Society’s responsibility to the “less fortunate”

[nemo]

The apparently widespread belief that those with financial means should bear more of society’s fiscal burden has piqued my curiosity. This axiom presents itself in everything from income taxes to late-night telethons. I don’t mind helping someone out when they need assistance, but I find myself wondering where the line that divides generosity and facilitating continuing dependence lies.

 

There was a point in my life when I honestly didn’t know how I would feed my family. I worked between twelve and sixteen hours a day in a manual labor intensive career field that kept me away from my family for weeks at a time. Many of my coworkers would spend their paychecks on alcohol or any combination of temporary vacations from reality, and then turn to public assistance for housing and groceries. Many long nights teaching myself how to operate, administer and finally, abuse computers have found me in a dramatically different environment; why now, should I (directly or otherwise) be required to help support the people I used to work with?

[infamous]

Many long nights teaching myself how to operate, administer and finally, abuse computers have found me in a dramatically different environment; why now, should I (directly or otherwise) be required to help support the people I used to work with?

 

Excellent point nemo, These are questions that civilization has been asking itself from the outset. I did say "civilization" by the way. Before this concept developed in the minds and behavior of the human species, little thought for the wellfare of others was ever considered. As hunters and gatherers, humans consisting of relatively small groups. Not untill we learned to till the soil and harvest crops for winter storage did the notion of civilization come into play. Once this co-operative effort between humans deveolped enough for some to realize that they could live off of the labors of others did then the wellfare state give birth. I am not necessarily against providing help to those that really need it. I am however disappointed that we make it so easy for the less industrious to take advantage these days. I'm not a communist but, Karl Marx did make an interesting comment about this very thing. "When the masses realize that they have the keys to the treasury, they will empty it". I'm not sure about exact wording that he used but, I think everyone will understand the gist of this quote.

[Biochemist]

Karl Marx did make an interesting comment about this very thing. "When the masses realize that they have the keys to the treasury, they will empty it". ...

I am pretty sure that was not Marx, althought it is attributed to everyone from Bismarck to Ben Franklin. I don't think Bismarck said it, since he is the godfather of the european welfare state. Franklin quote here:

When the people find they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic

Or

A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largess of the public treasury. From that time on the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with the results that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship.

Marx was "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need", so it would not seem to fit him either. But heck, it could be. Marx was a creative guy.

In a higher phase of communist society, after the enslaving subordination of the individual to the division of labor, and therewith also the antithesis between mental and physical labor, has vanished; after labor has become not only a means of life but life's prime want; after the productive forces have also increased with the all-around development of the individual, and all the springs of co-operative wealth flow more abundantly -- only then then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois right be crossed in its entirety and society inscribe on its banners: From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!

[C1ay]

Life does not come on a silver platter. Successful, hard working people did not get that way because they are 'fortunate', they took action to get there. I don't mind helping people that ask. I do mind people taking my help for others without asking.

[UncleAl]

There are certain minimal levels of public welfare a reasonably affluent State will maintain for the common good: basic public health, emergency aid for natural catastrophes, limited gratis services for acute personal tragedy. Jackbooted State compassion (the "safety net") is tyrannical abuse, pure and simple. If you do not arrange your life to maintain its persistence; if you are too lazy, stupid, crippled, or perverse to maintain yourself, then you beg for voluntarily contributed succor or you die. The State owes you nothing.

 

A feminine society sends its best out to suffer and die to maintain the expensive life of the runt of the litter. A masculine society kills the runt up front and gets on with it. A femine society drowns in runts when it runs out of productive peoples' stolen monies - improved means to deteriorated ends. A masculine society continuously improves itself by discarding its weaklings and monsters at minimal cost, and cherishing its best and brightest.

 

Government cannot award people what it first has not stolen from them. What one man receives without effort is confiscated from another who labors. The money I make belongs to me and my family, not to a government stooge who takes a cut and dumps the rest on slum bunnies for squirting out babies or shooting up drugs.

