If the government were to focus its post-budget bout of throwing money around on the 1.26 million Hong Kong people living in poverty, they would each receive over HK$31,000. Instead, a handout of HK$6,000 plus tax relief will go to everyone, from billionaires to overseas permanent identity card holders and the bureaucrats themselves. Yet, even if the more deserving were to get the cash, simply dishing out money to the poor makes no sense.
We pay our taxes and a myriad of government levies in the hope that this money will not be evenly distributed - yes, it's counterintuitive to look at it this way but surely it's true.
In any rational system there can, for example, be no justification for not having a special allocation to educate children even though the majority of the population are not of school age. And, then again, it would be plain balmy to cease paying for roads on the grounds that some people use them less than others.
In others words, the business of government is the business of priorities. When government funds are allocated, they are rarely spread evenly among the population, nor indeed are government revenues raised without discrimination, which is why some people pay higher taxes than others.
This crazy scheme of handing out HK$6,000 without discrimination and then adding more senselessness to this process with a round of tax relief produces a total cost of over HK$40 billion.
Let's put that sum in perspective. It is roughly the equivalent cost of building 40 fully equipped hospitals or, as the government likes to throw money around on mega projects, it's about the price of two West Kowloon cultural hubs. In other words, this is truly a massive sum of money.