Posted on 09/11/2013 6:47:12 AM PDT by Enza Ferreri
It is no coincidence but on the contrary highly significant that the British modern welfare state was born after the Second World War.
Having fought together against Hitler provided that sense of unity that is necessary for people to willingly financially support total strangers.
For a welfare state to succeed that sense of an entire society's belonging figuratively to the same family is a conditio sine qua non. Another necessary condition is a general sense of trust, the perception that the welfare recipients will not exploit and take advantage of the welfare donors' generosity.
Both these indispensable conditions have now been lost.
Immigration is undoubtedly a cause of this loss, but it is not the only one. The welfare state over the long decades of its existence has produced what American sociologist Charles Murray and others call the "underclass" (incidentally another sign that the US, contrary to European popular opinion, does have an extensive welfare state too).
The underclass is a new social class, it is no longer the working class. It is not characterised by its economic status so much as by its behaviour, mores and ethos. It has a disproportionately high illegitimacy rate, school drop-out rate, unemployment rate and crime rate. It is anti-social in its outlook, attitudes, rules and codes.
In the US the underclass is disproportionately black but in Britain it is mainly formed by indigenous Britons.
This is why only solving the problem of immigration will not solve the welfare problem.
That pro-welfare consensus after World War II does not exist any more. Now the opposite consensus exists.
One of the purported reasons for the creation of the welfare state was the desire to reduce income inequality (or relative poverty), portrayed as a cause of social unrest.
I don't know if enough evidence exists that income inequality causes social unrest. As is well known, correlation is not causation.
Social instability is more likely to be caused by poverty - real, absolute poverty in relation to one's needs, not the feeling of envy generated by looking over the fence at the neighbour's garden and seeing there rare orchids not found in one's own pretty but not luxurious garden - not income inequality. Moreover, it is caused by agitprop elements who keep telling people that they are treated unfairly (a bit like the US black leaders, that author Tammy Bruce calls "merchants of misery", who have made a career out of perpetuating in blacks a never-ending sense of victimhood and desire for retribution).
At the moment, much of Western social unrest is caused by the disastrous effect of governments' overspending, mostly due to elephantine welfare states.
This whole country is in need of reform.
I did not read the article.
Welfare should help those in genuine need - elderly and disabled.
It has been used to create a permanent, unhappy underclass that the dems use every election, to get reelected, and then they are ignored.
Use the money to help people get to work! And stop saying that we need to import cheap labor!
Great, more “reform” which is just bureaucrat for prentend to fix something while grown government power. The last time we did this song and dance in the 1990s we ended up with a few weak changes and a massive expansion of government and corporate power. Time to stop waving that reform rag in the air and just start taking a chain saw to these programs and their bureaucracies.
Welfare has no business being implemented by the government. It should be churches and private companies contracted so the process can have the appearance of being run efficiently and not be used as a campaign platform to garner votes.
One of the first things the NAZI’s did was a government take over of welfare in their country too.
Saw “EBT Accepted” on a gas pump yesterday. REALLY ticked me off as I watched the numbers roll up totalling how much I had to pay for MY gas AND some deadbeat’s.
Corporate Management & "Immigration Reform"
Actually, many aspects of the Welfare State started before World War II & the Debate on same started before 1900 in Europe. Kipling was ridiculing the idea when Wilhelm II first proposed it in Germany on ascending to the throne.
It never made any sense to those who understand human nature--never!
William Flax
You are right. There is absolutely no Constitutional basis for the Federal Government to be involved in any way. None!
Getting rid of welfare is immigration reform. We never really had an immigration problem until the government started giving away our earnings for votes.
If done right, one takes care of the other. Mass deportations, asap!
Wilhelm , I.e. Bismarck, didn’t have much of a choice if he wanted to keep Germany together. They were Prussian aristocrats, their idea of helping the poor was to not go out if their way to step on them in the street. But Germany was the birthplace of Marx, and it might have gone the way of Russia if they didn’t relent. The Tsar didn’t and look what happened to him.
I knew a guy who worked as a security guard married with 2 kids. This dude on purpose refuse to his Renew His Security Guard License and let it expired.He sits at home now collecting welfare,food stamps, gets reduced near free health care for his entire family. This dude was more than capable of working but no he decided to ride the system, collect the free money and let the taxpayers support him and his family. It does not bother him one bit to be ripping off the system..
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