 

We keep score (grades, money) because who wins is important - who can win is important. Winning isn't everything but losing isn't anything. Save the drama for yer momma. Get down and PUSH, maggot.

[Turtle]

___In regard to our old friend Ben, he hardly beiieved the quaint admonitions he sold. He really beieved that living off of others if one can, is the best/smartest strategy. He himself sought out rich men to support him in his daily needs as well as in his travels & personal pleasures. Only when he found such support unavailable did he resort to actual work.

___This and many other interesting historical accounts of the founders of the US I found in Gordon S. Wood's, The Radicalism of the American Revolution.

[karlfreak]

ok i belive that for those that honestly can't make enough moey to proved for them selfs should be assisted by the government, the politicians of the world also should have to donate to society (look at there paychecks) i also belive that what we call democracy is not really what it is--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Life does not come on a silver platter. Successful, hard working people did not get that way because they are 'fortunate'

 

well some of them did and some got lucky. but what really annoyes me is when a hard working person gets rippedof bye the government

 

power to the people

[UncleAl]

power to the people

Power to the government. Power bills to the people.

 

Uncle Al says, "There is nothng so stupid that it cannot be sung."

[lindagarrette]

Life is not fair. Some people live very happily without working. Others can't make a living for lack of opportunity or ability. Most of us do what we are expected to do which is pretty much slave labor. We work to make others prosper. People who are employed do not receive wages proportional to the work they do. Why is the CEO paid up to 500 times as much as the office worker? It's all relative. The only fair society is the Starship Enterprise.

[nkt]

The only fair society is the Starship Enterprise.

Tell that to the Red Shirts who are the first to die every time! Should they not get either no pay, or all the pay?

 

Life can never be fair. Since everyone is different, it just cannot be.

 

The 7 foot giant wrestler is going to need more food than the 5' lady who answers the phone and walks nowhere - is that fair? The person with poor eyes needs a bigger TV screen - but the other householders can see it too, so they get something for nothing...

 

The person who takes a fat profit and uses it to promote remorselessly is likely to get ahead of the honest person who takes only the small amount he needs, as long as people cannot always know who is good and who is not.

 

However, when bad times occur, the fat profit man will be the one buying power, and squealing loudest, and more likely to get the oil!

 

Whichever way you look at it, paying people to have babies while sitting on their butts smoking is a bad idea. Always has been, always will be.

 

I like "Follies" myself. (http://homepage.ntlworld.com/follies/swaytxt.html for example) Give the plebs something to do in order to earn their keep! Since they are unemployed, rather than paying them to sit idle, you pay them to work on something - it doesn't have to be useful, just decorative or fun.

 

This stops skills from going to waste, keeps people out of trouble, and in the habit of working. They also don't breed as fast! Obviously, this then keeps the population in check.

 

Kids who leave school at 16 should also only be allowed to do so if they are then working, rather than being idle, and loitering about street corners. Otherwise, a college for trade skills would be the other option, such that plumbers and the like become more common and useful skills are learned. After all, too many MBAs won't get you anywhere except outsourced!

 

The responsibility has to be with the person, to get themselves educated and moving - if they won't, well, hunger is a good motivation, or so I've learned!

[Biochemist]

Life is not fair....People who are employed do not receive wages proportional to the work they do. Why is the CEO paid up to 500 times as much as the office worker? It's all relative. .

If the CEO delivers 10,000 times the value to the stockholder, was he/she underpaid?

[IrishEyes]

This stops skills from going to waste, keeps people out of trouble, and in the habit of working. They also don't breed as fast! Obviously, this then keeps the population in check.

...

The responsibility has to be with the person, to get themselves educated and moving - if they won't, well, hunger is a good motivation, or so I've learned!

Wow! Ok, I have to agree with some of your post, but the first thing up there, about breeding so fast, just rubbed me wrong. Maybe because I have a rather large family. But then again, as I'm not on public assistance, and my husband's job pays rather well, I guess this was not directed at me. But really - it was kinda crass.

