<<The relitive number caught could easily be misleading , there are many thousands more Bussinessmen than congressmen . . . >>
But it's not fair to count only congressmen and include all businessmen and women. There are plenty of politicians who are crooks and thieves who haven't yet made it into Congress. If Big Government is as big as you claim it is, surely there are lots more potential wrongdoers than are gathered in Congress.
<< . . . and the rate at which they get caught relitive to one another doesn't tell you how relitively well they hide malfeasance.>>
Well, in the absence of any hard evidence either way, I would have to assume that neither businessmen and women or politicians are any more skilled than the other at concealing their defalcations. Besides, a lot of people in Congress were in business beforehand, which makes them qualified in either category.
<<Also the rules for Congressional obedience to the law are more lax , Congress isn't really passing the same test that Enron failed.>>
That can't be. When businessmen steal big-time, they wind up with huge accourtrements of wealth, private jets and yachts, private islands in the Caribean, wild, lavish parties costing hundreds of thousands of dollars, $60,000 bottles of vintage wine, the whole nine yards. Poor old political crooks like Duke Cunningham don't get to live that large, never seem to hit that Nirvana level of larceny, their efforts are so paltry compared to business crooks.
And also the standard wasn't who steals more, but who wastes more. Theft is only a part of the waste. In the non-criminal area of waste, the businessmen win hands down over the polticians. There, your issue of laxness is stood on its head - - there are NO RULES on how much money a businessman can take out from his business. Every extravagance, every strip-club expense account, every limo ride is the "cost of doing business" or a personal life-style decision which at any level of government would be critically scrutinized and mercilessly exposed. Corporate jets are the norm, mansions and bigger mansions are to be expected - - a politician living that life, unless he marries into it like McCain or Kerry, is going to have his ass nailed to the wall.
I think, particularly in North America (except Mexico) and Western Europe, the amount of thievery and waste from government programs is pretty well kept under control, while no such controls exist in business. The fact that thousands of employees can be let go in hard times to "cut costs" indicates that in good times a lot of unnecessary "fat" is being carried on business payrolls. The existence of corporate raiders such as Carl Icahn was premised on the existence of waste in corporate targets, waste that could easily and quickly be trimmed by the raiders until the corporate assets could be sold off.
If you look at the food industry, for example, and factor in the cost of competition - - each breakfast cereal comes with its own multimillion dollar package of advertising and packaging and marketing which vastly exceeds the cost of the cereal in the box, you will begin to get some tiny glimpse of the wasteful ways of the capitalist system, which YOU pay for with every box of cornflakes that you eat, every gallon of gasoline that you burn, every drug that you or your insurer purchases.
Your MSM is corporate-owned, therefore it's no mystery why they zoom in gleefully on government waste and corruption, but leave almost totally unexamined the stupendous amount of waste that is programmed into the capitalist system. In fact, by sensationalizing only the overtly criminal side of capitalist waste, they isolate it effectively from the much larger waste and inefficiency of capitalism that is found, for example, in the price of every box of Cornflakes. You become aware, for example, of the lifestyle of Dennis Koslowski, but not of the owners of the General Foods empire, the media empires, the oil industry, the pharmaceutical industry, etc. People are making 400 times what you are making, but the only time you hear of it is when they step over the line into overtly criminal actions. But most of them are smart enough to stay within the bounds of the law where it's LEGAL to make 400 times more than you do.
Now I could easily envisage someone who is twice or even three times as smart or as hard-working as you or I, but I can't imagine someone ten times smarter or ten times more hard-working, yet there are routinely found in business and commerce men and women making ten times, twenty times or more what the average guy is earning. Why are they being over-compensated at this rate? The answer is, because they can get away with it. The PROFITS, generated by the business they are in, permit it. There is the reason for the waste and inefficiency right there, the profit system. The governments are not run for profit, the waste and inefficiency you find there are accidents or corruptions of the system, but, and especially in Western Europe, Canada and the U.S.A., they are the exceptions and not the rule. The profit system however is built into every purchase and sale that takes place under capitalism. THAT is why the wastage is much greater in business than it is in government.
