“As all the media attention attests, the sad story of Flint is not limited to itself,” says Kishore Jayabalan in this week’s Acton Commentary. “The entitlement mentality is like a drug ruining not just American cities but spreading to the country as a whole. The entitlement mentality is like a drug ruining not just American cities but spreading to the country as a whole.”

As a native of Flint, Michigan, I am very saddened by the contaminated water crisis that has broken out in my hometown and has now gathered international attention. What’s even sadder is that I am not terribly shocked that such a crisis could take place there. Flint has long been Exhibit A in the story of the decline and fall of a once-proud industrial city in the age of globalization; it is also a prime example of why monopolies in politics, business and labor are inherently prone to placency and even corruption. Flint is what happens when we petition out of a false sense of “solidarity.”

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