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| Thread: Why work when you can get more money from welfare? |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 3 4 · «PREV / NEXT» |
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Gnomes2169
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posted August 28, 2013 02:52 PM |
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Zenofex said:
This has been discussed multiple times already. If the minimum wage is below (or fairly close to) the existence minimum of the given country, it is plain stupid to expect that someone would agree to work for it. Most people would prefer begging, stealing, ransacking the garbage bins, etc. Why? Because such activities have greater chance to sustain you in the long run (especially the stealing).
On the other hand, if the "help" provided by the welfare is way above the minimum wage, nobody in his right mind would prefer to waste time for someone else's interests when he can spend it as he sees fit. So obviously it needs to be below that limit BUT at the same time the minimum wage has to provide some actual sustenance.
And of course this is a very simplified version of the whole thing - there are, just to give one example, people who wouldn't work for a minimum wage but would rather go for street robberies because the latter are likely to be much more profitable.
And on the third hand, if you are given a temporary solution instead of a third one, you will go out and do something eventually because you have to (whether that be a minimum wage job, rob a bank or become a pimp, that's entirely up to the suicidal individual). Or perhaps welfare could be provided to anyone who falls below a certain profit margin, but only by enough that their salary actually reaches that margin (so people with a minimum wage job would receive welfare money to reach the level of money that people who live entirely on welfare already benefit from). Not only that, but you could make it so that only people currently registered as workers can receive the full benefit of permanent welfare support, while leaving all other forms of welfare temporary. This adds in extra incentive to have a job of some kind.
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Fauch
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posted August 28, 2013 03:36 PM |
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do you think that what is important is how society can use its people?
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Gnomes2169
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posted August 28, 2013 07:21 PM |
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No. But if you are going to belong to a society, whether that be a nation or a club, then you should do something to earn your place within it. Would you say that a golf club is forced to recognize that someone is a member is said member never pays club fees, never shows up and never does anything for said club besides state that they are part of it? No, because that would be silly. Especially if they had benefits from being associated with this club (like, say, exclusive interviews with VIP', free banquet diners, etc). If someone who wants to be part of the club does not contribute, then they are not truly part of the club and they do not reap the benefits, much like someone who does absolutely nothing by choice (not necessity) should not be allowed to reap the benefits society offers indefinitely.
Now, I happen to believe that people are worth more than what they contribute to society, which is why I support the idea of welfare at all. However, I do not believe that anyone should be able to get something for nothing, or something just by virtue of being a human born in the right place. Being human does not give you the automatic right to be a drain forever, if you are able to contribute you should, so that other people as well as you can benefit from the society to which you belong. I.E, while you can receive aid, it should only be temporary aid given to you so that you can get back on your feet and contribute again. Is this a moralless or heartless standpoint?
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Salamandre
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posted August 28, 2013 07:43 PM |
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Welfare should be offered to:
a) people who lost their job because external reasons (bankruptcy, economic crisis)
b) people who suffered a handicap because external reasons (accident, genetics) and can not work anymore.
Welfare should never be given to:
a) third world immigrants, just for putting a feet on ground in a country. Set a delay of 5 years, as Canada and Switzerland do.
b) for every new born. Kids are family responsibility and a life project, don't bred 8 if you can't sustain, and is not only about financial aspect.
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Fauch
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posted August 29, 2013 02:23 AM |
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the problem of welfare has nothing to do with contributing to the society. you can be on welfare and contribute (even though you are officially considered a leech) or employed and be nefast to society.
for example, feeding poors contributes to the society. most likely you won't get paid for it.
actually many people don't get paid for their contribution to the society, but because they earn for their employer more money than they cost him.
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OhforfSake
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posted September 03, 2013 07:42 PM |
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The idea of welfare is that you can become an expert in what you enjoy and eventually bring in more gold through that channel than welfare could grant you.
If we follow the teachings of mvass, we know people are greedy SoB's (except everyone and anyone who should happen to read this), and therefore we also know that the moment a person is in the position between what he sees as forced labor to survive versus welfare, said person will choose welfare. Likewise when said person is in a position between wanted labor versus welfare, said person will choose labor, because it's wanted.
Let's look at social norms too. When it's no longer wanted labor said person is either taking a vacation or retiring, depending on age and goals. However at such a point in time, said person will either be wealthy enough not to receive welfare, or be young enough to go for other interests.
The social norm is that vacation and retiring are not only accepted, but also expected. As such this doesn't provide any stigma.
The problem occurs when welfare itself generates social stigma and makes persons hate themselves to such a degree they aren't in an emotional state to find anything interesting. This stigma of people who're on welfare are a lazy greedy bunch need to be eliminated, so people can be even more free to seek their own happiness.
Of course there exists those who wants welfare and won't provide anything, that is a person without any interest. Such a person is not someone who should be a social outcast, but someone you ought to feel sorry for, because this person is more poor than any of you will ever be.
