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The Solution to Welfare Crisis
The problem
There have always been storms of argument regarding welfare. I think everyone would agree that there is a problem with the welfare system – an enduring problem from the inception of the current welfare paradigm. To turn to some of the nagging problems:
A. It is sometimes more profitable to stay at home and receive welfare payments than go out to work and receive less payment.
B. Some welfare programs encourage divorce.
C. There is a relationship between teenage pregnancy and welfare. At least in the UK a teenage mother gets rewarded for getting pregnant outside matrimony. This includes free home and constant pay from the government. Yes, you heard that right! This is an incentive for fatherlessness.
(If you need sources for any of the above claims - please inform me)
There is a problem here. . . . .
My solution
I stand on the principle of ‘welfare for everyone or welfare for no one’. In my opinion, this is the only way to solve the problem of incentives. A standard libertarian would prefer welfare for no one. I think that is not practical so I would go for welfare for everyone.
We could have a system of 10000 pounds negative tax income tax payable to everyone within a system . . and also a flat tax income tax of 25 per cent (the currency and figures are for analysis).
If you decide not to work you’d receive your 10000 pounds and do whatever you like with it. A salary of 20000 pounds will be taxed at 25 per cent – and so is a salary of 1000 pounds but everyone will receive the negative income of 10000 pounds.
Millionaires on 10 million income will have to contribute 25% to the system and get a negative income tax of 1000 pounds. The same rule for everyone . . . . This way the system will do away with the problem of incentive because it will be senseless for anyone to choose joblessness. More, we can then do away with all the welfare programs and bureaucracies.
If you have a different view please share.
Anne Thull
It should be a helping hand-up, not a free ride.
If it becomes a free ride you are diminishing the positive spirit the person may still have to improve their situation.
People who need additional help should move to another tier of Welfare, with proof of long term disability papers etc.
Here's an Idea: Using local State Universities to help reduce Welfare Costs
- The top state universities receive X dollars from the government each year, to meet their local Welfare Recipients and distribute the welfare Checks. The $ received by the government are based on how many Welfare recipients are in the community for the University to handle.
-The Universities offer certain classes to Welfare recipients who want to learn a new trade, get a new job and improve their situation. Many of these may be home-based businesses in the long run. Some of this training may need to be at the welfare recipients home, by a teacher in training at the university -for school credits.
- The Government gives the University a bonus $ for every Welfare person the University trains and becomes employed each year.
- The Universities use the bonus $ to pay for materials needed for training the Welfare recipients.
- Eventually the Universities create their own Community Adult School retraining
The University is creating more jobs by training the people - The university can use teachers in training to receive their credits.
The Welfare Recipients improve their lives.
The Universities are controlling Welfare Fraud at their end
The Community wins as it reduces non-productive and poorer economic areas.
The Universities turn Welfare Recipients into tax payers.
the people win - reduce government employee costs, government waste,
Random Chance 30+
Educate everyone. Put everyone to work.
As if there isn't enough that needs to be done to go around and share
Where everyone works a little bit, which contributes a lot, and gets things done that benefit humans collectively.
Rather than a competitive marketplace, people do for themselves (we do for us), and one another because we are all connected and every single thing done, meaning every job, is just as important as any other job.
With gaps in the entire chain of endeavors that are involved in accomplishing certain goals through labor, there is inefficiency, failure, the creation of new problems and usually mounting problems. Each job involved is necessary, therefore the people are necessary and valuable and in equal share to one another.
Yes, dismiss it with a single word.
elizabeth muncey 10+
Ehis Odijie 10+
To answer this question i turn to your point on future cost, I agree that there is a social cost if the problem isn't tackled.. but what have you done? You have created a system where teenagers find it profitable to get pregnant and receive benefit in form of housing and weekly payments. (I am not blaming the teenagers - i am accusing the system and people who choose to appeal to emotion instead of looking at the facts.) So, in order to solve the problem of future cost you are creating a bigger problem of diverting the attention of teenagers from school and other productive activities into compensation they could possibly receive by having a child - it is almost like an achievement . .
