Should the Government Give Away Free Money ?

I know nothing is really free! That is my whole point of the following concept. Government has created a huge money wasting system, above and beyond the actual money being given away, in the administration of the the money it hands out [ie. welfare programs] and in the money it collects [ie. the IRS]. Now what if they were to establish that a certain minimum amount of monery is necessary for people to live [say maybe 15-20 thousand per individual per year] and simply gave anyone below the minimum the difference necessary to bring them up to minimum standards - Do you have any idea how many government programs could be eliminated overnight? Do you have any idea how much private business would benefit as people would always have some money to spend? Streamlined government with an economy that keeps running as the people always have some money in their pockets.

Right - it will never happen. Too many people benefit from government waste and too many people hate the idea of a 'free lunch'. But I bet you 'dollars to donuts' that it would work. What do you think

In some cases it would work. In most cases I think it would breed dependency, sloth and apathy. Also I bet a lot of people would mismanage it. Blowing it on certain items.

a reply to: AlienView interesting idea,,i think at this point the world needs a better system,so i say give it a go what have we to loose

a reply to: AlienView

I am willing to bet, that very much like the UK, if the US government stopped throwing good money after bad on badly written contracts with its military suppliers, its healthcare providers, and all other private companies it has dealings with, and actually only paid what things were worth, rather than allowing unfavourable contracts to be established between itself and companies which seek to screw those contracts for all they are worth, that the USA would be able to afford to feed every impoverished human being in the nation, for all of bloody time!

My government gets over charged for everything it buys, everything it uses, and every service provided to it by every private company that it has an arrangement with. These contracts are passed without an eye being batted, probably because someone got a nice bung somewhere in the civil service, to ensure that they would go through, and that which ever highly placed secret partner in the firm, can profit from these contracts, many of which amount to outright thievery.

a reply to: AlienView

Your question should really be, "Should the government be giving away free money," because it is already giving away trillions of dollars in "free to me" money. And the answer is probably not to the extent that we see today. If the government became the sole issuer of new credit and could fix interest rates, there would be no need for taxation whatsoever except to reduce the rate of inflation if economic conditions warranted it. The government always gives away free money. It can do no other function. No government in history has ever produced anything at a profit. That is the function of private citizens, not kings or congressmen.

originally posted by: Yeahkeepwatchingme
In some cases it would work. In most cases I think it would breed dependency, sloth and apathy. Also I bet a lot of people would mismanage it. Blowing it on certain items.

But lazy people are that way anyway - we don't need them homeless and on the streets which also wastes money. And remember I'm not suggesting that the government give away money that would be considered a good income, just enough to avoid poverty and prevent homelessness. Ambitious people will still have all the incentive in the world to better themselves and will still do so.

And when you say: "I bet a lot of people would mismanage it. Blowing it on certain items" - People and government are doing this all the time anyway.

Bad idea. Lets take for example a landlord who knows his tenant is being subsidized by the government. Landlord figures he can raise the rent to make more money. Other businesses raise their prices too. Tenant winds up in the same boat he was in before. And let's not forget that the cause of most, if not all, problems-GOVERNMENT- decides in order to create more revenue, they can raise taxes too because tenant has more money.

Stimulus 2.0 comes to mind.

a reply to: Blueracer

I think your misunderstanding me. As it is how many trillions of dollars per year does the government now give away in social welfare programs AND the administration of these programs? The traditional consevative political view that all we need to do is to eliminate these programs to solve the problem is foolish - want more starving homeless people and hungry criminals on the street? I didn't think so - And the private economy by itself can not take up the slack by itself. But what I'm suggesting is we cut a lot of government waste by streaming all the government give away into one program - eliminate the lower levels of economic poverty in one simple program that would cost much less than the administration of the many government agencies now administrating this money - then more money would be available to people who need it and less would be wasted on the multi-billion dollar cost of administration.

a reply to: AlienView

Shalom- Do You mean the U.S. Gov't. aka 'Uncle Suga'? The same Ones who GIVE $18B-$20B to our 51st state, Israel every year? Do You mean that Gov't.?

The business that should be providing "Charity" are the organized religions™ who enjoy "tax free" status, that was their job, their primary function. They lost their way loooooooong ago and a Messenger was sent.. How was He to be found asked the guys in the desert? "the stars will tell us" said One. The other One pointed out where the shooting stars intersected.. "The first One went West to East, the second from North to South..." (if picturing this these guys have made what looks to be a †... )

When the Messenger was making too much sense, "they" saw 'loss of ¢'. "They" then slay Him and pinned it on Lee Harvey..Ooops, Osama Obama, wait.... Judas, they pinned it on the messengers bff, Judas..

