Role of the Government

I believe the role of the government in the lives of the American people should be to improve the quality of life for all citizens equally. The government should work to protect the public; internationally, nationally and on an individual level. I believe it is the government’s role to protect the individual rights of its citizens. This would include rights such as freedom of speech and freedom of religion. I believe at this time the government needs to be more involved in social programs and that more of our tax dollars need to be spent taking care of our citizens. Elisabeth Reichert (2006) defines individual or political rights that take away power from the government, and gives a freedom to the citizen, as negative rights (Reichert, 2006, p. 16). However, it is still the government’s job to define that freedom. What are the boundaries of freedom of speech? In order to have a civil society I believe it is the government’s job to say that a person cannot run into a movie theater and scream “fire” when there is none. I believe more of our tax dollars need to be spent on education. The government only spent 2% of the 2011 budget on education. Yet, 21% went to Medicaid, Medicare and CHIP and 13% went to safety net programs. If we valued the education of our youth I believe there would be less unemployment, less health problems, and less disability. The need for such a large amount of our tax dollars being funneled into those other programs could be instead given to the education system. However, in order to do this the investment in our children and lower class schools must first be made. This is why I see our government as needing to be involved in our lives. I do not believe the private sector would reach out, pull up the poor, or give them a hand up on their own. In order to have a chance the government needs to offer social programs to help those in need. After watching the First Principles Debate #1, between Miles Rapoport of Demos and

References: Reichert, E. (2007). Human rights: Challenges and promises. Social Justice in Context, 2, 11-24. WNYC (Producer). (2011, March 10). Debating First Principles: Demos vs. Ayn Rand on the Proper Role of Government [Video file]. Retrieved from http://www.wnyc.org/articles/its-free-country/2011/mar/02/debating-first-principles-proper-role-government/