Peter Schiff is interviewed by the Wall Street [Opinion] Journal on January 15, 2009.

On the government stimulus package:

In the short run, they can stimulate consumption. But more consumption is the opposite of what we need.

What is the stimulus Washington should be considering?

The stimulus would be less government. To understand government is in the way. Government is a burden on the economy. The lighter the burden the easier it’s going to be for the market to correct these imbalances.

On the right, left and center consenus about infrastructure development:

We’re broke and I don’t know if we can afford to make our bridges and our roads fancier or nicer right now.

On job cuts:

Labor is being poorly allocated right now in our economy. We have people working in areas where they shouldn’t be. And now the government has to subsidise those companies to keep them in business. But what they’re really doing is preventing that labor from being effectively used.

On the financial services industry:

We have too many people in financial services. We need to have that industry contract.

On TARP:

I have a small brokerage firm. I have no debt. I didn’t make any of these bad investments. Yet, I’m not getting any of this money from the TARP. It’s my larger competitors who lost hundreds of billions who are getting all this money.

If the government would allow these firms to fail, more firms like mine would be expanding. The brokerage industry would contract, but the capacity would be in the hands of more competent managers.

You’ve got to love Peter Schiff for his understanding of the current economic crisis and his candor in explaining it. They government should let these institutions fail go bankrupt (They’ve already failed). Their management is incompetent, their workforces are over-burdended with unnecessary employees, and instead of letting capitalism run its course, the government rewards them with billions in bail out funds.