Does welfare and social security challenge the free market?

a reply to: Bluesma

I have goals. They are small, and mundane, and do not involve turning pages in my life, but learning the page I am on until each and every single drop of ink is as familiar to me as my own body. That is the only way I can do anything worthwhile for the future.

Denial, refusal to engage with desires, no matter how normal or healthy, until or unless the WORK is complete. That is my life. I get one week a year off, just for myself and my needs. The rest is dedicated entirely to forming and maintaining, and growing the company. If I allow myself even ONE capitulation to my personal needs besides that, I know that my resolve will crumble, and my sons future will be imperilled. That is something I cannot accept, I will not tolerate such a failure. For all that I am a metalhead, for all that I enjoy the chaos of a storm, the whirling melee of a moshpit, and the insane geometries of the quantum universe, without discipline, nothing can be achieved. The greater the stumbling blocks along a path, the more rigid ones discipline must be.

Mine is formed of a diamond matrix, created in the volcanism of my anger at the leaders of my nation, for daring to undo so much of the work that had been done to protect people like myself, and my son, from the predatory nature of big businesses. For some, the hope of a brighter future for oneself is a balm, to be applied to ones present self, in lieu of that warmer time to come. For me, hope in such context is a toxin, sure to slow my pace, and weaken my sinew, and I cannot afford the horrific cost of allowing it to find root in my heart.

a reply to: TrueBrit

I certainly have a level of admiration for that... you and I have certain similarities there.
I sacrificed myself and any attention to my own happiness long ago out of concern for my child.
I don't want to go into the choices I made here, because it is not good for me to dwell on it- but I'll say this, I would not be here in France if I had put my desires before the percieved well being of my son. I adapted and learned to live with my decisions eventually.

The reason I now have a slightly different view is because my son is an adult now, and I can percieve ways in which my self sacrifice actually has had a less than beneficial effect upon him. Somehow, without ever speaking of such things, kids feel it all... they live your internal experience with you.

Carl Jung once said, "Nothing has a stronger influence psychologically on their environment and especially on their children than the unlived life of the parent."

I suspect there is some truth to that now. But if you are truly content with the way you are living right now, then so be it (and it sounds like there is a level of pleasure in the knowledge that you are focused on a reason for acting that has deep meaning for you? I get that. )

But like in your case, I can't help but think - if only we could help families a bit so that there doesn't have to be this selfless sacrifice in order to earn some security?

Perhaps I have become too used to the french system, where time with your family is the number one protected value.
What good is a society that is turning out personalities that develop in one extreme or another - those sacrificing self like martyrs for work, and those who (in reaction) refuse to sacrifice their comfort or pleasure to such "slavery" ?

This makes for a split in the society, it makes for "givers" and "takers", instead of each individual being both at different times. It makes for individuals not recognizing their self in others.

The idea that has been expressed here, that social programs, if they worked, would come to a point of no longer being needed.
I disagree. I think that there is always some people having a hard time at some time. The problem is when the help is considered to only be for the ones at the very bottom, in the worst of situations, so that if they begin to climb out, the aid is swept out from their feet immediately. (get a minimum wage job, your aid is stopped completely, not cut down progressively)

THAT is what causes them to stay down there and identify as a reciever who does not work and pay into the system.
Because there is no middle ground in the US system, in which middle class people can be both.
Small business is destroyed in that system too.

a reply to: onequestion


A truly free market will never provide a fair wage. This is because in many cases we have greedy people at the top who will take as much as they can possibly get away with.

Currently in the UK we are seeing the private water companies making over £1b profit from overcharging. The water industry is regulated and the regulators have over estimated the price limits which has been taken full advantage of. Imagine if they weren't regulated at all?

www.independent.co.uk...

Often, instead of competing with each other, large corporations will form a cartel of sorts (spoken or unspoken) to keep prices high and wages low.

www.ft.com...

People will moan but they are often apathetic, too busy trying to make ends meet or believe it when they are told to be grateful for what they have got (even if they are surviving off food from the food bank.)

So that's why, in my opinion, we need regulation of wages as well as prices and working conditions.

a reply to: greencmp

I totally disagree with that assumption. If this was 1800 and I told you people would be flying in giant metal machines and landing on the moon, talking into a tiny box to someone across the world or explaining the concept of nanotechnology they'd think you were crazy. Why can't it be so realistic that things will be invented that require very little resources but produce an abundance of necessity? We're not even a level 1 species yet and I would hate to see ultra advanced technologies being squandered for the benefit of the few. Could you charge money for things like food, fuel and medicine if it's produced in massive quantities for next to no cost?