The poison that is the Welfare State

As a compassionate person, I must admit I’ve struggled with the idea of the welfare state. I mean, the rich in the country live very well. Why shouldn’t they pay taxes and give some money to programs that help the poor? It’s eventually in their best interest as well, right? Less crime, less poverty. Isn’t that what’s in the best interest of the country as a whole? What I’ve realized is that not only is not in the best interest of the country as a whole, it’s not even in the best interest of the people who “benefit” from these social programs. And this is where conservatism gets twisted. I don’t believe “I worked hard for what I have and if you didn’t, you get what you deserve.” I not only believe, but I know, that welfare is actually bad not only for America, but for the poor who collect welfare. It does nothing to instill any values that will help these people long term. It does not value hard work or education. It actually perpetuates poverty.

What if I told you the rules of my classroom were as follows: No one gets a grade lower than a C-. Ever. You may work hard and get an A, but those people who earn As have the most points in my class, so I’ll take some of the points they’ve earned and give them to those students who “need” them the most. So those points will boost up the lower kids into the C- range. I don’t want a kid to fail. Who could argue with this? Only hateful elitists, probably A+ students themselves, who don’t want to help others. See where I’m going here?
While there may be some fruitcakes who praise this because all the kids will feel good about themselves, most of you would think this was ridiculous. What’s wrong with it? Well for starters, there would be very little incentive to work hard in my class. Some students who were raised to work hard still would, but there’d be a general lack of effort among many in the class. What about the students who have to work to get a C-, while others are given a C-? Fair? Of course not.
How about as a parent? Do liberal ideas work there? I guess it depends. You have an adult child who can’t hold a job, and is constantly in need of money, has to continually move back in with mom and dad, and still spends money irresponsibly. I think all of us would try to help our child. As a parent, do you continue to give money to your child, or do you eventually cut that child off, knowing that in the long run it is in the best interest of your child that he/she learns responsibility and learns to stand on his/her own two feet. I don’t think anyone would doubt that in these examples, both parents love their child. But most would agree that teaching someone how to succeed on their own is best. As the saying goes; Give a man a fish, and he’ll eat for a day. Teach a man to fish, and he’ll eat for a lifetime.
I don’t believe that liberals are evil. I just think they come up with a lot of answers to problems, without considering the long-term ramifications. Are these simplistic examples that don’t show all aspects of the welfare debate? Admittedly. But there’s no question for the most part, these examples go hand in hand and show exactly what we are doing to our poor people in this country.

POVERTY

Let's look at the poor in America. While I am not trying to minimize what some poor people in America have to go through, especially our homeless, let’s be realistic. Even the poorest in our country live better than many in the world, especially in places like Africa and Asia. About 1% of children in the United States suffer from chronic malnutrition, in comparison to 50% of children in southeast Asia. About two-thirds of all the malnourished children in the world are in Asia, with another one-fourth in Africa. So in these places, handouts are necessary. They’re necessary to keep people alive. But even in these places there is concern and criticism because eventually the handouts run out, and the people who need help are in the exact same spot they were before. The poor in the United States are not dying of starvation. They are generally able to get clean water, food, and shelter. So we can bypass the “handouts” that don’t work anyways, and skip right to the next step. The step where we actually get these people working, educate them, and allow them to live self-fulfilling, productive lives on their own. Yet we refuse to do it. We keep them in the cycle of poverty.

In Robert Rector’s paper How Poor are America’s Poor? Examining the “Plague” of Poverty in America.” In it, Rector looked at the conditions of who the government deemed to “poor.” He found that part of the problem seems to be expectations. “Today, the expenditures per person of the lowest-income one-fifth (or quintile) of households equal those of the median American household in the early 1970s, after adjusting for inflation.” Some other facts he found:
• Forty-three percent of all poor households actually own their own homes. The average home owned by persons classified as poor by the Census Bureau is a three-bedroom house with one-and-a-half baths, a garage, and a porch or patio.
• Eighty percent of poor households have air conditioning. By contrast, in 1970, only 36 percent of the entire U.S. population enjoyed air conditioning.
• Only 6 percent of poor households are overcrowded. More than two-thirds have more than two rooms per person.
• The average poor American has more living space than the average individual living in Paris, London, Vienna, Athens, and other cities throughout Europe. (These comparisons are to the average citizens in foreign countries, not to those classified as poor.)
• Nearly three-quarters of poor households own a car; 31 percent own two or more cars.
• Ninety-seven percent of poor households have a color television; over half own two or more color televisions.
• Seventy-eight percent have a VCR or DVD player; 62 percent have cable or satellite TV reception.
• Eighty-nine percent own microwave ovens, more than half have a stereo, and more than a third have an automatic dishwasher.

Rector goes on to say, “Overall, the typical American defined as poor by the government has a car, air conditioning, a refrigerator, a stove, a clothes washer and dryer, and a microwave. He has two color televisions, cable or satellite TV reception, a VCR or DVD player, and a stereo. He is able to obtain medical care. His home is in good repair and is not overcrowded. By his own report, his family is not hungry and he had sufficient funds in the past year to meet his family's essential needs.”
But probably most telling is that “In good economic times or bad, the typical poor family with children is supported by only 800 hours of work during a year: That amounts to 16 hours of work per week. If work in each family were raised to 2,000 hours per year—the equivalent of one adult working 40 hours per week throughout the year— nearly 75 percent of poor children would be lifted out of official poverty.”
CRIME AND WELFARE
When our welfare program was first started, many believed that welfare would help rid the country of crime and poverty in our country. “People rob and kill because they have little” was the thought. If the government were to set up a program where these people were taken care of, they would have no reason to commit crimes. And truthfully I don’t blame people for believing this at the time. It seems like an overly optimistic, yet plausible goal. But to believe it now is just plain foolish. Again, let’s forget about what we “think” or how we “feel.” Let’s look at the facts.
The United States had just lived through the “Lawless Years,” roughly the 1920s until the early 1930s. There is no doubt that it is more than just coincidence that this time coincides with prohibition, the 18th Amendment which banned liquor in the United States. The Amendment was ratified in 1919 and put into law one year after ratification. And while it prohibited the manufacture, sale, and transportation of liquor, it also created an underground culture of blind pigs (illegal bars which sold alcohol), bootlegging, smuggling, and organized crime. In 1933 the 21st Amendment was passed, repealing the 18th Amendment. Since the repeal of the ban on alcohol coincided with the start of welfare, you could effectively argue that either made the difference in the drop of crime rate afterwards. So I looked at the U.S. Crime rate over a 47 year period from 1960 to 2007.
According to the crime statistics gather by the Disaster Center, crime has fluctuated throughout this time, but hasn’t gotten better and for the most part gotten worse.
Since 1960 murder and burglary are up, forcible rape has tripled, and robbery has more than doubled, per capita. So while there have been many changes over the last almost half century, one constant has been our welfare system. There is no way you can look at the statistics and come away thinking welfare is somehow limiting crime. And while in no way am I claiming welfare actually causes crime, I think that you could look at the statistics and reasonably argue that welfare may encourage crime because it gives many the notion that they are “owed” something. That you don’t have to work hard for what you get.