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Sorry - different names in Australia.
What you call social security, we call aged and disability pensions etc.
Social security here includes unemployment payments or income security. So forget I used the words 'social security' and said welfare instead. Same thing goes.
As what? Baristas? Because it's not gonna be manufacturing when people in China are willing to work for 1/4 the price Americans could afford to live on.
Well, actually what I meant without going into a 1/2 page drivel was, If the JOB CREATORS would actually create jobs, Americans would say goodbye to minimum wage standards, and corporate execs would be employing people at 75 cents per hour, and Americans would be glad to get even that because some money is better than no money at all.
But there would still be lowlife Americans who would jump at the chance to slice a big shot's throat.
Here is one of the things that irritates me about certain types of welfare.
Take food stamps for instance.
A friend of mine always talks about planting himself a garden, and canning the food he grows in his garden. I thought it was an interesting idea, and could save you a lot of money on yearly food costs.
Then I thought, the only people who really need to grow their own food, would be the poor. But the poor get food stamps, so there is no reason for them to grow their own food. Unless of course they then just sell their surplus food stamps(which is illegal)
Who really benefits from food stamps? Food and beverage companies, who suddenly have a much larger market.
Take another example, housing. I've always thought housing was grossly overpriced. In my mind, government regulations and subsidies which are supposedly to "help the poor find housing", doesn't really help in any truly meaningful way.
Take for instance these three questions.
Would housing prices go up or down if they got rid of section 8? Would housing prices go up or down if they got rid of the mortgage tax deduction? Would housing prices go up or down if they greatly trimmed down building codes, size/material requirements, and residential/commercial zoning?
In my opinion, all three would cause housing prices to drop. The last one would cause housing prices to drop most significantly.
Why does this matter?
Well, the problem with the housing is that, the regulations cause the basic minimum price to be higher than it otherwise would be. Mostly on the basis that, many people would happily live in a shack, if it was renting at the right price. But in most cities, this isn't a possibility. The higher minimum cost of rent, forces the working poor to either live in public housing, which is always horrible. Or to pay more than they can really afford, to live in a more civilized environment. Plus, because of the existence of other assistance programs, like section 8, the low-income houses are further inflated in price. Because the landlords will want to take full value from section 8, whatever its artificially set at for some arbitrary type of dwelling. Which causes the rents of low-quality housing to be further inflated towards some basic minimum.
Because of all this, you end up concentrating the poor in very narrow areas of town, which further concentrates crime in these areas.
I always tell my friend. The sad thing is, even if you could find a nice apartment very cheap, you wouldn't want to live there. For instance, you really don't want to pay less than $700 a month for a two-bedroom apartment in Oklahoma City. Anything cheaper than $700 a month begins to attract losers.
Lets pretend you could buy rental property cheap and wanted to rent it out cheap. The problem is, you would be bombarded with losers, who would destroy your property, and usually have drug addictions and other problems. You might still be able to rent that property cheap, as long as you could be very careful about who you rented to. Otherwise known as "discriminating" against anyone who concerns you. Of course the problem is, if you discriminate, even for good reason, you might be sued.
Who really benefits? In my view, the rich. Such as real estate developers/investors, and also landlords. But also, the rich, who are more able to "keep the poor" away from their own neighborhoods, while pretending that their home is an "investment".
But, it doesn't really matter, because no one is going to pull these entitlements.
In my opinion, it feels like we are more interested in basically keeping the poor and criminals sort of locked away in public housing, while throwing food at them and other basic necessities, then we kind of forget about them, while pretending that we are such wonderful people for "helping".
Here is one of the things that irritates me about certain types of welfare.
Take food stamps for instance.
A friend of mine always talks about planting himself a garden, and canning the food he grows in his garden. I thought it was an interesting idea, and could save you a lot of money on yearly food costs.
Then I thought, the only people who really need to grow their own food, would be the poor. But the poor get food stamps, so there is no reason for them to grow their own food. Unless of course they then just sell their surplus food stamps(which is illegal)
Who really benefits from food stamps? Food and beverage companies, who suddenly have a much larger market.
