Socialism and the Welfare State - G. Richard Jansen

I came across this very succinct summary that I think deserves attention.

The author is able to convey much of the basic message that I have merely attempted to communicate here on ATS.

Socialism and the Welfare State

The dangers of the Welfare State are:

1) it often is unjust in taking lawful property from individuals through excessive taxation
2) it substitutes the collective judgment of the government for the freedom and judgment of the individual
3) it discourages initiative and entrepreneurship by individuals
4) it leads to excessive government power and hence corruption

The danger of these tendencies of the welfare state were well summarized by Lionel Trilling, a respected man of the contemporary liberal left as quoted by Gertrude Himmelfarb in her book Poverty and Compassion (Knopf Publisher 1991) “Some paradox of our natures leads us, when once we have made our fellow men the objects of our enlightened interest, to go on to make them the object of our pity, then of our wisdom, ultimately of our coercion. It is to prevent this corruption, the most ironic and tragic that man knows, that we stand in need of the moral realism which is the product of the moral imagination”.

a reply to: greencmp

I seem to see quite a bit of this stuff on this site. I Like the reasoning behind the idea the welfare automatically = excessive taxation for no other reason that to pay individuals the dole and pensions. These people very conscientiously forget about the tax that is required to make corporate welfare payments.

Anyone would think that people who are anti welfare for individuals have never heard of corporate welfare and I would probably be right because the man on the TV hasn't told them about that yet therefore they do not know about it.

Everyone I have met who is anti welfare for individuals has never heard of corporate welfare and does not know of its existence. Moreover they never stop to think about how much money is paid out each year in various forms of corporate welfare. Nor do they ever ask themselves why the media and the media commentators not talk about corporate welfare. None of these people are ever able to tell me how much is corporate welfare is paid out each year.

Such people do not even realsie that they have been trained up by the media to anti welfare because they think the only kind of welfare that exists is welfare for individuals.

When I start to talk about corporate welfare to these sorts of people, their eyes and thei8r mouth starts of open wide in astonishment because they have never even thought about corporate welfare before.

One day, these people will wake up and realise they have been used as useful idiots by TPTB because they will realise welfare has been taken off individuals but tax rates have not gone down and business people are laughing their box off at them all the way to the bank.

a reply to: learnatic

Indeed, it makes even less sense to destroy society and make ourselves less free for the sake of corporations.

Yet, I can't help but gather that you have entirely missed the point.

originally posted by: greencmp
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Socialism and the Welfare State

” The welfare states of Europe are in trouble because the wealth transfer from productive individuals to those not as productive, for either the “deserving or the non-deserving poor” is resulting in a stagnant non-growing economy, particularly in the face of a global economy.

One of my state's leaders back in the 1970s - 80 claimed the states of Sweden, Norway and Denmark would not last more than just a few years because of their welfare systems for individuals. I gather they are in trouble now but again, we still do not know the extent of corporate welfare. Governments all around the world refuse to talk about and publish figures on corporate welfare.

On the 09 November 1998 Time Magazine published an feature on corporate welfare and it even had the strength of character to admit that they too had put their hand out for corporate welfare. Could the reader see this happening today.

a reply to: learnatic

That is confirmed, you have missed the point.

Though, perhaps that isn't exactly correct since you didn't read it. It is difficult to misunderstand what you refuse to inspect much less comprehend.

1. The concept of property arises from the authority of government. Claiming that property exists beyond its legal description, licensing, deeding, titling, etc. is similar to claiming that we can innately own air or sunlight. Even in anarchia systems, property only exists by the threat of force orderly applied, "this far and no farther" which is of course, even at the individual level a legal limit imposed by a governance of one.

2. Every political system that has ever existed in the scope of human history has substituted communal judgment and criteria over the will or "freedom" of the individual; that is the nature of government. This is more of an argument for anarchy.

3. There is no basis for the claim that individuals or entrepreneurs are "discouraged" by a social safety net. Ambition and the desire to create and innovate very often exceeds the mere desire for money or a subsistence dole.

4. Governmental corruption exists in systems where there is virtually no social safety net; there is no correlation.

In my opinion.

Australia has a massive welfare system and it has worked just fine for us, we really don't have any of the social issues that plague the US. We have a high minimum wage and a working poverty is basically non-existent. There's no slums over here like in the US and you can basically go anywhere you want with the relative security of being safe. Drug dealers for the most part operate from there suburban middle class homes and there really isn't any mass culture of corner kids selling drugs openly on the streets.

