Welfare is established in order to maintain the well-being of the general public within a society. These establishments, in turn, present institutions that are put forth in order to satisfy this agenda of maintaining a certain level of its citizen’s livelihood. However, many of these programs tend to cause more trouble than they alleviate. While there are options that allow for the financial protection of individuals, it is difficult to implement the large scale institutionalization of these programs. Furthermore, there are not significant benefits to the cost of their implementation. For this reason, the only option is that all forms of government welfare should be abolished.
The issue of welfare is based upon this notion of what the individuals within society have a responsibility towards others. In this way, the arguments are in contention on what this idea presents. While many would argue that there should be a responsibility that individuals have towards one another, others maintain that this responsibility should not be presided over by the state, but rather, through the decision of the individuals.
In essence, the question is concerned with how society should maintain its public systems. “Should social services be based on contributions, with the result that they will be unequal, or should they be equal, universal allowances from the state purse, or should there be a mixture of both?” (Agassi 2010) This question assumes that there are various fundamental ways of funding programs. However, these programs should be funded privately, with no contribution or legitimization through the state itself.
The reason for this is that there are various side effects of implementing these welfare policies throughout the general public. Not only can these effects be related to an overall degradation of the work ethic that is perceived by the individuals within society, but it can create a sense of dependency, which has the effect of lowering the independence, and thus the democratic standards, of the individuals who are under the system. For this reason, there are many arguments against the implementation of these programs. These arguments cover varying degrees of political alignment. In other words, there are varying arguments from many different groups that have put forth reasons why these programs should not be implemented.
Welfare is often criticized and from many different political perspectives. These perspectives are considered from not only a moral standpoint, but an economic standpoint as well. While those from a moral standpoint are presented with the issues that welfare programs have in the character of individuals, the economic focus on how the programs often come at a great, and unnecessary, financial cost. This is due to the inability of welfare to actually pull these individuals out of poverty. “The national poverty rate is now about the same as when the War on Poverty was instituted 30 years ago, despite the expenditure of over $5 trillion (at 1993 prices) for meanstested public assistance programs in the intervening years and a 75 percent increase in average real income.” (Niskanen 1996)
Furthermore, there are presentations of these forms of welfare from all across the political environment. These forms are considered to be the presentation of an unnecessary and costly implementation of a socially degrading program. For this reason, the arguments are often presented through the lens of responsibility as well as of fiscal foresight and independent thinking and judgment.
On one side of the spectrum, those who are considered to be conservative thinkers often argue that the welfare leads to various negative effects. Often, these arguments are based in the idea that there are various moral duties that people within society must undertake in order to maintain a free and democratic society. This is due to the fact that a free society relies heavily upon the independence of its citizens. However, in an open, urbanized society, these dependencies will ultimately increase under a welfare program. “A 1 percentage point increase in the population residing in metropolitan areas increases the dependent population by about 1.3 percent.” (Niskanen 1996) This results in an overall negative effect in how the systems are able to run.
These effects include, mainly, a reduction of incentive, which many believe will ultimately culminate in a culture that does not shoulder the responsibility of work, leading to the collapse of the social structure. This would lead to a rise in the amount of individuals who accept welfare, putting strain on those who do work, and lowering the standard of living for everybody. “A 1 percent increase in the dependent population increases the poor population in a state by about 0.3 percent.” (Niskanen 1996)
These ideas are based in the understanding that individuals have this moral responsibility towards one another. Through carrying out their efforts they are helping to ensure the health of society and functional representation of its character value. In this way, these arguments are characterized by the way that people act, their habits, rather than the established laws, and their enforcement through the government. “An increase in welfare benefits indirectly increases the violent crime rate by increasing the number of welfare dependents. An increase in AFDC benefits by 1 percent of average income” (Niskanen 1996) In this way, the responsibility of the individual is maintained through their moral character.
Furthermore, the undertaking of these programs allows for the overreaching authority of the federal government to establish itself in the lives of individual citizens. This results in a loss of liberty. “The problem lies in a culture of poverty that condones self-destructive behaviour. The answer to dependency, then, is not for governments to abandon the poor, but for governments to exercise authority over the poor” (Deacon 2001). In this sense, the inability for individuals to take these actions themselves ultimately leads to the government having a greater amount of authority over them.
These arguments are considered conservative, but they are not the only arguments that are made. There are many others who argue against the establishment of welfare programs due to the inability they create for negative political institutions to be properly tied to the issues that they helped to create. In this way, those who make these arguments tend to make the point that the programs that are established through welfare institutions are not necessarily the best for the well-being of the public in general.
These arguments are presented from the viewpoint that capitalism itself is the issue, and are not satisfied with simple measures that have been established through these types of measures. More liberal criticisms tend to make the argument that the forms of welfare employed in the United States are essentially flawed. These arguments are based on the idea that forms of welfare employed by capitalist countries are mere showpieces that only serve to alleviate public opinion to policies. In this way, these arguments are based in the sense that welfare programs are simply a show and do not serve to solve any real issues.