 

Second, from experience, not only is personal hunger a great motivator, but looking at children knowing that there may not be enough food in the fridge next week works even better. After some major life changes, we found ourselves without cash for about 3 weeks. From checking the couch for quarters to buy ramen, to considering selling our blood, to eating very little but drinking lots of water ourselves, the constant was not wanting our kids to experience any type of hunger. We also had an overwhelming desire to NOT go on public aid. If that meant that we both worked two jobs slinging burgers to pay grocery bills and rent, that's what we would do.

Thankfully, it didn't come to that. He got a decent job, as you read above in the first post. No, it wasn't his dream job. And we were still barely scraping by. But we were making it. Without help. Stubborn? You bet your life. But more than that, we were both determined that our kids would not only NOT go hungry, they would see what happens when you set your mind to something and work your butt off to succeed.

We look back on that part of our life, barely 6 years ago, with fondness though. Many other couples would have called it quits, and many other families would have asked for handouts. However, we were both able, and willing, to work for what we needed, and work harder for what we wanted. We call that time the "ramen time", because we ate hardly anythng except Ramen noodles for 3 weeks. They were cheap, 10 for a buck, and the kids thought it was awesome.

Now, thanks to a very determined husband, he is enjoying success that we never could have imagined, and I am able to stay home with our children. It wasn't easy, and it makes me very angry when people look at us and see only what we have now, as opposed to how hard it was for us to get to this point.

Is my husband special? Of course he is. He is probably the most brilliant person that I know. Does he love his family? Well, I see what he's done for us, and I never question that. But is he any different than any other person out there? Every single person has opportunities. Every person makes choices. Whether or not they choose to use those opportunities, whether or not they are willing to make sacrifices and do the hard work, that is what makes each person different. I think he is unique. But then again, I think every one has the potential to do what he did. Can everyone get the exact same job with the same pay? Maybe not. But nothing is stopping people from improving their own situations where ever they may be.

well, nothing but laziness and a lack of desire to be better than what other tell them they can be.

Just MHO.

[InfiniteNow]

Most of the posters in this thread have been inactive for some time, however, I feel it worth while to acknowledge the validity in their posts. Of course we should each work as hard as possible. Of course we each have opportunity, and of course many of us have fallen on tough times. I, myself, have had to limit meals to one per day, stop driving completely, and even had to sell a few things which were left to me by my deceased father. The most difficult part was purchasing medical supplies. Being a diabetic, not having an income is truly life threatening.

 

I struggle to completely agree with the "pull yourself up by the boot straps" approach though, because I did have assistance during my time of need, and I struggle to understand what I may have done (other than die, rob, or steal) if I didn't have that assistance available to get out of the hole into which I fell. I worked odd jobs. I arranged situations where I got paid to teach kung fu. I mowed lawns. I babysat. It still wasn't enough though.

 

I suggest that, within reason, we must help the less fortunate. They are part of what defines society itself. Turning a blind eye does not cause the problem to go away, and it is a problem. However, as evidenced here, it's not the assistance that is a problem, but people exploiting it. It's inherent in our nature to get maximal benefit for minimal expenditure. So...

 

How do we plan better as a planet... symbiotically? What can we do that is both logically and morally appropriate, without letting go completely of the fruits of our own efforts and labor?

 

 

Ramen and peanut butter, brown rice and pasta. Five months straight. ;)

[Moontanman]

