[Torie]

You do know that localizing welfare and redistribution programs would cause both to rapidly collapse don't you? The poor would tend to go where the benefits are most generous, the rich to where the taxes are lowest (presumably with not generous benefits), and the whole financial edifice would rapidly unravel. Sometimes invoking the mantra of localization shortcuts thinking about the real consequences.

[Jim Robinson]

I don't see anything bad about collapsing the federal welfare and redistribution syetems. I think the founders intended for all of this to be controlled at the state and local levels.

[NeoCaveman]

You do know that localizing welfare and redistribution programs would cause both to rapidly collapse don't you?

And the problem with that is?

[Jim Robinson]

I'd like to get back to what the founders intended. The federal government was never meant to be all things to all people. It was designed to be very limited in scope and power. The state and local governments tightly controlled by the voters is where all of this stuff should be done. We should be paying an excise tax on goods purchased rather than an income tax. The excise tax would have a natural built-in limit (free market) and people would have a better chance at controlling their finances and their tax contributions. And, I suppose, if the liberals really want some money to go to the feds to be redistributed to the states for welfare, they can always donate as much as they want. For example, Barbara Streisand, The Kennedys, Ted Turner, Jane Fonda, et al, could donate millions if not billions to the cause.