There is a basic economic principle that has never been contradicted to the best of my knowledge. . that is, 'if you are ready to pay more for anything - product or behavior - the supply will increase' - if the government is ready to pay couples to stay married you'd have less divorce - this is common sense. So - paying teenage mother only create more - i am not saying they should be left to suffer. All i am saying is that we should look into the system.
To top that – it is all happening in a backdrop of an immoral society where sex and what have you are seen as just fine for teenagers. . .
To then say i am demonising the poor (even though i am not rich myself) or the single mother for pointing this out is completely wrong and emotional.
Jon Ho
I know where you're coming from now!
You're looking at welfare from an economic standpoint while I looked at it from a sociological standpoint. Well, the thing is, you should use the right tools for the right job. You do not for example use a hammer to hammer in screws right? You use a screwdriver.
So, in this scenario, you shouldn't really use economics to solve a sociological problem. You should use a sociological solution, ie free education provided by for non-profit organization to tackle this issue.
Jon Ho
Second, did you even check out the sites I gave you?
Did you even actually check out the TED talks given by Salman Khan? Did you go to his Khan Acedemy site? I know you did not because you keep on harping about attending school and free ride and taxpayers money. If you had actually checked out Khan Academy you will actually know what I'm talking about!
Oh, and here is an excerpt from their About
"A free world-class education for anyone anywhere. The Khan Academy is an organization on a mission. We're a not-for-profit with the goal of changing education for the better by providing a free world-class education for anyone anywhere."
First you accuse me of being new, perhaps trying to leverage your seniority or something to cow me into submission. Then you ask for civility, claiming that there is nothing in my presentation to suggest that making education free will solve the problem I identified. Well, let me tell you this now, I do not suffer fools. If you insist on acting like such, well, don't say I didn't warn you.
And finally, what in Zeus name did you say I said? I never said that a government official should have the right to tell citizens what to buy with their money. What they do with their money is their rights! Please don't put words in my mouth. And then you come up with 'The logic of this statement is that the state should have the power and right to determine the basic need of individuals (this is not even possible in a technical sense)? Sigh. How the hell can you twist something from 'I should get a say' to 'the state should have the power and right'? The state does not equal me! I am not the state!
Ehis Odijie 10+
Jon Ho
Although this may not be the best solution, it is so far the best, as shown by this
http://edudemic.com/2012/08/state-of-mobile-learning-education/
Heck, even TED have started offering free online courses! :D
Josh S
Your idea makes great sense, and too me atleast, sounds like a good idea. It would seem everyone walks away happy, and if this could be implemented for a sustainable amount of time, it would be.
But thats the problem, a SUSTAINABLE amount of time. I dont think the economics of it work, money doesnt come from nowhere, it has a source and has a limit. Lets do the math real quick just for an example, obviously your numbers were just for the sake of an argument, but lets keep it going. Lets say we implemented this system in the US, giving 10,000 dollars to every person per year. By the way, this is NOT enough to live on in most areas. The cost would be 3 trillion dollars. Just on giving the flat amount to everyone. This doesnt include costs of general upkeep in the country, government salary, a military, it doesnt cover anything else. Taxes of 25% wont cover the expenses of the country. something like the top 10% of the US pays 90% of the taxes. They usually pay well over 25% in taxes and because they have to pay less, there will be even less money coming in from taxes.
How can a country possibly stay economically in the black with this plan? i think thats the biggest problem with welfare. Its not that 'rich old white men' are greedy and dont want to help the poor with welfare, its that these 'rich old white men' realize a country cant survive if everyone is getting free money.
I do like your principle though, welfare for everyone or for no one, but this economically means their cant be welfare for anybody.
Ehis Odijie 10+
To turn to your point that "something like the top 10% of the US pays 90% of the taxes", i have to disagree . .your statement is not even possible in a technical sense. By taxes do you mean direct contribution or any contribution . . Corporation taxes, sales taxes and most form of indirect taxes (inflation included) are mostly paid by the masses. I think you meant income taxes which is no different, in money terms, from corporation taxes or VAT.
Jon Ho
First, make education free. From kindergarten all the way to masters level. This way, there is no excuse for the welfare recipient to not reinvent themselves, learn a new skill set, get a job with good salary.
