Chris
07-20-2012, 09:46 AM
The welfare state is just a euphemism for socialism.
John Maynard Keynes—not exactly history’s greatest opponent of government spending—is reported to have said he would be worried if government outlays ever surpassed 25 percent of GDP. Well, in recent years both American and British government expenditures have hovered around 40 percent of GDP. The bulk of that spending, perhaps as much as 70 percent in Britain, goes to feed the ravenous welfare state.
Clearly it’s time to question the welfare state. But such questions are too often viewed as taboo. Anyone who challenges it is viewed as seeking a return to the “dog-eat-dog” world of unfettered capitalism—a world where sellers supposedly exploited buyers, employers exploited workers, the rich exploited the poor.
...Capitalism—real capitalism, not the mixed economies that have existed for the past century—is the system based on private property, free production, and voluntary trade. It’s not a zero-sum game where people battle over a fixed pie. Each person is free to create wealth and to trade it with others, such that they all benefit.
...In place of capitalism’s philosophy of win-win, the welfare state puts everyone’s wealth up for grabs, ensuring that one person’s gain comes at his neighbor’s expense. Talk about dog-eat-dog.
The Dog-Eat-Dog Welfare State Is Lose-Lose (http://www.forbes.com/sites/objectivist/2012/07/12/the-dog-eat-dog-welfare-state-is-lose-lose/)
John Maynard Keynes—not exactly history’s greatest opponent of government spending—is reported to have said he would be worried if government outlays ever surpassed 25 percent of GDP. Well, in recent years both American and British government expenditures have hovered around 40 percent of GDP. The bulk of that spending, perhaps as much as 70 percent in Britain, goes to feed the ravenous welfare state.
Clearly it’s time to question the welfare state. But such questions are too often viewed as taboo. Anyone who challenges it is viewed as seeking a return to the “dog-eat-dog” world of unfettered capitalism—a world where sellers supposedly exploited buyers, employers exploited workers, the rich exploited the poor.
...Capitalism—real capitalism, not the mixed economies that have existed for the past century—is the system based on private property, free production, and voluntary trade. It’s not a zero-sum game where people battle over a fixed pie. Each person is free to create wealth and to trade it with others, such that they all benefit.
...In place of capitalism’s philosophy of win-win, the welfare state puts everyone’s wealth up for grabs, ensuring that one person’s gain comes at his neighbor’s expense. Talk about dog-eat-dog.
The Dog-Eat-Dog Welfare State Is Lose-Lose (http://www.forbes.com/sites/objectivist/2012/07/12/the-dog-eat-dog-welfare-state-is-lose-lose/)