Anyone that loses there job here gets put on newstart allowance and is entitled to $650 a fortnight, plus $100 for each child under the persons care. Then of course there's the pension and sickness allowance which is at least $100 more than newstart as far as I know. Every person is entitled to free healthcare no matter what there income is.

It clearly doesn't destroy a nation like a lot of people in the US are raised to believe, since Australia has one of the highest quality of life statuses in the world.

Also, when the world had the huge economic crash a few years back we were one of the only countries to avoid it, because our government gave every person on a low or middle class wage $1400 and also $1000 per child. Even people on newstart allowance who were unemployed got a $900 pay out.

This whole thing about welfare destroying a nation is just a bunch of propaganda from big corporations and conservative bigots who are more than happy to take hand outs from the government for themselves, so they can keep on taking there luxury holidays and living there silver spoon feed lives, well the lower and middle class people bust there asses just to make ends meat.

A welfare system is just basic compassion and the only way to make a country a safe place to live that enjoys a high quality of life.

originally posted by: Gryphon66
1. The concept of property arises from the authority of government. Claiming that property exists beyond its legal description, licensing, deeding, titling, etc. is similar to claiming that we can innately own air or sunlight. Even in anarchia systems, property only exists by the threat of force orderly applied, "this far and no farther" which is of course, even at the individual level a legal limit imposed by a governance of one.

2. Every political system that has ever existed in the scope of human history has substituted communal judgment and criteria over the will or "freedom" of the individual; that is the nature of government. This is more of an argument for anarchy.

3. There is no basis for the claim that individuals or entrepreneurs are "discouraged" by a social safety net. Ambition and the desire to create and innovate very often exceeds the mere desire for money or a subsistence dole.

4. Governmental corruption exists in systems where there is virtually no social safety net; there is no correlation.

In my opinion.

First of all, thank you for addressing the topic of the thread, it really does help to make it a discussion.

From the text:

The issue isn’t whether there should be a “safety net” of social services for the less fortunate and an important role for government in a number of areas. Hayek made this very clear in his Road to Serfdom; “To prohibit the use of certain poisonous substances or to require special precautions in their use, or to limit working hours or to require certain sanitary arrangements, is fully compatible with the preservation of competition.

The only question here is whether in the particular instance the advantages gained than the social costs which they impose. Nor is the preservation of competition incompatible with an extensive system of social services-as long as the organization of these services is not designed in such a way as to make competition ineffective over wide fields”.

The quintessential classical liberal F. A. Hayek thus is not a libertarian.

originally posted by: Subaeruginosa
Australia has a massive welfare system and it has worked just fine for us, we really don't have any of the social issues that plague the US. We have a high minimum wage and a working poverty is basically non-existent. There's no slums over here like in the US and you can basically go anywhere you want with the relative security of being safe. Drug dealers for the most part operate from there suburban middle class homes and there really isn't any mass culture of corner kids selling drugs openly on the streets.

Anyone that loses there job here gets put on newstart allowance and is entitled to $650 a fortnight, plus $100 for each child under the persons care. Then of course there's the pension and sickness allowance which is at least $100 more than newstart as far as I know. Every person is entitled to free healthcare no matter what there income is.

It clearly doesn't destroy a nation like a lot of people in the US are raised to believe, since Australia has one of the highest quality of life statuses in the world.

Also, when the world had the huge economic crash a few years back we were one of the only countries to avoid it, because our government gave every person on a low or middle class wage $1400 and also $1000 per child. Even people on newstart allowance who were unemployed got a $900 pay out.

This whole thing about welfare destroying a nation is just a bunch of propaganda from big corporations and conservative bigots who are more than happy to take hand outs from the government for themselves, so they can keep on taking there luxury holidays and living there silver spoon feed lives, well the lower and middle class people bust there asses just to make ends meat.

A welfare system is just basic compassion and the only way to make a country a safe place to live that enjoys a high quality of life.

Welfare and minimum wages are counterproductive because the inflationary policies necessary to achieve them produce institutionalized unemployment and eventually reduce the 'real wages' of those who remain employed. The actual value (buying power) of the wages reach the same equilibrium which would have been realized in the free market.

a reply to: greencmp

Brief reply.