Where does the responsibility stop and the taking advantage of stop? I'm not sure if that is the question or even if it can be answered but I've spent most of my life making sure others were taken care of. Getting people to give money to the needy both by talking and by my actions. If I had a tenth of the money I've given away I would not be having the dilemma I currently have. I have come to the sad point in life where I am worth far more dead than I am alive. I've been trying to say ahead of what was coming by doing everything I was supposed to do. But slowly almost inevitably it has slowly came down on me. Something like a slow landslide where even though the process looks slow you realize you are even slower than it is and no matter what you do it is always too little too late. My final move was to file bankruptcy. I chose to do 100% payout so that none of my creditors would lose anything. I just didn't want to loose this old house I've lived in for 30 years. Now I know when the landslide started, I was injured on the job and forced into disability retirement. Ok, I didn't like the idea very much but I really didn't have much choice, not being able to really do anything that paid well enough to live on I figured that with 25 years with the company I could be a house husband and my wife would continue to work and we would spend out declining years with our dogs and helping people. That worked for a while until my wife couldn't work anymore. Now I am faced with the dilemma of what to do. I can't live like this but I'm really not exactly ready to die either. Like a slow motion storm I can see everything being ripped away from me but I am also in slow motion so I can't do anything about the situation. It's funny that an amount of money that in my society most would say was a trivial amount (but not to me of course) could have saved me from having any problems and the people I have given money to over the years suddenly don't know who I am. Now things are starting to move faster almost a perfect financial storm. MY wife cannot find work due to a bad economy and her age, and now her health. I know know why they put all those bullshit ads on the Internet for things everyone knows cannot be true. Get rich today!, our plan will make you wealthy. Let us show you how to make other work for you. or the good old boys line, let us work for you! I know now how these ridicules adds can work is desperation, I used to think it was simply people who were not well informed but it's desperation that makes you do stupid things. Now they tell me the bankruptcy is going to keep me from being able to use the equity in my house to pay off my bankruptcy and start over. Catch 22 for sure, I'm not sure who is responsible for the less fortunate but now that I am one of them I whish they would stand so I could see them.

 

Michael

[Michaelangelica]

The apparently widespread belief that those with financial means should bear more of society’s fiscal burden has piqued my curiosity. This axiom presents itself in everything from income taxes to late-night telethons.

& religious charlatans who operate as tax free "charities"?

 

The idea was good to start with.

You had these Super rich people who could easily afford to help poor people and politicians.

So the US invented tax of the very wealthy and started compassionate welfare progammes (all-be-it, very limited, in the land of the Protestant Ethic)

The Super Rich then took all their money overseas (Latest estimate 6 Trillion in off-shore personal accounts)

So the government started to tax the middle class & others who could not afford a good creative accountant.

 

Last week Australian politicians gave them selves a 6%+ pay increase while arguing that nurses were only entitled to the C.P.I. (2.2%).

Thats the sort of welfare I object too.

( And don't give me the old chestnut about paying peanuts and getting monkeys. We have monkeys no matter how much we pay them.)

[Moontanman]

& religious charlatans who operate as tax free "charities"?

 

The idea was good to start with.

You had these Super rich people who could easily afford to help poor people and politicians.

So the US invented tax of the very wealthy and started compassionate welfare progammes (all-be-it, very limited, in the land of the Protestant Ethic)

The Super Rich then took all their money overseas (Latest estimate 6 Trillion in off-shore personal accounts)

So the government started to tax the middle class & others who could not afford a good creative accountant.

 

Last week Australian politicians gave them selves a 6%+ pay increase while arguing that nurses were only entitled to the C.P.I. (2.2%).

Thats the sort of welfare I object too.

( And don't give me the old chestnut about paying peanuts and getting monkeys. We have monkeys no matter how much we pay them.)

 

Well no matter how I say it, to at least some extent I have to accept responsibility for the end of my life being so much less than nothing. Most people of the NEO-CON persuasion would say I should have spent more time making money for my self instead of helping others and talking others into helping the less fortunate. My wife who has three college degrees stayed at home to take care of the kids instead of working and eventually landing a job that would have supported both of us.

But there again we both made the decision for her to stay at home while I worked. I made what was considered rather good at the time and if things had worked out and I had managed to retire from Du Pont in the normal fashion I would have been reasonably well off, well off enough to continue helping others in my old age and maybe keeping some of my hobbies going. But trust me when I say and if you are young and getting started out, listen well. No matter how much fulfillment you get from helping others always remember that if everything goes well you will be old and broken down one day and no one will be there to reach down to you and give you a hand when you need it. More likely you will have people driving by trying to buy your house for a small fraction of what it is worth so they can make a killing by fixing it up and reselling it. You know all the commercials you see on TV about making money in real estate? Get rich with minimal time and investment? List of hundreds of homes repossessed by the bank just waiting to be bought by some lucky investor! At the other end of that equation is often a person like me who is in a bad situation struggling to make things work and failing because there is no for him to get the tiny amount of money he needs to become solvent again.

