Life Without Welfare?

Artysim

Join Date 09/2007

+33

Life Without Welfare?

During my time at JU I've seen repeated postings arguing against welfare, universal health care, and the role of the government in society proper. Obviously this is a real sticking point with many of the fine users here, and to be honest I've learned quite a bit from reading posts that come from the other side of the fence. To be fair, I do in fact agree with some of the main arguments against welfare. For example, it can definitely encourage complacency and some people will try to abuse the system rather than use it for its' intended purpose. Every system, whether public or private, will have its' flaws. But does that mean it should be abolished entirely? I do believe that welfare, social security (retirement) and government mandated healthcare are absolutely essential for any modern democratic nation to thrive. Why? There are many reasons. Please bear with me as I launch into another misguided rant.

First off, all developed countries in the modern world have these things in place, and the U.S sticks out like a sore thumb among them as one of the only nations that doesn't have universal healthcare. I'm sorry Americans, but I've visited your fine country quite frequently and Medicaid is a sorry, underfunded, over-stretched piss poor example of anything that could ever closely resemble universal care. Why do all these other countries have socialized medicine, welfare, etc? The answer has nothing to do with "left vs right" or democrat vs republican, liberal vs conservative or any such nonsense. There was no vast left wing conspiracy that gripped all these other countries and tricked the poor fools into adopting socialist policies. The answer is quite simple; they learned that we're all in this together. Other nations have learned that if they provide a social safety net that largely guarantees the average citizen a decent quality of life, people actually are happier and more willing to work. Yes, some people will always try to find ways to get on welfare and stay on welfare indefinitely, and unless they have some kind of ailment or disability that prevents them from working, those people are indeed a leech on the system and need to be dealt with. But that's a matter of finding and correcting an abuse of the system, not a problem with the fundamentals behind it.

All of the other developed nations at one point in time had no social safety net that people could turn to when they fell on hard times, and these were not nice places to live (unless you had money, in which case, who cares right?) Perhaps you are familiar with Charles Dickens "A Christmas Carol" and "Oliver Twist"? While these are famous stories that have been hollywood-ized several times over, they were actually written as social commentary about life in 19th century industrial-revolution England. Child labour. No laws governing how employers could and couldn't treat their employees. Sixteen hour workdays with no guaranteed minimum wage? Now that's progress baby!! If you got sick from all the smog and ash that covered London then (and many people did die from respiratory ailments because of it) you were useless to your employer, and literally discarded onto the streets. Hope you get better on your own, because you sure as hell can't afford a real doctor! There were charities and hospices around at the time that were dependent on donations to operate, but they didn't have nearly the amount of funding and resources necessary to provide a true hand to all the needy (hey, that sounds like a good point for the government to step in!) The United States of today isn't 19th century England, so how can you compare the two? I'm using it as an example of how things were for other nations before, and still could be if the U.S continues on its' path of "privatize everything, and remove all government regulations!!"

Social safety nets are just like the army. When times are good and a nation is at peace, people start asking why all that money needs to be spent on those big ol' ships and tanks and planes. It's been proven time and again, no one likes a soldier until the enemy is on your doorstep, and then everyone loves a soldier and cries "hallelujah, kill the somna bitch!" The same goes for welfare. When you're doing good, have a decent job and paying the bills it can be hard to rationalize giving a big chunk of your pay to the government so that they can take care of "lazy poor people who don't wanna work like me!". What happens if you get sick and need care under a privatized system? The way that I see it, unless you're very well off you're still screwed even if you have health insurance. Unless you're Bill Gates and can pay the tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars out of pocket, you use your health insurance policy. Assuming that someone from this private health insurance company, who is NOT a doctor, decides that your policy covers the care recommended by a real doctor, they pay for your care, and yay for you, you get to live another day. And to penalize you for living, your insurance company has decided that since you actually have now used medical services your risk (liability) has gone up and so now you have to pay a higher premium. Get sick again..... oooh, now your health insurance company might decline paying for your care. Could be that your need to live is starting to affect their profit margin, and we can't have that now!

So why haven't Americans seen the light as to the benefits of socialized care for all citizens? In my humble opinion there's a disturbing trend that I've noticed when I visit my American brothers and sisters- I call it the "I've got mine" mentality, and it bears no political affiliation- it's present in both liberal and conservatives (in my humble opinion). It's the attitude that everyone is on their own, the only rule of the game is to look out for #1, and if someone gets in the way of your goal or is going after the same thing you are, don't work together, stomp the fuck out of the guy and take the prize for yourself! Now please do not misunderstand me- this is not a rant against Americans, nor am I trying to attack your way of life. I am trying to understand it. What I see regularly is good hardworking people turned against each other by a system that encourages competition over cooperation and operates under a sink or swim mentality. If you make it that's great, if you don't too bad, hope you enjoy the pine box coffin and better luck next time, chump! In my opinion, running a country under the ideal that everyone is a rugged individual who has to fend for themself is not workable in the present day. Maybe back in the days of the wild west, when you had pioneers who were literally on their own did you see that, but that time is no more. Many nations in the world have moved on to universal programs that look after all citizens, that acknowledge that everyone is truly all in this together. When will this happen for the U.S? Or will it ever happen?

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Draginol

Join Date 03/2001

+137

In the US, sure, but most countries with socialised systems don't have such a big wealth disparity as you do. Maybe it's because we 'stifle innovation', but I don't think that's particularly accurate.

There is a reason that the United States tends to dominate emerging industries. Germany, France, etc. certainly aren't the hotbed of cutting edge innovation in human achievement these days.

A huge income disparity simply means that the economy is less regulated by the government.

I don't see it as a problem if person A makes 1000X more than I do. It doesn't hurt me one bit.

