State Welfare is Evil, And UBI is Not The Answer
State welfare is an all-out assault on the institution of the family, both figuratively and literally. It’s an assault that consists of both direct and indirect violence against the American people. The violence of stealing hard-earned money from families to redistribute that money to deadbeats and welfare queens. Welfare spending raises the rate of single parenthood. When LBJ's welfare programs were first implemented, this was a concern, and a 1993 study confirmed that the welfare state was in fact to blame for the growth in single parenthood. According to the report, single parenthood rates rise by 43% for every 50% increase in social spending.1
The goal of the welfare state is to create a total dependence on the evil corporation that is the United States government. A dependence that does its job in making families, communities, and churches seem obsolete. The welfare state seeks to take the place of those structures and continue to grow until it consumes every part of every person's life. And this doesn’t exactly come with any net benefits. Increases in public income transfers will only be compensated by decreases in private incomes. A $1,000 increase in welfare benefits is countered by a $660 decrease in private income.2 As a result, low-income families see little improvement in their level of life and become more dependent on government assistance.
Before we had the tyrannical and evil welfare state, Americans largely depended on family, community, and churches. Not to mention general private welfare and fraternal benefit societies. Organizations regulated social behavior far more effectively than the state ever could or will. They did not compel social virtue by threatening death. They kept virtue a necessary part of society. Mutual trust, cooperation, self-help, civility, business skills, frugality, leadership, self-government, self-control, and "excellent moral character" were shared principles among these organizations.3 This is in sharp contrast to modern welfare.
Our modern welfare system rewards laziness and promotes a higher time preference and instant gratification, as well as envy, malice, entitlement, violence, and theft. It punishes success by taking the hard worker's income and giving it to deadbeats and degenerates. Some social conservatives propose that Universal Basic Income (UBI) is a viable alternative to modern welfare, but they are badly mistaken. A UBI in particular unfairly punishes citizens with a prime focus on the most outstanding and prosperous members of society, while also claiming to value all people equally. It is the most productive members of society who are going to foot the bill for everyone else. What costs are associated with a scheme like this? Each of the 210 million adult Americans would earn $1,000 per month. $210 billion a month and $2.5 trillion annually, or nearly 40% of total government spending, would be the total cost. This amount exceeds what is spent overall on education, military, and healthcare.
UBI conveniently opens the door for mass social engineering. Conform to the state or have your “universal” income relinquished. Creating dependence on the state always opens the door for this type of evil, and UBI would be the most effective tool for this. The only viable alternative to state welfare is to return to the private welfare of days past.
M. Anne Hill and June O'Neill, Underclass Behaviors in the United States: Measurement and Analysis of Determinants (1993)
Final Report on the Seattle–Denver Income Maintenance Experiment, Volume 1, Design, and Results (1983) pp. 127–128.
Beito, David, From Mutual Aid to the Welfare State: Fraternal Societies and Social Services, 1890-1967 (2000)