Take another example, housing. I've always thought housing was grossly overpriced. In my mind, government regulations and subsidies which are supposedly to "help the poor find housing", doesn't really help in any truly meaningful way.
Take for instance these three questions.
Would housing prices go up or down if they got rid of section 8? Would housing prices go up or down if they got rid of the mortgage tax deduction? Would housing prices go up or down if they greatly trimmed down building codes, size/material requirements, and residential/commercial zoning?
In my opinion, all three would cause housing prices to drop. The last one would cause housing prices to drop most significantly.
Why does this matter?
Well, the problem with the housing is that, the regulations cause the basic minimum price to be higher than it otherwise would be. Mostly on the basis that, many people would happily live in a shack, if it was renting at the right price. But in most cities, this isn't a possibility. The higher minimum cost of rent, forces the working poor to either live in public housing, which is always horrible. Or to pay more than they can really afford, to live in a more civilized environment. Plus, because of the existence of other assistance programs, like section 8, the low-income houses are further inflated in price. Because the landlords will want to take full value from section 8, whatever its artificially set at for some arbitrary type of dwelling. Which causes the rents of low-quality housing to be further inflated towards some basic minimum.
Because of all this, you end up concentrating the poor in very narrow areas of town, which further concentrates crime in these areas.
I always tell my friend. The sad thing is, even if you could find a nice apartment very cheap, you wouldn't want to live there. For instance, you really don't want to pay less than $700 a month for a two-bedroom apartment in Oklahoma City. Anything cheaper than $700 a month begins to attract losers.
Lets pretend you could buy rental property cheap and wanted to rent it out cheap. The problem is, you would be bombarded with losers, who would destroy your property, and usually have drug addictions and other problems. You might still be able to rent that property cheap, as long as you could be very careful about who you rented to. Otherwise known as "discriminating" against anyone who concerns you. Of course the problem is, if you discriminate, even for good reason, you might be sued.
Who really benefits? In my view, the rich. Such as real estate developers/investors, and also landlords. But also, the rich, who are more able to "keep the poor" away from their own neighborhoods, while pretending that their home is an "investment".
But, it doesn't really matter, because no one is going to pull these entitlements.
In my opinion, it feels like we are more interested in basically keeping the poor and criminals sort of locked away in public housing, while throwing food at them and other basic necessities, then we kind of forget about them, while pretending that we are such wonderful people for "helping".
There's one thing that irritates me about CORPORATE WELFARE, can you guess what it is?
Let's say that, in a radical attempt to balance the budget, Congress entirely cut spending on SNAP (food stamps), Section 8 (subsidized housing), and Medicaid (and they found a loophole around these "mandatory programs" that allowed them to be cut, or declared a special state of emergency).
In addition, in the same year, several states that also fund these programs separately cut their funding by 100% of near that.
What would be the result?
My guess is some or all of the following:
- Huge lines at private relief agencies
- A moderate to dramatic rise in private giving
- Massive rioting in poorer districts of cities, leading to looting, arson, and other crimes
- A rise in "flashmob" and other attacks on stores / gas stations / etc., coordinated by social media
- Attempted assassinations of politicians
- Flood of evictions leading to crime against landlords, mass eviction resistance movements (coordinated by Facebook, Twitter, etc.), rebellious occupation of property by swatters, homelessness
- A drastic rise in property crime rates
- A sharp rise in violent crime rates, often related to property (e.g. assault during robberies)
- A slight uptick in overall employment (including the informal economy)
- An unprecedented boom in the private security industry
- The closure of numerous inner-city grocery stores and corner markets
- Decrease in revenue for supermarkets and food producers in general, but:
- Expanded markets for cheaper food items and discounters
- Decreased prices for medical services and increased incidence of doctors providing "charity care"
- Rises in property, city, and state taxes to fund or expand programs instituted because of the above effects of cutting federal spending
I'm guessing that there would be riots in the streets if they just radically cut it.
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