Once again the powers that be (legislators) punish the responsible people to subsidize the irresponsible?

Read "Atlas Shrugged", the first time I read a quote from it to my girlfriend, she said, "hey wait a minute, is this a true story?" She was joking of course, she knows it was written 60 years ago. But the part I was reading her was about punishing the productive to provide for the unproductive and is sounded like the network news to her.