Why welfare and entitlements are actually good for society

I happened to read a web page this morning that complained about entitlements and welfare. It made me both angry and sad.

I'm not going to bother to provide you with a link to that page. It's typical of the genre, telling a story of a young man who discovered the value of hard work due to the sage advice of his father. The young boy gets a paper route, earns money, and learns many valuable lessons.

It goes on to invite comments on the errors of "redistribution of wealth" and any other horrors that have befallen honest citizens whose money has been stolen by an out of control Federal government. The comments came, of course.

I left one myself. It was a bit contrary to what most were saying. I'd like to expand upon that here. It's a complex subject, of course. I doubt I can do it full justice in any reasonable amount of space, but I will try.

Something for nothing

Those words are common in right wing propaganda. Lazy welfare recipients expect something for nothing - they live on the fruits of others labor.

We all get something for nothing at some time in our lives (at least here in the U.S.).

Many of us were educated in free public schools. That's "welfare" and it's also an "entitlement". A long time ago we as a nation decided that our children are entitled to a free public education. Not only entitled, but we require it.

Why? Because we know that we are all better off with an educated populace. We demand taxes to support schools that provide that education - that's "redistribution of wealth".

We do the same thing with our roads, with our police departments, firemen and more. It was not always so - all of those things were once provided by private businesses. We quickly learned the folly of that: when one house burns, others are in danger and that is meant as allegory, not as a specific indictment of privatized fire houses.

We employ "socialism" because it makes sense. It's not a dirty word, it's a sensible and smart solution to many problems.

Lazy welfare recipients

That's the image the Right wants to put in your head every time you hear "welfare". People like Newt Gingrich lie about food stamps being used to fund a trip to Hawaii. Veiled comments about "welfare queens" play into racial stereotypes. These people are stealing your hard earned money!

In fact, the vast majority of people receiving welfare are single mothers and it's usually neither very much nor does it last very long. The government's interest is primarily in the children, but even then we don't provide much. We hope to provide enough to give those children some chance of growing up healthy enough to become useful members of society and enough to keep their mother from having to turn to crime to support her family, but often we really don't.

The reason, of course, is that ugly right wing media convinces us that these mothers are just breeding machines, popping out illegitimate children so that they can continue living well at the expense of others. The reality is much different: children cost far more than what any welfare program offers.

Poverty costs all of us. It costs in crime, in neighborhood blight driving down real estate values, in the loss of an educated work force, in poverty related health problems that end up costing us far more later in life.

Smart people understand that and vote to support and expand these programs. Dumb people believe the lies of right wing media.

They are giving them free cars now!

That exclamation was one I heard recently from one of my ever complaining friends. He was right: our State has a program that provides cars (cars donated by other people, not purchased by the State) to some needy people.

The idea is to provide transportation for those who need a car to get a job. Needy people are often caught in a terrible Catch-22: they might be able to get off assistance programs if they could get a job, but a job requires a car that they cannot afford. Most won't be able to swing any credit to buy a car, and if they can, it will be at usurious rates. This "car giveaway" was designed to save the taxpayers money but of course it became political fuel for right wing demagogues.

In fact, our State has numerous programs that provide education and training for the poor. These programs are designed to help lift people out of poverty, but they are often castigated by the Right as a waste of money and are usually big targets for across the board cost-cutting.

The social safety net

The social safety net provided by welfare programs can benefit us in other ways. People who are nowhere near being qualified for these programs may be emboldened to take the risk of starting a business if they know they can only fall so far. In this country, welfare is a far fall indeed, so we don't get much benefit there, but it is a factor in more enlightened places.

Even as poor as it is, as demeaning and as difficult as these programs really are, they do keep some people from a life of crime. They also keep people at least marginally healthy, which can help protect us from more expenses later and even epidemics. There are real cost benefits to "entitlements" and "income redistribution".

Proof of this can be seen in the Legatum Prosperity Index. Norway, a highly "socialist" country, beats the United States hands down. We could learn much from them.

My soapbox

As usual with this sort of hub, I will be moderating comments. Those on the Right will scream "Censorship!" and say that I won't allow their comments to be posted. That's completely untrue: I allow all intelligent comments, whether I agree with them or not. I won't tolerate unintelligent comments. It's not my fault that much of the Right's rhetoric is based in ignorance and stupidity.