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Fauch
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posted September 05, 2013 08:06 PM |
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I think it fits here
mvassilev said:
"There are some government programs that give money to the poor - Aid to Families with Dependent Children, for instance. But such programs are vastly outweighed by those having the opposite effect - programs that injure the poor for the benefit of the not-poor. Almost surely, the poor would be better off if both the benefits that they now receive and the taxes, direct and indirect, that they now pay were abolished...
People with higher incomes have a longer life expectancy. The children of the middle and upper class start work later, often substantially later, than the children of the lower classes. Both of these facts tend to make Social Security a much better deal for the not-poor than for the poor...
Many years ago, when I did calculations on part of the Agriculture Department's activities, I estimated, using Agriculture Department figures, that higher food prices then made up about two-thirds of the total cost of the part of the farm program I was studying. Higher food prices have the effect of a regressive tax, since poorer people spend a larger proportion of their income on food." - David Friedman
we also know that 3rd world countries must pay much more debts than the helps they receive. but we don't hear much about their debts, do we?
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xerox
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posted September 05, 2013 11:45 PM |
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Edited by xerox at 11:12, 06 Sep 2013.
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Yeah, third world countries must really love states like France which subsidies, regulations and tariffs strongly contribute to keep them in poverty. Just like low-skilled people living off welfare are better off competing against subsidies, regulations and minimum wages on the labour market...
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del_diablo
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posted September 06, 2013 06:35 AM |
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States like France regularly will donate money to a third world, country, but with strings attached. "Things must be gotten from so so country", "So so employers must be used", "The corporation you hire for this, must be so so". Once enough strings are attached, its no longer donation, its a donation to hire the French workforce or buying French gods with the cash donated.
Its interesting.
Another problem is that temp aid does not create lasting infrastructure. Refugee camps being the worst examples there is.
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Fauch
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posted September 06, 2013 03:38 PM |
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yeah they basically give to themselves and then tell the people from the 3rd world country : now you have jobs, pay us back.
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OhforfSake
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posted September 06, 2013 03:51 PM |
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Well Brazil, South Africa, etc. managed to come out on top economically.
There are something to consider though.
#1 What does it take to get out on top economically?
#2 Is it even possible for all countries to be wealthy, or is wealth relative to the total amount of money and if everyone had about equal, we'd all be poor?
In regard to #2) I can only say that money itself is worthless, but the work traded for money is worth something. The total work force is determined by the total amount of people who can work. Therefore, I don't think someone HAS to be poor.
Further more, Europe has come a long way the last 100 years or so in terms of freedom and security of the individual, which translates to buying force for the single person and average health. How does average health compare in countries which receives welfare from past times? If it hasn't changed, then the country is only poor relative to those who're richer. The same comparison can be done in regard to buying force, except here one ought to look at the availability of resources required (like food), and wanted (like luxery goods). Has this changed for these countries compared to say, when these people weren't part of "society"?
There's this romantic idea that when we were hunters, we could provide for ourselves, but I can't help but wonder if that's not the lowest possible state any person could be in, as such the poverty often shown in commercials may be targeted at individuals with health problems, which have always existed, in stead of the average individual, giving us a false picture?
In regard to #1), we know that oil is one way for a country to become wealthy. Otherwise I imagine agriculture and industry are required. The problem is that not all environments allows the broader aspects of these two, which requires a given country to specialize within certain fields. While this is possible, I believe it opens up the same problem as when you put all your eggs in few baskets, that's the variance of average wealth of the country over time can become huge.
As such, maybe many people from third world countries would be better off if we dropped our aggressive border controls and allowed for immigrants to settle on equal foot, we're all humans after all, right? Why should they suffer only because they weren't born where you were, or weren't as smart as you?
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Fauch
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posted September 06, 2013 04:24 PM |
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Edited by Fauch at 16:44, 06 Sep 2013.
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didn't South africa fought against occidental power? they also received quite a help from Kadhafi.
Quote:
#1 What does it take to get out on top economically?
currently, that seems to be control of crucial resources. there is also control of the monetary system. and even both at the same time with dollars.
Quote:
#2 Is it even possible for all countries to be wealthy, or is wealth relative to the total amount of money and if everyone had about equal, we'd all be poor?
aren't rich and poor words of comparison? if there are rich people, then there are poors too. if everyone is equal, there are no richs or poors.
now, if we consider our productive capacities, we could probably allow everyone to have a decent life, if our economy wasn't based on wasting and didn't require to make entire population miserable in order to make very few extra-richs.
of course, the amount of money available is currently very important (even if apparently totally disconected from actual production) since it is the main reason why a lot of people are poor despite resources being abundant.
the problem in Europe, and in particular in countries like Portugal, Italy, Greece, Spain... are due to monetary mass having heavily shrunk, making money less available, and trade more complicated. if you don't take money into account, those countries are probably actually very rich.
