paulsol wrote:
gbaji wrote:
We do so because we believe that there will be fewer poor people if we don't spend money on them.
It would be nice to believe that. But I doubt its true.
Why do you doubt it?
It's kinda obvious that if you lower taxes on potential employers, they will spend most of that money attempting to make yet more money, right? And that's going to require employing more people. Expanding existing business, adding new product lines, researching new products, all require hiring more workers.
You're looking at an existing status quo and assuming that it's unchangeable. You see poor people in need and assume that there's no way to help them except with government programs. You assume this because that's how it's been your entire life. It must be the only way to deal with the problem, right?
Can you show that the rate of poverty has decreased as the rate of public assistance has increased? And when I speak of poverty, I'm not including the benefits granted by the programs themselves. We want to know whether the programs increased the number of people who need them, so we need to look at the whole number.
Quote:
Do you have any examples to share?
It's pretty basic math really. If we assume there is a pool of money available which may be used to hire people, and we subtract money from that pool, the effect must be that fewer people are hired and/or are hired for lower wages.
Do you really need an example to prove to you that X-Y < X for all positive values of X and Y? Again. It's basic math.
And Elinda. I disagree that it's "inhumane" to oppose assistance programs. Didn't I just finish saying that my motivations aren't greed or hatred of poor people? I believe that over time people are better off if they are not given assistance from the government. This does not preclude private charities stepping up to help them, of course. I've mentioned this before. It's a psychological issue. If a local charity helps provide your family with food so you don't go hungry, you're far more likely to feel gratitude to them and make efforts to improve your own finances so that you don't rely on them anymore. When the same assistance comes from the government, you're more likely to feel you deserve it, or are entitled to it. As a result, more people stay on public assistance once they are on it.
I'm all for charity. I just think it ought to be voluntary. The government can't kick someone to the curb if they are cheating or taking advantage of the situation. Private citizens can. It's about freedom of choice on that level. And, as I pointed out earlier, it's about an honest belief that if we take less from the people in the form of taxes, we'll have more opportunities available to the rest of us.
The government does not offer opportunity. Only existence.
