In 1953, the U.S. provided no pensions for presidents. That means that when President Harry S Truman left the White House and returned to life as a private citizen in Missouri in January 1953, he had little or no income beyond his Army pension of $112.56 per month. Truman took out a personal loan from a Missouri bank shortly after leaving office and wrote he memoirs. He received a flat $670,000 and, after paying the then 67% tax rate and for his expenses, netted about $37,000. He later wrote, “Had it not been for the fact that I was able to sell some property that my brother, sister, and I inherited from our mother, I would practically be on relief, but with the sale of that property I am not financially embarrassed.” Ex-presidents now get a pension.

It hardly seems right that a former president be destitute after a lifetime of service. There is little chance of that happening today. Today, public service is one of the most sure paths to great wealth. In the six years after leaving office, Bill Clinton collected more than $40 million in speaking fees. He came to office of modest means and left office with a negative net worth. Shortly after leaving office, however, he was fabulously wealthy.

He ain’t got nothin’ on his VP, however. Al Gore is on his way to being a billionaire.

Al Gore could become world’s first carbon billionaire: Al Gore, the former US vice president, could become the world’s first carbon billionaire after investing heavily in green energy companies.

He is the master of using the bully pulpit afforded him by his role in government for first creating a market, and then driving government funds into it.

“Rent seeking” is a economic term implies the extraction of uncompensated value from others without making any contribution to productivity, often by imposing burdensome regulations or other government decisions that may affect consumers or businesses. This is Al Gore in a nutshell. Rent seeking, and thus Al Gore, imposes substantial losses on society.

As the government grows, entrepreneurs like Gore realize that political maneuvers are more profitable than selling goods or services. Changes are made to the tax system to benefit special-interest groups like environmentalist. Of course the regulations special protections for various groups like “green” businesses. Seekers of economic privilege are emboldened by past successes, so they pressure for additional assistance. The sum total of all these demands absolutely hobbles the American economy.

What is the logical conclusion? Al Gore is transferring wealth from your pocket to his without providing any real economic benefit to society. He is doing this by virtue of the role he served in government and the fame and authority it has afforded hm.

When Truman left office, government service wasn’t the path to fabulous wealth and market manipulating rent seeking. It wasn’t that people then were somehow of better moral fiber than today. They just didn’t expect to use the government to get wealthy nor did they have the means. That is much different today. The size of the government has come to dominate the economy. We no longer live in a market economy. Rather, we are part of a political/governmental economy and rent seeking like Al Gore promotes is the “entrepreneurialism” of the day. Sadly, it comes at great cost to the American economy. The result will be long years of economic decline.

The cause of rent seeking and decline is the size of government. A major factor inhibiting economic growth is the attempt by Al Gore and others to manipulate markets and to petition for special privileges from the government. The only possible correction is to decrease the size of the government.

Don’t hold your breath.

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