I've often said that I don't hate the welfare state on fiscal grounds alone. I hate the welfare state because it is morally wrong. I'd hate it even if were indefinitely sustainable. I'd hate it even if it didn't cost me a dime. The modern welfare state, as an expression of the great "progressive" drive towards a secular Utopia, is a poison to the body politic. Whatever good its proponents claim for it in the short run, in the long run it will destroy us if we do not purge it from our society. (I am not speaking here of charity, which is an action taken by the individual for motives of their own; I am speaking of money taken from the individual by the State and redistributed to other individuals deemed by the State to be more worthy of it.)Read the whole thing.
Update - Kinda, sorta related: Paul Rahe on Obama’s challenge to the Catholic Church (which is really a challenge to anyone, or any group, that presumes to defy Obama’s all-powerful state):
In 2008, when he first ran for the Presidency, Barack Obama posed as a moderate most of the time. This time, he is openly running as a radical. His aim is to win a mandate for the fundamental transformation of the United States that he promised in passing on the eve of his election four years ago and that he promised again when he called his administration The New Foundation. In the process, he intends to reshape the Democratic coalition – to bring the old hypocrisy to an end, to eliminate those who stand in the way of the final consolidation of the administrative entitlements state, to drive out the faithful Catholics once and for all, to jettison the white working class, and to build a new American regime on a coalition of highly educated upper-middle class whites, feminists, African-Americans, Hispanics, illegal immigrants, and those belonging to the public-sector unions. To Americans outside this coalition, he intends to show no mercy [emphasis mine – Paco].Land of the free and home of the brave? We will know before the year is out.
Outside the US, welfare states have evolved out of things like British 19th century poorhouses (Dickens), plus universal military service and extension of soldier's pensions. Australia has been something of a welfare state since about its 1900 Federation, when a universal age pension was introduced. By WWII there was universal 'Child Endowment', paying people to reproduce.
ReplyDeleteI can understand Americans asking 'Why can't we, the richest country in the world, have what other countries have?'
But people are living longer than ever before, which means more likely to get serious disease too, requiring expensive treatment.
Old welfare systems were just not designed to cope with this.
We certainly all need to have this debate.
One of my first jobs 40 years ago was Social Security clerk. Even then people were very attached to welfare, 'I fought for this country, I paid my taxes, welfare is my right' we heard even 40 years ago. Weaning people off it is not easy.
The biggest problem with the so-called "safety net" in the U.S. is that it is now aimed, not at the truly needy, but at the middle class. Once everybody becomes dependent on some form of government assistance, the willingness to restrain the growth of the government - and the expansion of its power - weakens. This poses not just a threat to our economic well-being, but to our individual freedom.
ReplyDeleteI am absolutely with Mark Steyn on this: "big government makes for small citizens."