I think it's pretty simple: when you give someone your own resources, you'll be choosy about who you think will make a good recipient; you don't want to give away the wealth and goods that you worked hard to accumulate on a bum who's going to just squander the gifts on booze and cigarettes (unless you're their mother, maybe! ).
…But if you have the power to safely take other people's resources without their consent, that significantly lowers the barrier to acquiring valuable resources, which accordingly lowers the reason to carefully choose how to spend them because you didn't have to work as hard to acquire them (this is the same reason why trust fund kids are so spoiled and free-spending). Heck, just give stuff away to people who maybe you think will vote for you as a result even though they don't deserve the stuff at all (because they're able-bodied, of sound mind, have plenty of opportunities, etc).
Human behavior is economic behavior. The particulars may vary, but competition for limited resources remains a constant.
- CEO Nwabudike Morgan
Pointedstick wrote:
I think it's pretty simple: when you give someone your own resources, you'll be choosy about who you think will make a good recipient; you don't want to give away the wealth and goods that you worked hard to accumulate on a bum who's going to just squander the gifts on booze and cigarettes (unless you're their mother, maybe! ).
…But if you have the power to safely take other people's resources without their consent, that significantly lowers the barrier to acquiring valuable resources, which accordingly lowers the reason to carefully choose how to spend them because you didn't have to work as hard to acquire them (this is the same reason why trust fund kids are so spoiled and free-spending). Heck, just give stuff away to people who maybe you think will vote for you as a result even though they don't deserve the stuff at all (because they're able-bodied, of sound mind, have plenty of opportunities, etc).
Even a charitable organization will have to be selective because significant donars will want to know where the money is going and the criteria.
This is how people who might not have someone directly in their life who loves them can recieve help....if they are worthy of it.
It's all very simple and moral because it's based on a volutary solution to a problem and not the violation of people's rights.
It's important if I'm to try to decide in my lifetime how to interact with charities and personal decisions about how to help people.
Certainly, some forms of charity breed dependence and feelings of entitlement, which is exactly what is so toxic, in your mind, about the government creating any sort of safety net. I don't want to be part of the problem if that is the case.
If people are literally not deserving of my help until I've somehow decided they're deserving of my help, that seems like a circular definition. It seems very useless to me. If a baby dies in a dumpster because his crack-head mom didn't want to take care of him, perhaps I should not feel a "duty" to make sure that happens to as few kids as possible, but I surely would feel he "deserves" better than that.
Personally, I think a large amount of what you see as "property" is simply partially theft from society backed by the force of government, which happens to result in enough order and productivity, though, that it is extremely useful, since we're all in this big moral dilemma of being forced to bump shoulders with each other and compete for resources...
So if we're going to have this social tool called property, it appears that some benefit far more than others by it, so creating a social safety net below which you don't fall I think is a perfectly reasonable balance for everyone else. If the government is going to protect property for the wealthy, I don't think there's anything wrong with creating a base-line of human dignity.
But that is just my opinion. More importantly, I want to have a guiding principal with which to live my personal life by, and if I am to do some positive good for others, I'd rather not be doing more harm than good by being a source of dependency and poverty, as you say.
Just curious, how do you define "poverty?"
"Men did not make the earth. It is the value of the improvements only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property. Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds."
moda0306 wrote:
Just curious, how do you define "poverty?"
Unable to afford basic needs:
Shelter, food, clothing, perhaps the tools to earn income (health, car or computer or whatever is neccessary to produce value they can trade for money)
Here are my questions again:
How do you think the poor should be helped? Who is deserving of help in your opinion?
I told you I was in favor of government creating a safety net... if you need more detail than that:
- Free education
- Subsidized healthcare
- Help with housing
- Help with food costs
... essentially the same thing you mentioned regarding poverty.
So if government provides "basic needs" such as shelter, food, clothing, and those other tools you mention, which our governments (various levels of it, anyway) in many ways DO provide for people, how can you say that government aid creates poverty.
I received a government education for free (to me)... how did that create poverty for me?
Even if it does breed "dependence," that is very different than "poverty" given your definition.
"Men did not make the earth. It is the value of the improvements only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property. Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds."
I told you I was in favor of government creating a safety net... if you need more detail than that:
- Free education
- Subsidized healthcare
- Help with housing
- Help with food costs
... essentially the same thing you mentioned regarding poverty.