It all began with my insurance company canceling my home owners insurance because I had (to them) an abandoned vehicle on my property. My old jeep that I worked on as part of my surf fishing hobby. They of course called my mortgage company to give them the good news. "That I didn't have any insurance" Of course the mortgage company couldn't put up with that so they stopped taking my payments and called in the loan.

Now during all this someone in some part of the mortgage company or insurance or somewhere realized that I had almost 100,000 dollars in equity built up in my house "Wow, that would be a great profit!" Of course for that to happen the home owner would have to be dumb as dirt or simply not in the loop. Guess what? the insurance company I had for about 30 years forgot to send me a note asking me to remove the old jeep from my property. then with an astonishing amount of surprise the mortgage company forgot to send me a note telling me they were foreclosing on my property.

So between the two of them they held my life by the head of a writing utensil. Eventually I noticed a dude wandering around my property asking me what I would take for my house cash money right then. I told him it wasn't for sale. He of course corrected me by showing me the newspaper where they report foreclosed property.

I was amazed, I kindly told him it was an accident and that the house wasn't for sale. When my wife came home from her job that day to tell me she had been laid off (this is not a joke, bad or otherwise) I showed her the paper that said our house was under foreclosure. She started calling companies from the mortgage to the insurance and sure enough it was true. By this time we had accrued more than 12,000 in lawyers fees and such not to mention payments not accepted. the insurance company said they were sorry they hadn't sent me a notice so they would extend my time limit by another 30 days or so, or something like that. The mortgage company with visions of equity in their eyes said no way dude! 15 grand up front or get out. I engaged yet another lawyer to fight for me and the race is on and has been for the last nine months or so. So far I haven't been evicted but it was close, the mortgage company has started taking my payments again but to them I still owe 12 to 18 grand in attorneys fees and late charges. In this period two cars have died, only my son who is in college and sharing his car with me keeps me mobile at all. It is a real living nightmare with so many plot twists and turn around's any author worth his ink could write a best seller about it, except it's a dog bites man story. So here I am unable to make any real living, my house is falling down around me and the bankruptcy administrator will not allow me to use the equity in my house to get out of this mess even though it would cost me a small fortune in interest. Even the IRS has jumped in claims I owe them money. I have pretty much convinced them I owe them none but I think they did that just for ****'s and giggles.

As they say, so the story goes, what does an honest man who would rather live than die do in such an untenable situation?

 

Michael Hissom

Life is the poetry of the universe

love is the poetry of life

[TheBigDog]

There are certain minimal levels of public welfare a reasonably affluent State will maintain for the common good: basic public health, emergency aid for natural catastrophes, limited gratis services for acute personal tragedy. Jackbooted State compassion (the "safety net") is tyrannical abuse, pure and simple. If you do not arrange your life to maintain its persistence; if you are too lazy, stupid, crippled, or perverse to maintain yourself, then you beg for voluntarily contributed succor or you die. The State owes you nothing.

 

A feminine society sends its best out to suffer and die to maintain the expensive life of the runt of the litter. A masculine society kills the runt up front and gets on with it. A femine society drowns in runts when it runs out of productive peoples' stolen monies - improved means to deteriorated ends. A masculine society continuously improves itself by discarding its weaklings and monsters at minimal cost, and cherishing its best and brightest.

 

Government cannot award people what it first has not stolen from them. What one man receives without effort is confiscated from another who labors. The money I make belongs to me and my family, not to a government stooge who takes a cut and dumps the rest on slum bunnies for squirting out babies or shooting up drugs.

 

We keep score (grades, money) because who wins is important - who can win is important. Winning isn't everything but losing isn't anything. Save the drama for yer momma. Get down and PUSH, maggot.

Damn I miss UncleAl sometimes!

 

Bill