out that lots of statists openly say they want a VAT to make government bigger.