Second, replace welfare payments to goods rationing. Once a week, recipients receive the basic commodity needed to live. No, not live comfortably, but alive nonetheless. This means no tobacco, no beer, no alcohol, nothing that will cause them to enjoy living the way they are, mooching off the rest of the population.
Once these malingerers have decided that they had enough of second class living, they will go back to school because it is free, learn some new skills, and apply it to get a well paid job.
If you say what if the welfare recipient is struck with a malady that renders them somewhat akin to Stephen Hawking, I will say even HE has a well paying job, debilitated as he was! All you need to do is pick up a new skill, perhaps learn a new language, and then get a job like Will-writing or Foreign Document translator or whatever, you're only limited by your creativity.
You may say this whole project will be very expensive, I say to you Bollocks, sir! The only reason public education is expensive right now is because educational center is a veritable day care center overgrown with bureaucracies seeking to enrich themselves instead of doing the one thing that they should be doing all along: transmitting knowledge!
I swear to you, nay, I'm willing to bet my life on it, that if
Ehis Odijie 10+
Your second view imposes a dictatorship on the people. You are saying that someone, usually a government official, should have the right to tell citizens what to buy with their money - be it welfare or otherwise.
You cannot be serious.
Jon Ho
>
I say to you Bollocks, sir! The only reason public education is expensive right now is because educational center is a veritable day care center, overgrown with bureaucracies seeking to enrich themselves instead of doing the one thing that they should be doing all along: transmitting knowledge!
The reason that you are here on TED, a FREE site to learn and understand things, and yet you dare to come up with lame excuses like expensive education? Shame on you sir!
Let me show you, nay, enlighten you, with this http://www.ted.com/conversations/1189/is_salman_khan_s_idea_of_incor.html
and this
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/salman_khan_let_s_use_video_to_reinvent_education.html
You said that numerous research demonstrated that free school is a zero sum game; some groups loses while another groups gains. I say, bollocks! Show us these research sir, so that we can disseminate the flaws in their reasoning together.
As to my second point, do you even understand what I wrote? Let it make it simpler, replace money with goods. Simple enough? First of all, the reason they are handing out money instead of goods is because the bureaucrats are lazy and are prone to abuse/misuse. Second, the money that are used to buy those goods comes not out of the recipient pocket; it comes out of other hardworking tax payers pocket, people LIKE ME.
Dictatorship you say? HELL NO. What I'm saying is that since I AM paying for these lazy bums, I SHOULD GET A SAY in what they are getting. I SHOULD BE the one getting the biggest bang for my bucks! Which is basically the physiological portion in Maslow's hierachy of needs. Oh, they're welcomed to buy kegs of beer, BUT NOT WITH MY TAX MONEY.
Ehis Odijie 10+
I think you can afford a little more civility! You must be new - there is no abuse here .
First you said “ make education free. From kindergarten all the way to master’s level”.
I am helping you understand that there is no such thing as free education in the way you employ the term. What you termed "free education" is a code term for 'education paid for by the tax payers'. The question we should be asking is whether the taxpayers are getting their money's worth. . If we make "education free" those paying for the so-called free education -will they get their money's worth? This is the only question.
You answered the question in the negative when you said "The only reason public education is expensive right now is because educational center is a veritable day care center, overgrown with bureaucracies seeking to enrich themselves instead of doing the one thing that they should be doing all along: transmitting knowledge!"
There is nothing in your presentation to suggest that making education free to masters level will solve the problem you identified.
The very definition of public or government is something that is owned by nobody and controlled by people with no personal interest. There is no way to structure government schools without the involvement of bureaucracies - we can only hope for 'good bureaucracies'. It is a case of spending somebody else’s money on somebody else.
You wrote: "What I'm saying is that since I AM paying for these lazy bums, I SHOULD GET A SAY in what they are getting". The logic of this statement is that the state should have the power and right to determine the basic need of individuals (this is not even possible in a technical sense). . But where do you draw the line?
Debra Smith 200+
http://youtu.be/pIqHcq2L2qE
george lockwood 20+
george lockwood 20+
Ehis Odijie 10+
shawn disney 10+
Mitch Skiles
Noah Crossfield
Mitch Skiles