So to answer Your query: Not just "NO" but 'Hades NO' Let religion™ pay the tab. Maybe the Preacher doesn't need a new $3M mansion and the 4 $35k watches he wears as He beats His 3rd wife and tapes One of His 4 t.v. shows collecting even more ¢ ??? But We need a new Rectory, We need to pay more $$ to pedophile charges..

It is either religion™ or the NFL™ because I don't see either BigPHarma™ or Big Business™ or Oil™ or Energy™ coming forward.. I'd do it but I only have close to $3M but I have 7 kids w/12 different 'Baby Mamas' and the FREE phone doesn't have a wi-fi...

namaste

a reply to: AlienView

We do it to the tune of 85 billion a month.

It's called Quantitative Easement.

a reply to: AlienView

In a roundabout way, this is what we do in the UK. Those on low wages get their income topped up with tax credits and other benefits. Problem is, as has been pointed out, it does create a dependency rather than getting to the nub of the problem which is high costs and low pay.

a reply to: AlienView

They're good at wasting and giving money away, but they're also good at taking it in the form of taxes.

No.

Oh, I think that we'd find that if we calculated the amount individuals on government aid received every year and simply cut them a check for the sum total once every three months instead of paying whole bureaucracies to administer and manage the funds for them, we'd come out light years ahead in our government budget.

Of course, since the poor are still poor somehow despite in some cases receiving enough money in benefits to be equivalent to a family of four living over the median income for the US in many states, I have no doubt there would be many homeless people inside of the first three month period, too.

Instead of the auto "bailout" Uncle Suga should've just distributed $25k to each citizen and let them blow it.. Like what the good looking Man typed above.. Just ask for the "Israel Treatment" but their citizens get $33k m/o/l if My math is correct *Note this was done w/old fashioned math and not Common Core or 'the new math'...)

You know who else should receive a stipend?? Anybody over the age of 70. Each 70+ should receive $3,500/month to blow on whatever they want. If married, the surviving spouse will continue to receive the $$. Who has the time to spend it? Certainly not the folks "working" they are too busy trying to get more crap they don't need. As soon as the Joneses moved in, the crap sucked...

What will happen to ALL people w/a little luck? They will grow OLD. This will provide incentive to keep oneSelf physically fit. The folks who are older now are getting ROYALLY SCREWED. They built this country and are 'stuck' with rising bills and a pension set for 1976.. They would have the time to spend the $$$ but can't afford to leave the house..

Give the $$$ to the Older folks..

EDIT: But I'd be happy to compromise and give single mothers a "raise" if they agree to use birth control for however long the check is good for. If the check is good for 6 months, You get a birth control that lasts 6 months. No more getting a raise spitting out future slaves.. (too honest?..)

We pay billions to foreign aid. Obama spent 1 trillion updating the old nukes. Money to the poor is no problem at all or shouldn't be but is sadly

originally posted by: Yeahkeepwatchingme
In some cases it would work. In most cases I think it would breed dependency, sloth and apathy. Also I bet a lot of people would mismanage it. Blowing it on certain items.

Well it doesn't where this system is applied (look beyond the narrow borders of the very right wing USA and open your eyes to northern Europe). The situation is in fact the exact opposite. People work harder because they are more content, they have no worries about falling sick, being unemployed, having kids etc. There is no anger at wealth disparity since the disparity does not exist.

Such ideas run contrary to the right wing capitalist ideology. That mistaken ideology is engrained in the thinking of the average US and UK citizen.

originally posted by: MGaddafi
We pay billions to foreign aid. Obama spent 1 trillion updating the old nukes. Money to the poor is no problem at all or shouldn't be but is sadly

That's so racist! Don't you know that in many cases those countries we spend foreign aid on are only poor because we stole from them to begin with? /sarc

a reply to: TrueBrit

The real reason Government get's overcharged is because most of the Civil Service have never worked in the real world, have no idea how much things should cost and merrily go along with whatever is quoted simply because they don't have the same budgetary pressures as a corporation or real person would.

Take the IT systems, for example..Billions spent on databases! The IT contractors must have been laughing all the way to the bank. It's akin to getting a quote to fix your roof and accepting the first one to come along without even checking whether it is value for money.