So if government provides "basic needs" such as shelter, food, clothing, and those other tools you mention, which our governments (various levels of it, anyway) in many ways DO provide for people, how can you say that government aid creates poverty.
I received a government education for free (to me)... how did that create poverty for me?
Even if it does breed "dependence," that is very different than "poverty" given your definition.
I missed where you said that first part.
I would like to see if anyone else would prefer to answer your questions before I add a coment on how the government creates poverty doing this stuff. I don't think it's very interesting because it seems so obvious to me. That makes it boring to write about and I'd rather read what others think.
Here is how "free" government education causes problems (pastebomb incoming):
A major problem with government schools is that their structure is often set up to exacerbate existing inequalities. In the United States, for example, government schools draw both their students and their tax revenues from specific geographic areas. Originally intended to create “neighborhood schools,”? the true result is a perverse segregation by income level. Wealthy areas, full of high earners able to pay hefty property tax bills, receive in return well-funded public schools that are mostly safe and attract top teachers eager for students who are generally non-violent and high-achieving. These good school districts attract more wealthy people and upwardly-mobile professionals, inflating neighborhood real estate prices and pricing out poorer people. The same factor in reverse starves the schools in more impoverished neighborhoods of vital funds and leaves them with students from difficult and unsafe social situations. As the bad schools become a turn-off for home buyers, housing prices fall, and families who value education move elsewhere, starving the schools of the kinds of students that teachers actually want to teach. As a result, these schools gradually see their teaching staff replaced with the bottom of the barrel.
In most American cities, there is a shockingly stark contrast between the well-performing schools filled with the children of upper-middle-class professionals taught by skilled and caring instructors, and the poor schools filled with the children of impoverished and working-class laborers or the unemployed, taught by graduate school washouts and brutes. In this manner, well-off children attend schools that propel them to success, while children dealt worse cards in the game of life find themselves trapped in schools that teach them more about gangs and drugs than writing and math. In many of these places, government schooling is designed less to educate students and more to “get kids off the streets.”? Unfortunately, where street violence is a problem, this simply means that the violence migrates into the schools, since the gangsters-in-training and their victims alike are forced into the same buildings.
As a result of these perverse realities, public education in the United States is a tragic farce that mostly exists to perpetuate pre-existing class distinctions.
Human behavior is economic behavior. The particulars may vary, but competition for limited resources remains a constant.
- CEO Nwabudike Morgan
moda0306 wrote:
government creating a safety net...
- Free education
- Subsidized healthcare
- Help with housing
- Help with food costs
Good plan in theory. Abuse of this plan = poor execution in reality.
People who are really in need should receive. Enormously stricter criteria is essential to qualify for, and continue to, receive benefits.
I think the critera should be decided by the ones providing the benefits. This is not the government, they are only providing a portion of what they steal.
In other words, if the "free" (not really free) government education was beneficial to you, it's highly likely that your parents had enough money to live in an area where the schools were of high quality, signaling that in a system without property taxes and neighborhood schools that distort real estate prices, they would have had enough money to afford even an expensive private school. And it is my contention that the absence of "free" (not really free) government primary education would result in a flowering of private schooling options, many of them extremely cheap or even free. What would be the reason to offer schooling for free? Why, to try to tilt dumber students in favor of your point of view, of course. Does this sound monstrous? Well then what do you think the government is getting out of educating kids for free? (not really free)
Last edited by Pointedstick on Wed Jan 15, 2014 12:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Human behavior is economic behavior. The particulars may vary, but competition for limited resources remains a constant.
- CEO Nwabudike Morgan
Pointedstick wrote:
Here is how "free" government education causes problems (pastebomb incoming):
A major problem with government schools is that their structure is often set up to exacerbate existing inequalities. In the United States, for example, government schools draw both their students and their tax revenues from specific geographic areas. Originally intended to create “neighborhood schools,”? the true result is a perverse segregation by income level. Wealthy areas, full of high earners able to pay hefty property tax bills, receive in return well-funded public schools that are mostly safe and attract top teachers eager for students who are generally non-violent and high-achieving. These good school districts attract more wealthy people and upwardly-mobile professionals, inflating neighborhood real estate prices and pricing out poorer people. The same factor in reverse starves the schools in more impoverished neighborhoods of vital funds and leaves them with students from difficult and unsafe social situations. As the bad schools become a turn-off for home buyers, housing prices fall, and families who value education move elsewhere, starving the schools of the kinds of students that teachers actually want to teach. As a result, these schools gradually see their teaching staff replaced with the bottom of the barrel.