You are making an assertation that can not be proven by facts. This is some guy's theory and as a theory sounds great but it is a theory unsupported by facts.

A theory unsupported by fact (not the invisible hand of the free market - which I've yet to see or measure) is just a theory.

You are not willing to accept the 'opinions' (or other theories) as equally valid or even make the attempt to understand another point of view and one that actually coinsides with historical facts.

I'm glad you liked this piece you read and thank you for sharing it.

originally posted by: FyreByrd
a reply to: greencmp

Brief reply.

You are making an assertation that can not be proven by facts. This is some guy's theory and as a theory sounds great but it is a theory unsupported by facts.

A theory unsupported by fact (not the invisible hand of the free market - which I've yet to see or measure) is just a theory.

You are not willing to accept the 'opinions' (or other theories) as equally valid or even make the attempt to understand another point of view and one that actually coinsides with historical facts.

I'm glad you liked this piece you read and thank you for sharing it.

A very astute observation and one that do I agree with. I am mulling over how exactly to explain this fact, that is, the fact that economics is not empirically provable. As a broad scoping, all encompassing study of human action, economics is not experimentally provable or disprovable though it is logical.

We can make comparisons using the device of economic history, both recent and ancient but, I am hesitant to complicate this particular discussion. In this case, the evidence, the economic history of the unworkability of these specific policies is compelling.

I am making the case that the abdication of individual freedom for what I believe to be a spurious doctrine is a loss for everybody and will cost our society greatly.

originally posted by: greencmp

originally posted by: Subaeruginosa
Australia has a massive welfare system and it has worked just fine for us, we really don't have any of the social issues that plague the US. We have a high minimum wage and a working poverty is basically non-existent. There's no slums over here like in the US and you can basically go anywhere you want with the relative security of being safe. Drug dealers for the most part operate from there suburban middle class homes and there really isn't any mass culture of corner kids selling drugs openly on the streets.

Anyone that loses there job here gets put on newstart allowance and is entitled to $650 a fortnight, plus $100 for each child under the persons care. Then of course there's the pension and sickness allowance which is at least $100 more than newstart as far as I know. Every person is entitled to free healthcare no matter what there income is.

It clearly doesn't destroy a nation like a lot of people in the US are raised to believe, since Australia has one of the highest quality of life statuses in the world.

Also, when the world had the huge economic crash a few years back we were one of the only countries to avoid it, because our government gave every person on a low or middle class wage $1400 and also $1000 per child. Even people on newstart allowance who were unemployed got a $900 pay out.

This whole thing about welfare destroying a nation is just a bunch of propaganda from big corporations and conservative bigots who are more than happy to take hand outs from the government for themselves, so they can keep on taking there luxury holidays and living there silver spoon feed lives, well the lower and middle class people bust there asses just to make ends meat.

A welfare system is just basic compassion and the only way to make a country a safe place to live that enjoys a high quality of life.

Welfare and minimum wages are counterproductive because the inflationary policies necessary to achieve them produce institutionalized unemployment and eventually reduce the 'real wages' of those who remain employed. The actual value (buying power) of the wages reach the same equilibrium which would have been realized in the free market.

The statistics disagree with you.

In Australia you get $325 ($276 US) tax free a week on unemployment.

Australian minimum wage is set at $18.70 an hour or $748 ($636.17 US) for a 40 hour week. Yet in the US minimum wage is only $7.25 US an hour (apparently), which works out to be only $290 US before tax for a 40 hour week.

The current unemployment rate in the US is at 5.8% and the unemployment rate in Australia is currently at 6.2%.

So to put it into perspective, in Australia you get approximately the same amount of money for being unemployed as a person in the US makes busting there ass 40 hours a week on minimum wage. Yet there is only a 0.4% difference in the unemployment rate between the two countries.

Also a person in the US makes $386 US less for a 40 hour week on minimum wage as a person makes on minimum wage in Australia for a 40 hour week.

