The election is finally here. It’s time to pull out the trumpets, drop the streamers, wave the flags and lock the doors so volunteers can’t get in to ask about your voting status. Regardless of the electricity in the air for the election on Tuesday, it is time I stop berating former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney on his policies and focus on the future.
While I have spent the last few weeks writing for a liberal agenda, there is one policy that I do not agree with in the liberal ideology: welfare. While I believe liberal Democrats have the right idea in regard to government intervention in healthcare and efforts towards affordable education, I have to disagree with the efforts in favor of welfare. This is primarily due to the fact that I am best defined as an advocate of “big-government” (something I would consider modern-day socialism), rather than a left-wing nutcase.
I know that being too far left is equally as bad as being too far right. So sure, nationalize healthcare, nationalize education (which is already kind of true), but don’t try to feed the poor, too. I agree that homelessness is horrible and the poor deserve equality, but the government should act as a crutch, not artificial lungs. Welfare would not be a problem if it weren’t for the fact that a decent portion of welfare benefactors simply collect money from the government because a factory job would not pay as well as a government hand-out. The problem with welfare is that it gives an alternative to work. Why would someone work hard for a job that pays just enough for home and food when one could just lie around and let the government take care of these problems for them? The government made a mistake when it decided to make charity into a tax-sponsored program. The only ones who deserve to be provided for by the government are the elderly and the handicapped. Those who do not fit in either of these groups are fully capable of work and should not need the government’s help in order to get through a financial strait.
It is very possible to see my prognosis as immoral but the fact of the matter is welfare is a program that will do little more than add to the national debt. It is ineffective to support a costly liberal social program while also being one of the strongest capitalist economies.
In our economy, it is best to encourage as much of the population to work as possible in order for the system to work properly. If people are unemployed there is a drop in the work force and a drop in demand because the government does not provide enough money for splurging. Therefore, if there are more government handouts, there is a smaller work force and a smaller demand for goods. The only way a welfare-like program would be effective would be in a society where there were no markets, which would mean that it really wouldn’t be welfare, it would be communism.
There are enough holes in the government’s purse as it stands now. In order to start to hack away at our debt, we are going to have to start sealing up holes that are not helping the country. Welfare has been so misused that it’s time the government mends that hole and stops allowing the money we don’t have to spill out.
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