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OhforfSake
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posted September 06, 2013 05:34 PM |
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Fauch said:
now, if we consider our productive capacities, we could probably allow everyone to have a decent life, if our economy wasn't based on wasting and didn't require to make entire population miserable in order to make very few extra-richs.
Indeed. It's strange how when considering trade it's always either free market or controlled. Never is it considered the alternative, a system which discourages negative trades, where many loses just so a few can gain. Personally I'd prefer if we'd rid ourself of our monetary system and freely distribute goods across the globe. Of course there'd be problems to be dealt with, no doubt, and it's probably not the thread for discussing those.
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mvassilev
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posted September 06, 2013 05:51 PM |
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Quote:
Never is it considered the alternative, a system which discourages negative trades, where many loses just so a few can gain.
That's called a free market. Under mutually beneficial voluntary exchange, people only trade if they expect to be made better off by it.
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OhforfSake
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posted September 06, 2013 06:03 PM |
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You wrote expect, and that changes everything.
It's fun to play a game, but we also know a game has a winner an some losers. If no one lost, many would claim it'd not be possible to win and therefore it'd be boring. Others would not use comparison and be happy with what they have.
To be more concrete. If someone tries to sell you a gold mine and you expects an income from the sale and the person who sells it to you believe the money you give him now are more than he can make on the mine, you might both win in that he wouldn't be able to make more while you do, but I believe that's the exception when dealing with gold mines with university students. Rather I find it much more likely that this person who sold you the mine did so, because the mine was worthless, yet you expected otherwise, and you lost on it. There may be laws protecting you, but not always.
I don't mind people can lose their money, I mind that losing your money might mean poverty. With welfare there can exist a lowest level of income everyone who so choses can have, this will to a large extend remove poverty. Sadly it also usually requires high taxation meaning one is effectively trading off freedom for security, without any say in the matter. So maybe it's more like someone steals your freedom and throws some security back at you, you never asked for, than an actual trade.
When energy access won't be a problem, e.g. if we can tap it much more effectively than what we get at our point on the light sphere from the Sun, then automation can be completed and goods may get freely distributed and no trading would be required.
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xerox
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posted September 06, 2013 06:13 PM |
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Edited by xerox at 18:22, 06 Sep 2013.
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I don't see the point in getting rid of the monetary system. Money exists because it happens to be the most convenient known form of economic transaction. It's not like you remove economic transactions, i.e. trade, just because you get rid of the monetary system. You just make it a lot more inconvenient.
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mvassilev
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posted September 06, 2013 06:27 PM |
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Ohforf, if he tells me the mine isn't empty and it is, he's committing fraud and I can sue him.
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OhforfSake
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posted September 06, 2013 06:36 PM |
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Sometimes laws will indeed protect you, but not on every occasion. To make it such an event, let's say he allows you free access to the mine and openly tells you he doesn't believe it will do well, he even tells you why. He believes in this theory of mining you yourself find ridiculous to even consider, and you might think him a bit foolish for selling a mine, which according to the theory of mining you happen to find reasonable (which might also have the best results, let's say 99% accuracy for a large sample size) will very likely generate profit for you.
Now I know full well you probably wouldn't put all your eggs in a basket and the person in this example doesn't have to be you, all it really requires is that for the 1%, i.e. the mine doesn't have sufficient value to be worth it, maybe even no value at all.
1% might seem like reasonable, but if one considers that maybe only 1/100 mines are good, then 99% of 1/100 is .99, while 1% of 99/100 is .99, only giving you 50% chance of getting a good mine in the first place.
Edit: I don't think money should be removed, I only wish for independence from money, and I believe that could be done, if you weren't forced to trade for something if you wanted it. But one could also get very specific and ask if the work required to get something even if no trade is required is not also a trade in itself. So to be more specific I suppose it's mainly a question of being independent of other people, but I'm not completely sure.
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mvassilev
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posted September 06, 2013 06:44 PM |
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Then I am taking a risk. Should people be forbidden from taking risks?
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OhforfSake
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posted September 06, 2013 06:51 PM |
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No, and I never said that. I clearly wrote here:
Elvin said:
I don't mind people can lose their money, I mind that losing your money might mean poverty.
People, in my opinion, ought to be allowed whatever they want. What I mind is that people are not certain to be safe. The free market does not guarantee the safety I'd like:
mvassilevsky said:
said:
Never is it considered the alternative, a system which discourages negative trades, where many loses just so a few can gain.
That's called a free market. [...]
But now when I reread it, maybe the term "discourages" isn't the best? In any case, my point is that since people can land in poverty with a free market as well as with a government controlled one, neither of those two options are ultimately the preferable choice.
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