In most American cities, there is a shockingly stark contrast between the well-performing schools filled with the children of upper-middle-class professionals taught by skilled and caring instructors, and the poor schools filled with the children of impoverished and working-class laborers or the unemployed, taught by graduate school washouts and brutes. In this manner, well-off children attend schools that propel them to success, while children dealt worse cards in the game of life find themselves trapped in schools that teach them more about gangs and drugs than writing and math. In many of these places, government schooling is designed less to educate students and more to “get kids off the streets.”? Unfortunately, where street violence is a problem, this simply means that the violence migrates into the schools, since the gangsters-in-training and their victims alike are forced into the same buildings.
As a result of these perverse realities, public education in the United States is a tragic farce that mostly exists to perpetuate pre-existing class distinctions.
This is a problem with locally-funded education. You'll notice that countries with much more centralized education infrastructures don't have as much of this inequality.
If you think this inequality is bad now, wait until everyone has to pay for their own education.
"Men did not make the earth. It is the value of the improvements only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property. Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds."
So a government that provides housing, education, healthcare and food for the poor (many countries do this to varying degrees) is actually promoting poverty even though it is providing the very things that, by your definition, eliminate poverty??
I know that's not what you're saying, but it's what your contradictions are implying.
If those things are provided for people, how is that expanding poverty? It really is not that obvious to me...
"Men did not make the earth. It is the value of the improvements only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property. Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds."
So a government that provides housing, education, healthcare and food for the poor (many countries do this to varying degrees) is actually promoting poverty even though it is providing the very things that, by your definition, eliminate poverty??
I know that's not what you're saying, but it's what your contradictions are implying.
If those things are provided for people, how is that expanding poverty? It really is not that obvious to me...
People in poverty (defined here as a lack of material goods) who are simply given the material goods may become lifted out of poverty, but they will become dependent on the entity that gave them the goods continuing to do so forever because they did not lift themselves out of poverty in a sustainable manner. The moment the subsidies end, they will fall back into poverty because they still don't know how to prevent themselves from being impoverished.
This is why IMHO safety nets, welfare, and charity need to be well-targeted to have any hope of succeeding. If you look at an impoverished person who is fundamentally healthy in mind and body, this is a person who is impoverished because they do not know the life skills that you and I do. Simply giving them the stuff they have the capacity to earn for themselves if they knew how does nothing to help them. It just turns them into a ward of the state, their mom, etc.
This is of course distinguished from aid to the mentally ill, physically disabled, etc. Those kinds of people really do have impediments to earning a living and dependence on other people is less unfortunate because they have fewer options.
Last edited by Pointedstick on Wed Jan 15, 2014 1:05 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Human behavior is economic behavior. The particulars may vary, but competition for limited resources remains a constant.
- CEO Nwabudike Morgan
So a government that provides housing, education, healthcare and food for the poor (many countries do this to varying degrees) is actually promoting poverty even though it is providing the very things that, by your definition, eliminate poverty??
I know that's not what you're saying, but it's what your contradictions are implying.
If those things are provided for people, how is that expanding poverty? It really is not that obvious to me...
No contradiction from me.
Yes, stealing from some and auctioning off the stolen goods through the democractic process certainly breeds dependancy and poverty.
It breeds the poverty because eventually you run out of other people's money. Look at the unfunded liabilites.
So a government that provides housing, education, healthcare and food for the poor (many countries do this to varying degrees) is actually promoting poverty even though it is providing the very things that, by your definition, eliminate poverty??
I know that's not what you're saying, but it's what your contradictions are implying.
If those things are provided for people, how is that expanding poverty? It really is not that obvious to me...
People in poverty (defined here as a lack of material goods) who are simply given the material goods may become lifted out of poverty, but they will become dependent on the entity that gave them the goods continuing to do so forever because they did not lift themselves out of poverty in a sustainable manner. The moment the subsidies end, they will fall back into poverty because they still don't know how to prevent themselves from being impoverished.
This is why IMHO safety nets, welfare, and charity need to be well-targeted to have any hope of succeeding. If you look at an impoverished person who is fundamentally healthy in mind and body, this is a person who is impoverished because they do not know the life skills that you and I do. Simply giving them the stuff they have the capacity to earn for themselves if they knew how does nothing to help them. It just turns them into a ward of the state, their mom, etc.
