Another fine example of why targeted welfare aggressively encourages a cycle of dependency.
If we are going to have a social safety net, we really should do a Negative Income Tax. Â Probably the savings in administrative overhead of all the various welfare programs would be enough to seriously offset the cost of such a program. Â The only problem is the moral hazard associated with it, and the potential for fraud (although the current system has the same problems, so that would likely be a wash).
Thoughts?
Vying for the Newt Gringrich Worst Idea Ever award?
Money is fungible. Giving money would be a mistake. Figure out what the minimum is that you think people deserve, and give them that directly.
A true safety net would be:
1) free government water and sewers – a place to get drinking water, wash clothes and stuff, and a toilet
2) free food – vitamin fortified bread and cheese. Maybe canned meat and vegetables. Enough to survive on is good enough.
3) an occasional free train car and/or bus for long-distance travel
4) free cheap medical care: antibiotics, set bones, pull teeth, all the generic drugs that cost $4
5) 5th grade education free for minors.
6) high school and college free, but only as online lectures and multiple-choice exams adminsitered by tricky programs that make it harder to cheat. Taped lectures are cheap and effective.
Benefits should be determined on net income, not gross. Implement phase outs like the Section 8 rent on everything rather than cutoffs, even if the phase outs are dollar for dollar. That way you don’t lose while retaining the upside benefit of promotability etc.
I like the FairTax, basically a 23% final retail sales tax (not a VAT) that replaces ALL current federal taxes, with a rebate on taxes paid on the first ~$25k spent (for a family of 4), so people at that line effectively pay no tax, below it get a progressive greater subsidy, and above it pay a gradually higher effective rate. Ever extra dollar you earn helps you out (none of the random cut-off levels our current welfare system has), it captures a lot of profits from illegal activities (drug dealers and prostitutes buy food and shoes and rent, right?), would save an estimated $400 billion a year in tax prep costs, and would make America the low-cost place to put corporate headquarters (no corp taxes). It also gets the FedGov out of social engineering via tax policy, which is why they’d never go for it.
Here’s the program: shades of the olden days:
1. Work/Housing/School. Public works jobs which will pay a living wage for your skilled hands/strong back, and everything else is up to you, but those not wanting to work will find themselves “working” to survive. No handouts, no “negative income tax”, you get in-kind support, like dustydog suggests. If you don’t want to work, you get offered housing which will look like and be run like an Army barracks for E-1 to E-3. Everyone gets 64 square feet. Family of 5 gets 320 square feet. Possessions are limited. No drugs, no booze on premises. You keep it clean or you’re out. Quiet hours. A recreation club available where you may imbibe, watch TeeVee, play games. Mandatory schools through high school. Job training offered into any craft or business practice. Gateway training into the professions offered. If you’re smart, you’ll get to teach in these schools.
2. Health Care: Private health care for all who can pay/be insured at market price. For those who can’t, public clinics/rural traveling nurses. Regional public medical centers for critical lifesaving medical care in the public system. All run by the military as a means to train their medical personnel (not a new idea, this is how my Dad started out in the late 1920’s). If you have a feeling you’ve seen this idea before, you have, if you paid attention to your surroundings and not just your next cervesa on your last trip to Mexico. Actually, most of the world has some variation of this system except the USA.
3. Everything else: keep the Government the Hell out of everything else.
No, Ron Paul did NOT write this, but he should have…
A single percentage for income tax for all brackets, with NO deductions.
A work-farm and poor house for people living on the street, and aggressive foster care programs for the children of welfare queens.
A county hospital to send all charity cases to, and laws not allowing discrimination cases from deadbeats sent to them.