Now considering there is no universal healthcare in the US and medicine is not subsidized, together with the fact that the US is the wealthiest nation in the world and has more millionaires than any other country, how can these statistics be described as anything else than a outright human rights violation!?!

originally posted by: Subaeruginosa

originally posted by: greencmp

originally posted by: Subaeruginosa
Australia has a massive welfare system and it has worked just fine for us, we really don't have any of the social issues that plague the US. We have a high minimum wage and a working poverty is basically non-existent. There's no slums over here like in the US and you can basically go anywhere you want with the relative security of being safe. Drug dealers for the most part operate from there suburban middle class homes and there really isn't any mass culture of corner kids selling drugs openly on the streets.

Anyone that loses there job here gets put on newstart allowance and is entitled to $650 a fortnight, plus $100 for each child under the persons care. Then of course there's the pension and sickness allowance which is at least $100 more than newstart as far as I know. Every person is entitled to free healthcare no matter what there income is.

It clearly doesn't destroy a nation like a lot of people in the US are raised to believe, since Australia has one of the highest quality of life statuses in the world.

Also, when the world had the huge economic crash a few years back we were one of the only countries to avoid it, because our government gave every person on a low or middle class wage $1400 and also $1000 per child. Even people on newstart allowance who were unemployed got a $900 pay out.

This whole thing about welfare destroying a nation is just a bunch of propaganda from big corporations and conservative bigots who are more than happy to take hand outs from the government for themselves, so they can keep on taking there luxury holidays and living there silver spoon feed lives, well the lower and middle class people bust there asses just to make ends meat.

A welfare system is just basic compassion and the only way to make a country a safe place to live that enjoys a high quality of life.

Welfare and minimum wages are counterproductive because the inflationary policies necessary to achieve them produce institutionalized unemployment and eventually reduce the 'real wages' of those who remain employed. The actual value (buying power) of the wages reach the same equilibrium which would have been realized in the free market.

The statistics disagree with you.

In Australia you get $325 ($276US) tax free a week on unemployment.

Australian minimum wage is set at $18.70 an hour or $748 ($636.17US) for a 40 hour week. Yet in the US minimum wage is only $7.25US an hour (apparently), which works out to be only $290US before tax for a 40 hour week.

The current unemployment rate in the US is at 5.8% and the unemployment rate in Australia is currently at 6.2%.

So to put it into perspective, in Australia you get approximately the same amount of money for being unemployed as a person in the US makes busting there ass 40 hours a week on minimum wage. Yet there is only a 0.4% difference in the unemployment rate between the two countries.

Also a person in the US makes $386US less for a 40 hour week on minimum wage as a person makes on minimum wage in Australia for a 40 hour week.

Now considering there is no universal healthcare in the US and medicine is not subsidized, together with the fact that the US is the wealthiest nation in the world and has more millionaires than any other country, how can these statistics be described as anything else than a outright human rights violation!?!

It will require some careful and unbiased investigations to establish either of our positions.

In brief, the questions I would ask are; does $18.70 AUS buy you the same amount of goods that it did before the institution of the unemployment benefits? Has the unemployment decreased or, as I am arguing, has it instead increased?

originally posted by: greencmp

originally posted by: Subaeruginosa

originally posted by: greencmp

originally posted by: Subaeruginosa
Australia has a massive welfare system and it has worked just fine for us, we really don't have any of the social issues that plague the US. We have a high minimum wage and a working poverty is basically non-existent. There's no slums over here like in the US and you can basically go anywhere you want with the relative security of being safe. Drug dealers for the most part operate from there suburban middle class homes and there really isn't any mass culture of corner kids selling drugs openly on the streets.

Anyone that loses there job here gets put on newstart allowance and is entitled to $650 a fortnight, plus $100 for each child under the persons care. Then of course there's the pension and sickness allowance which is at least $100 more than newstart as far as I know. Every person is entitled to free healthcare no matter what there income is.

It clearly doesn't destroy a nation like a lot of people in the US are raised to believe, since Australia has one of the highest quality of life statuses in the world.

Also, when the world had the huge economic crash a few years back we were one of the only countries to avoid it, because our government gave every person on a low or middle class wage $1400 and also $1000 per child. Even people on newstart allowance who were unemployed got a $900 pay out.

This whole thing about welfare destroying a nation is just a bunch of propaganda from big corporations and conservative bigots who are more than happy to take hand outs from the government for themselves, so they can keep on taking there luxury holidays and living there silver spoon feed lives, well the lower and middle class people bust there asses just to make ends meat.

A welfare system is just basic compassion and the only way to make a country a safe place to live that enjoys a high quality of life.