This is of course distinguished from aid to the mentally ill, physically disabled, etc. Those kinds of people really do have impediments to earning a living and dependence on other people is less unfortunate because they have fewer options.
Yes well said. This is how the poor are bred by the state. It is cruel because the promises cannot be kept. That's why I say all this government borrowing which enslaves the unborn, the inflation which raises prices on the poor is a cruel hoax being played on people to gain their support.
The government masters keep $0.50 of every dollar and say "gee look what I did for you"
Or as Browne always said....."Government breaks your legs, hands you a crutch and says look what I did for you".
Mentally ill, physically disabled are such a tiny portion there is no doubt they would be much much better cared for if we were wealthier and so much wasn't being handed to deadbeats.
Opposing welfare is to love people and the poor and unfortunate. It's to love them and actually think about real solutions rather than the mentally lazy non-solution of stealing.
Stealing, like all violence is an attempt to get something for nothing. Since something cannot come from nothing you know beforehand it's going to be a complete failure. Unless the goal is to create more poor. The war on poverty has succeeded in that.
We can't run out of other people's money in a closed system... nor can you with the way our fiat monetary system works.
So if you can provide some reason why providing housing, food, education, and healthcare will collapse a society (into not being able to provide it for people going forward), I'm all ears... but based on where western civilization is at today, it doesn't appear that your argument holds much water. Many very prosperous countries provide these safety nets to people.
"Men did not make the earth. It is the value of the improvements only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property. Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds."
I'm of the opinion that it's hopeless. Prosperity and democracy lead to overly-generous welfare, using the term very generally. Eventually entitlements and programs become too much for the productive economy to bear, and a long slide begins. Then hungry upstarts, countries on the rise, will take over. Rinse and repeat. I don't see a way out of it for the USA.
My way of dealing with it was to take a cue from Ayn Rand, and stop supporting the looters. I sold my business, and structured my investments so as to incur extremely low taxes.
We can't run out of other people's money in a closed system... nor can you with the way our fiat monetary system works.
So if you can provide some reason why providing housing, food, education, and healthcare will collapse a society (into not being able to provide it for people going forward), I'm all ears... but based on where western civilization is at today, it doesn't appear that your argument holds much water. Many very prosperous countries provide these safety nets to people.
Ok money doesn't feed people or house people. Food and housing do. Peopel need to produce that. When you create so many dependants that the producers can no longer support them you've run out.
The expression has the word money in it but it's not meant to be taken litterally. Obviously, look at Zimbabwae. They didn't run out of money....they were using 100 trillion bills as wallpaper. It's a meaningless distinction though.
What good did having 100 trillion dollar bills do for the poor there? The poorest person was worth 100s of trillions.
We can't run out of other people's money in a closed system... nor can you with the way our fiat monetary system works.
So if you can provide some reason why providing housing, food, education, and healthcare will collapse a society (into not being able to provide it for people going forward), I'm all ears... but based on where western civilization is at today, it doesn't appear that your argument holds much water. Many very prosperous countries provide these safety nets to people.
I Shrugged wrote:
I'm of the opinion that it's hopeless. Prosperity and democracy lead to overly-generous welfare, using the term very generally. Eventually entitlements and programs become too much for the productive economy to bear, and a long slide begins. Then hungry upstarts, countries on the rise, will take over. Rinse and repeat. I don't see a way out of it for the USA.
My way of dealing with it was to take a cue from Ayn Rand, and stop supporting the looters. I sold my business, and structured my investments so as to incur extremely low taxes.
We need to all listen to her. I disagree with her on plenty, but wow, she was brilliant and brutally clear, even in a 2nd language.
We can't run out of other people's money in a closed system... nor can you with the way our fiat monetary system works.
So if you can provide some reason why providing housing, food, education, and healthcare will collapse a society (into not being able to provide it for people going forward), I'm all ears... but based on where western civilization is at today, it doesn't appear that your argument holds much water. Many very prosperous countries provide these safety nets to people.
Ok money doesn't feed people or house people. Food and housing do. Peopel need to produce that. When you create so many dependants that the producers can no longer support them you've run out.
The expression has the word money in it but it's not meant to be taken litterally. Obviously, look at Zimbabwae. They didn't run out of money....they were using 100 trillion bills as wallpaper. It's a meaningless distinction though.
