Before discussing economics and the respective policy implications, we need to decide on our objectives.
Protect the genuinely needy
To me, you are genuinely needy if you, for whatever reason, cannot earn sufficient income or have sufficient wealth to afford basic food, shelter and medical care; AND have no family nor friends willing to help you meet these basic needs.
You are responsible for yourself.
If you need extra help, then your family is responsible for you. If you have no family or they cannot or will not be responsible for you, then your friends are responsible for you. If your friends cannot or will not be responsible for you, then I would want society, through the mechanism of government, be responsible for you.
I do not know the numbers however I suspect by this definition, well less than 5% of the population are genuinely needy. If you ask yourself what percentage of adults could not fend for themselves and multiplied it by the percentage of adults that would not have friends or family to support them, you can come up with your own approximation.
What I do know is that the Australian Government estimated the total cost in Social Security and Welfare for 2019/2020 was $191.8 billion; and that there were about 8.3 million households in Australia in 2020.
If the poorest households received $100k each from the $191.8 billion allocated to Social Security and Welfare, then 1.91 million households would receive a payment. That is 23% of the population.
I will say that again. If the $100k was distributed to each of the poorest households in Australia, then 23% of households would receive this payment.
Of course, I am assuming there are no costs of administering the welfare system, which is not true; but hopefully, not substantial (which it probably is).
The central point, however, is this: 23% is significantly higher than my 5% of genuinely needy; and I expect it will be much higher than your own definition of genuinely needy.
Middle class welfare is a blight on our welfare system and something I see as immoral.
I do not blame the middle class for taking the money, as it is rational for them to follow the incentives. I do blame, however, the system. And, for me, that needs to change.
Protect the environment
It is important to me to not only protect all species of flora and fauna; it is also important to protect the natural ecosystems – large and small.
In any market based system, trade is an exchange between two humans, so the environment is not considered explicitly and suffers the potential by-products from any trade.
I believe the environment conceptually needs to be considered as an entity in its own right and we need appropriate regulations that protects the environment within any trade and also promotes the growth of the flora and flora on our planet.
There are complicated trade offs to consider as it relates to the environment, which we will explore case by case. These include:
- Trading off between the genuinely needy and the environment
- Trading off between economic growth now (that will reduce the genuinely needy later) and the environment
- Trading off between renewable energy like windfarms (that use up a lot of space) and nuclear energy (that uses up very little space and produces minimal waste however is a non-renewable)
I will explore where we need greater government regulation and where we need greater deregulation to both protect and support the environment.
Protect the freedom of the individual
I believe adults in society should have the freedom to say or do whatever they want as long as they take no actions to harm anyone else.
It is not for anyone else to force me how to live or not live my life: it is upon me to choose the best pathway to flourish.
“What do you call it when someone steals someone else’s money secretly? Theft. What do you call it when someone takes someone else’s money openly by force? Robbery. What do you call it when a politician takes someone else’s money in taxes and gives it to someone who is more likely to vote for him? Social Justice.”
Thomas Sowell
Taxes, of course, are one of the largest violators of individual liberty. It is important for us not to forget it. ‘Government funded’ is really ‘citizen stolen.’
I am not an anarchist, I am a pragmatist. I recognise that there are some elements in society that provide such large benefits to the entire society that we must compromise our liberty to levy taxes to fund these elements.
These elements include a legal system that establishes and protects both the safety of the individual and their property rights, as well as the environment; a police force to enforce these laws; a defence force to protect our borders from invasion; and a safety net for the genuinely needy.
When I explore ‘government funded’ programs in the future, I will reflect on whether the program’s universal good for society is substantial enough to satisfy the very high bar of undertaking the immoral act of stealing from citizens through taxation.
I hope to remind people that there should be a high bar to be passed. And right now many government funded programs are far from meeting that bar.
WHat is your position?
You now know my stance and I hope it can help you establish your own stance as this will become important as we start exploring the trade offs in public policy.