Welfare and minimum wages are counterproductive because the inflationary policies necessary to achieve them produce institutionalized unemployment and eventually reduce the 'real wages' of those who remain employed. The actual value (buying power) of the wages reach the same equilibrium which would have been realized in the free market.

The statistics disagree with you.

In Australia you get $325 ($276US) tax free a week on unemployment.

Australian minimum wage is set at $18.70 an hour or $748 ($636.17US) for a 40 hour week. Yet in the US minimum wage is only $7.25US an hour (apparently), which works out to be only $290US before tax for a 40 hour week.

The current unemployment rate in the US is at 5.8% and the unemployment rate in Australia is currently at 6.2%.

So to put it into perspective, in Australia you get approximately the same amount of money for being unemployed as a person in the US makes busting there ass 40 hours a week on minimum wage. Yet there is only a 0.4% difference in the unemployment rate between the two countries.

Also a person in the US makes $386US less for a 40 hour week on minimum wage as a person makes on minimum wage in Australia for a 40 hour week.

Now considering there is no universal healthcare in the US and medicine is not subsidized, together with the fact that the US is the wealthiest nation in the world and has more millionaires than any other country, how can these statistics be described as anything else than a outright human rights violation!?!

It will require a some careful and unbiased investigation to establish either of our positions.

In brief, the questions I would ask are; does $18.70 AUS buy you the same amount of goods that it did before the institution of the unemployment benefits? Has the unemployment decreased or, as I am arguing, has it instead increased?

Well actually it doesn't take much investigation at all, the facts are there for anyone to see with a few simple google searches.

Oh and considering like the majority of civilized countries we have had unemployment benefits since shortly after world war 2, I really don't see how your questions about inflation and unemployment rates are relevant to the debate.

a reply to: Subaeruginosa

Because the value of the currency distributed directly impacts the goods and services that are exchangeable for it.

Since that currency is universal (such as it can be) a devaluation erases whatever benefit was achieved for the recipient while simultaneously devaluing any savings or financial instruments which are in that currency.

This creates a circumstance where saving and capital accumulation become useless and force everybody to become speculators in order that their holdings do not evaporate.

a reply to: Gryphon66

4. Governmental corruption exists in systems where there is virtually no social safety net; there is no correlation.

But governmental corruption exists in the U.S. and the U.S. has an extensive social safety net.




And the general welfare state has created massive government debt.
World Debt Clocks by Country

Where is the actual "success"?

a reply to: greencmp

Yeah, but for your question to have any relevance you would have to show that unemployment benefits cause a higher unemployment rate, which there is no evidence for, when you consider that most wealthy countries (like the UK and western Europe for example) enacted unemployment benefits around the time that WWII ended.

originally posted by: xuenchen

a reply to: Gryphon66

4. Governmental corruption exists in systems where there is virtually no social safety net; there is no correlation.

But governmental corruption exists in the U.S. and the U.S. has an extensive social safety net.

Hmm, No universal health care or subsidized medicine, a $7.25 minimum wage and as far as I can tell no long-term unemployment benefits. I’d be very interested to know what these extensive safety nets are you speak of?

If you want my opinion, I think the ridiculously high US debt is due to the corrupt wealthy elite robbing the common people blind, more than it has to do with these phantom safety nets you speak of.

The lower and middle class right-wingers vote conservative to keep foreigners, gays, non-christians & socialists from ruining their lives. But the wealthy elite vote conservative to keep the lower and middle class right-wingers from realizing that the wealthy elite are the only ones ruining their lives.

a reply to: Subaeruginosa

About 1/3 of the population is benefited with Medicare/Medicaid.

And many States and Cities have higher minimum wages. Depends on local economies.

High numbers have food stamps and other welfare.

Half the population is under some form of social welfare.

Welfare Spending The Largest Item In The Federal Budge

a reply to: xuenchen

Do you have any proof that there is a connection between the social safety net and government corruption? Please provide it if so.

In point of fact, the more a country spends on social service programs, the lower the cost of debt seems to be:



The Atlantic Magazine


The "general welfare state" is not the prime contributor to national debt. Try defense war spending, tax cuts for the rich, corporate welfare, etc., and you'll be a lot closer to the truth.

One wonders, in regard to your link, if the whole world is in debt, who did we all "borrow" the money from? Mars?