Mark Twain didn’t say “everybody talks about entitlements but nobody does anything about them,” but he may as well have.  He was a keen observer of human peculiarities, an ability which turned out to be essential for fathoming people and their entitlements.  Entitlements -- benefits to which a person has rights by custom or law -- are either the salvation of the common man or the root of all fiscal evil, depending on whom you ask.  Debates surrounding entitlements range from cerebral economists dueling with sharpened pencils to entrenched Congressmen reenacting the feud of the Hatfields and McCoys.  The entitlements that dominate our consciousness are big ticket items such as Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, unfunded sinkholes ranging from 50 to 200 trillion, depending on who’s counting.  These staggering obligations may threaten to wreck national budgets and lay waste to society, but they have little to teach us about the...(Read Full Article)