Government wasn't created to provide jobs

By David R. Hoffman,
Harrisburg, Pa.

So defense cuts could slow the Washington region’s economy [“Va. to fight Defense moves,” Metro, Sept. 10]. Any cut in defense acquisitions or closing of a base will slow the economy wherever the manufacturer or base is located.

But what is the purpose of government? Is it to provide permanent employment for selected private industries or related support groups? The preamble to our Constitution says that our government was formed “to establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty ..... ”

I read nothing about permanent subsidies for a defense industry that has excess capacity, or, for that matter, an industry in a swing state or congressional district. We may from time to time need to provide a temporary stimulus that protects the entire economy or that enables a region to recover from a disaster not of its own making. But our government should not be making unneeded acquisitions to support permanent employment in an industry; nor, above all, should it contract out governmental functions to private industry to further the fiction that government is being reduced in size.