What good did having 100 trillion dollar bills do for the poor there? The poorest person was worth 100s of trillions.
Ok, so what you're saying is that there is going to be such a huge growth of the needy class that the productive class will either fall into it, or just leave, right? Actually... it seems you think we're already there.
Do you have any figures to back this up, either in foreign countries or domestically? Do you have anything that shows that welfare and social support is growing massively as a percentage of GDP?
Also, if this was the case, I would expect to see a flattening of discrepancy of income... if being productive sucks so friggin' bad, and the moral hazards are so lucrative towards NOT being so, why are rich people becoming MORE and MORE wealthy compared to everyone else? They must be masochists!
And more importantly, if welfare (and other social support) is so much better than working, why do you work so dang hard (I assume you do)? This isn't rhetorical... legit question...
"Men did not make the earth. It is the value of the improvements only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property. Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds."
We can't run out of other people's money in a closed system... nor can you with the way our fiat monetary system works.
So if you can provide some reason why providing housing, food, education, and healthcare will collapse a society (into not being able to provide it for people going forward), I'm all ears... but based on where western civilization is at today, it doesn't appear that your argument holds much water. Many very prosperous countries provide these safety nets to people.
Ok money doesn't feed people or house people. Food and housing do. Peopel need to produce that. When you create so many dependants that the producers can no longer support them you've run out.
The expression has the word money in it but it's not meant to be taken litterally. Obviously, look at Zimbabwae. They didn't run out of money....they were using 100 trillion bills as wallpaper. It's a meaningless distinction though.
What good did having 100 trillion dollar bills do for the poor there? The poorest person was worth 100s of trillions.
Ok, so what you're saying is that there is going to be such a huge growth of the needy class that the productive class will either fall into it, or just leave, right? Actually... it seems you think we're already there.
Do you have any figures to back this up, either in foreign countries or domestically? Do you have anything that shows that welfare and social support is growing massively as a percentage of GDP?
Also, if this was the case, I would expect to see a flattening of discrepancy of income... if being productive sucks so friggin' bad, and the moral hazards are so lucrative towards NOT being so, why are rich people becoming MORE and MORE wealthy compared to everyone else? They must be masochists!
And more importantly, if welfare (and other social support) is so much better than working, why do you work so dang hard (I assume you do)? This isn't rhetorical... legit question...
Food stamp usage has doubled in 5 years.
Labor participation is falling.
More people are going on social security every year......it is set to explode.
Rich are getting richer because the QE has inflated the price of their assets.
Poor are getting poorer because the QE has made stuff more expensive.
Middle class is getting hurt for the same reason, plus regulations are killing businesses.
Welfare doesn't seem like a good alternative for me. But I'm pretty smart, have a simple, stress-free (for me) and lucrative job. This is not the case for many.
Ok, so what you're saying is that there is going to be such a huge growth of the needy class that the productive class will either fall into it, or just leave, right?....
Do you have any figures to back this up, either in foreign countries or domestically? Do you have anything that shows that welfare and social support is growing massively as a percentage of GDP?
Venezuela, Argentina, Zimbabwe, France, Britain. The productive folks are fighting back in Britain. For evidence, just Google the hard-hitting (and devastating) new Brit TV documentary called "Benefits Street." It is an eye-opener for all but the most Krugmanesque tin foil helmeted.
moda0306 wrote:
Do you have any figures to back this up, either in foreign countries or domestically? Do you have anything that shows that welfare and social support is growing massively as a percentage of GDP?
moda0306 wrote:
Do you have any figures to back this up, either in foreign countries or domestically? Do you have anything that shows that welfare and social support is growing massively as a percentage of GDP?
Welfare is welfare no matter what name the government uses to describe (or hide) it. PS, you are good at finding visual aids, so please post a graph of the U.S. gov's unfunded liabilities. It is a shocker.
moda0306 wrote:
Do you have any figures to back this up, either in foreign countries or domestically? Do you have anything that shows that welfare and social support is growing massively as a percentage of GDP?
So we're essentially not too far from where we were at in 1977 or so... There doesn't seem to be much growth there. And maybe what growth there is, is POSSIBLY a result of, not a contributor to, the loss of opportunity in our economy for lower classes.
SS is up because we have more retirees in general... not an overall growth in dependency.
The most recent spike is obviously a natural result of a financial crisis followed by recession and rampant unemployment.
"Men did not make the earth. It is the value of the improvements only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property. Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds."
).