And the discussion is about health insurance in the United States. Most Americans have health insurance already. It works well for most people. About 5% of US citizens population doesn't have health insurance, can't easily afford it and don't quality for medicaid.

The idea of turning our working system upside down for a few percent is madness.

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Draginol

Join Date 03/2001

+137

At the end of the day, if you drop money into someones hat on the street, you don't know what they're going to use that money for.

That pretty much sums up how I feel about my tax dollars going to the federal government.

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But what liberals now want is the next step - not "we're all in this together" but to basically saddle us with parasites in the most literal sense. People who are not paying in but are free riding.

I think the Far-Left with whom you always discuss these issues gave you the impression that this is what the main-stream Dem are saying. No one is proposing to saddle the Gov with any parasites. You ignored what i said about we must FIX the system to eliminate that. And i am sure you also know full well that there is nothing perfect in this worled. I am sure if YOU look closely in your organization you will find few of those parasites, i am also sure that you always try to clip them off and If you blink for a second they will multiply and any good-run business does that ALL the time. Gov is no exception. leeches and parasites will always be there, even in charaties. That doesnt mean we give up and discard the whole idea of giving honest working people a chance to afford meaningful health care.

Even if we let the whole thing to be handled by charities as you suggest, i can assure you there will be parasites .... there is no way to "purify" our world from them.

Dont always concentrate on this point of allowing cheats and leeches and drug-addicts to drain the system. NO ONE is against ridding the system of all of them. every single one of them. If you have a magical solution to do that, you will be the most famous and popular Democrat. Honest, and i am not joking. Just say how do we do that. keep in mind they also exist at charities and all other those private organization.

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A huge income disparity simply means that the economy is less regulated by the government.

It can also mean that the economy is _very_ regulated by the government. There was a huge income disparity in the Soviet Union. Most had nothing, some had a lot, one guy had an entire country, an army, and nukes.

I am translate-quoting here from a story written by Hungarian-Israeli author Ephraim Kishon:

"[A communist's wife says to her husband:] You are no real communist like the others yet. You don't have the villa or the car or the driver."

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cactoblasta

Join Date 04/2004

+48

Having the government tell me if I can have a procedure or not based on their determination of whether I deserve it or not is an anethema to me.

Well if you're not a monumental cheapskate you can always use the private system and pay through your teeth/buy private insurance, get your medicare discount and hope it covers it. Do you think private health insurance in the US doesn't make decisions about who gets treatment and who doesn't?

Germany, France, etc. certainly aren't the hotbed of cutting edge innovation in human achievement these days.

Except in solar power, where Germany leads the world (with China probably a rapidly gaining second). But you're right, France is pretty rubbish.

That pretty much sums up how I feel about my tax dollars going to the federal government.

There's nothing stopping you from reading the Budget. Sure there are 'black' programs, but they consume a tiny portion compared to the rest of it. So long as you have a reasonable knowledge of economics and can read a complex ledger you should be fine. Or you can rely on the analysis by economic specialists that come out in newspapers/online every once in a while.

Now admittedly you don't get to choose where that money goes, but that's the same with everything you buy - if you want to pay the government to provide you police and road services, you pay what they ask and in return get a few things you might not want. But that's the package deal and, unless you want to move, they're the only game in town. If you don't want to pay tax at all move to the Cayman Islands. You're rich enough to live pretty well there.

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cactoblasta

Join Date 04/2004

+48

It's called 'charity.' I give, and I give with no strings attached.

Some comedian a few years back made a pretty insightful comment about this. I don't remember his exact words, but the basic thrust was "I used to not give to bums because they would just spend it on booze and drugs. But when I think about it that's exactly what I'm going to spend it on."

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this works for those of you who drink.

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I will echo MM's comments. Great article and congrats on the feature.

I read most of the comments, and skimmed the rest, and did not see the point that I would like to make. I wish it was mine, but no, some other thought of this and I merely read it.

To paraphrase it: The societies we are being compared to all have one thing in common that we lack. They are based on a monarchy that was supposed to provide for their citizens (in ye olden times, their defense - more recently defense against disease). America was born of rebellion and the desire to go on our own. Of all the British empire, we are unique in that no one "gave" us our freedom, we took it.

While the same can be said for some of the colonies of other European powers of the past, the one thing they lack that we have had - is the feeling/understanding/desire/ (insert term of choice) that ANYONE can be WHOMEVER they want. regardless of birth right.

That attitude, although greatly diminished today, still pervades a lot of American Society. America is not heartless - as is demonstrated by our charity and willingness to help other countries that have no connection to us other than they are people too. But we are fiercely independent and (most, definitely not all) of us want to do it on our own. And so we do. And through charity, not government, we try to care for those who stumble and fail.

Welfare, and more recently Universal Health care, is the big guy on the block (in this case government), trying to tell us we no longer can, or will be allowed to take care of ourselves. And that gets our hackles up.

Medicaid is not perfect (in my opinion and others) for a very good reason. It is not charity, it is subservience. And like all other such programs, we cannot abide that since the next "victims" of such subservience will be us (the criminal aspects of the 2 Universal health care proposals now being pushed by some running for president).

To a foreigner, outside, looking in, it may seem that we are barbaric. But that is due to their lack of understanding that America is not a descendant of a Monarchy, but the first, and best example of a democracy (or representative republic to be more exact), where we do care for our less fortunate. But WE do, not the government. And we hate it when the government tries to tell us how to live our life.

If America was so bad, we would not be world leaders. Perhaps Europeans see us as being great IN SPITE of that. We see us being world leaders BECAUSE of it. It being our Independence.

and yes, you can find a google of exceptions now. And that is why I said "diminished" today. It is still around, but some (like Kerry in 04), think we should be more European. And the rest of us are trying hard to prevent us from being just that.

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