It’s odd and funny sometimes how a merchant will hear, from some on Whitewater, Wisconsin’s Common Council, how his or her business desires are not legitimate, not the right desires. Not from everyone in office, but from some.
This took two forms at the June 16th Common Council meeting. First, one heard from our oldest politician that, the weather being bad (one way or another) throughout the year, there was no point in a restaurateur establishing a sidewalk café in spring and summer.
Never mind that these cafés exist in other Wisconsin cities. They do – if only one would imagine a world beyond the westside Taco Bell.
What’s odd – and so smug it’s funny – is the idea that this or that politician is in a better position than a entrepreneur to assess risk in the market. It’s not that merchants always succeed, but that they’re more likely to succeed in market ventures than bureaucrats and politicians.
The second example of political conceit is the notion that regulations a politician proposed as somehow reasonable and easy to implement. The 30% food receipts requirement for an outdoor is like this.
Why 30%? It’s a requirement with no reasonableness behind it, as our conditions make it difficult to achieve. There’s no reason to think that 30% is more fair than 35, 31, or 41.3, for example.
One number pulled from the air is as good as another, beguiling rhetorical power being the only difference.
If it’s all just guesswork – and it is – I propose a different percentage.
0.