This idea presents itself in the form of financial responsibility towards the state of the individual. “Welfare, as have seen, does not operate without a fiscal constitution on which it depends.” (Cadogan 2013) In this sense, there are always fiscal costs associated with implementing these programs. Often the value of these costs does not outweigh the initial investment. Furthermore, there are various fiscal responsibilities that workers have towards the state in their association with these values.
While these issues tend to be debated among both sides of the political spectrum, there are various points in which they tend to overlap. Although they tend to be at odds with one another, these characteristics work together in order to form a more solid argument as to why welfare itself should not be utilized by the government in any sense. Through the implementation of these programs, there are various consequences that do not justify the establishment of the system in the first place.
While there are various political ideologies involved, the perspectives that inform these ideologies tend to present similar standpoints concerning the way in which welfare and responsibility are related in a moral sense. These arguments are essentially constructed from two different perspectives. These are the responsibility of the individual and the socially informed aspects of welfare. These aspects present alterations in the way in which they reflect the fundamental perspectives of the rights of individuals.
While many have argued that welfare is a positive aspect, others have made the point that it is not necessarily healthy for the social context of society. Some argue that welfare programs should be handled by local or state governments. While these authorizations would be less detrimental to the overall standing of individuals within society, they would still have an effect, leading to the conclusion that it is not necessary to implement these programs through the political institutions of either the state or local governments.
This is the differentiation between public and private needs. While there are indeed private needs that need to be met, they should not be shouldered by the rest of society. Those institutions that are shared among individuals, such as roads and parks, are those that should be funded by the government. Those that are not shared, personal health, etc., should be shouldered only those who wish to do so. Although those run by private individuals cannot be discredited, those sanctioned by the state should not exist. For this reason, it is important to consider the responsibilities that individuals have towards one another.
For this reason, there are possibilities that are not within the realm of the government to pursue. These pursuits are not the discretion of the public sector to maintain. It is argued that a more fair country “cannot possibly be achieved through reform and modification of federal welfare programs. Nor can it be achieved by turning the administration of such programs over to state and local governments.” (Goodman 1994) In this way, it is not a matter of how large or small these programs are scaled, but rather, to how much of an extent that they are a part of the private or public sector.
Another argument that has been made against the institutionalization of welfare withint he country is that the United States has more wealth than other countries. “The average ‘poor’ American lives in a larger house or apartment, is more likely to own a car and is more likely to have basic amenities such as an indoor toilet than the general population of Western Europe.” (Goodman 1994) For this reason, it is argued that there are various institutions that are not needed.
Studies show that there are detrimental effects to the work sector when these programs are implemented within the economic structure of the country. “The escalation of the War on Poverty coincided with a sharp reduction in work effort by the poor” (Goodman 1994) These findings show that there are indeed negative consequences to funding these types of programs. Not only do they cost money to the government, but to the economy as well.
These detrimental effects are due to the essential characteristics of welfare programs. They not only present individuals with the incentive to not have a job, but they reward them for not having one for long periods of time. “This change is not hard to understand. The welfare state has increased the penalties for working and the rewards for not working.” (Goodman 1994) In this way, the programs are not necessarily effective, and so their establishment would not be effective.
Finally, the reestablishment of wealth is a difficult thing to achieve, especially by the government in a country such as the United States. Cowen argues that these ideas are established within the more advanced countries that allow for liberty, although they tend to spend more money than they are attempting to spread to more individuals. “These expenditures and their associated programs affect individual behavior at the margin, through taxes and subsidies, but many do not redistribute net wealth to the poor”. (Cowen 2000) This presents the problem of welfare in its effectiveness of actually establishing a balance of wealth in the country in which it is implemented.
The biggest problem with this system is the inability to establish the monetary value that a person can achieve through work. The lack of motivation of an individual is difficult to measure, and so any program attempting to compensate this will have difficulty. “A variety of assets have little or no measurable market value, even though they contribute greatly to individual well-being. This includes human capital, the value of leisure time, the value of one's marriage and friends, and the general intellectual and cultural heritage of mankind, much of which has entered the public domain or is available very cheaply.” (Cowen 2000)
While welfare can be established for the purpose of maintaining the integrity of the society, these institutions indicate that there is no way to satisfy the need of these individuals. For this reason, a certain level of its citizen’s livelihood are effected by many of these programs. They often cause more trouble than they alleviate, though. Therefore, the solution is the abolishment of all forms of Government Welfare.
References
Agassi, Judith Buber. The Rise of the Ideas of the Welfare State. York University. 2010.
Cadogan, Bernard. Welfare Policy: Governance History and Political Philosophy. Oxford. 2013.
Cowen, Tyler. Does the Welfare State Help the Poor? George Mason University. 2000.
Deacon, Alan. Ending Dependency. Lessons from Welfare Reform in the USA. The Institute for
the Study of Civil Society. 2001.
Goodman, John C. Why Not Abolish the Welfare State? North Central University. 1994.
Niskanen, William A. Welfare and the Culture of Poverty. Welfare and Poverty. Cato Journal.
1996.
