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The Forum > Article Comments > Be productive, then procreate > Comments

Be productive, then procreate : Comments

By Gary Johns, published 14/1/2015

Children who grow up in welfare-dependent families are much more likely to be dependent upon welfare as adults. This is the unsurprising finding of Professor Deborah Cobb-Clark in the Youth in Focus research project.

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Dear Aidan,

<<You assume that bludging is what most people want to do. In reality it's not even what most unemployed people want to do!>>

EXTREMELY few sickos want to bludge others - the vast majority, employed or otherwise, simply wants to survive, yet that doesn't imply that they want to be employed, if they can get away from it. Keep in mind that the biggest of bludgers ARE employed!

<<You assume most people's voting choices are entirely selfish. In reality that's not the case at all. I've always voted for the party that I think would run the country/state better. Haven't you?>>

Most people vote for those whom they believe would do less damage - to themselves as well as to others.

So long as it only provides the frugal basics, welfare is good - it provides safety and dignity and most importantly, helps to prevent the creation of unnecessary jobs which are either immoral or just nonsensical which do not contribute towards any real improvement in the quality of life.

People who do not perform formal work for money can still do lots of good things informally rather than going through the economic mechanism. However, making children is not one of those.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Thursday, 15 January 2015 2:54:32 PM
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Aidan,
I don't buy that. But even if acknowledge high skill sets, often overated or based on established hierarchies rather than real skills, this class is still way overpaid. I take the Trading Places stand that most of the working elite could be quickly replaced by gutter snipes.

I say the elite is way over paid also though in terms of the Australian economic pie. If the rich minority is taking %60 of the pie, that only leaves %40 for the rest, and only a tiny fraction of that for the lowest of the low--the ones Johns wants to sterilise:

http://www.petermartin.com.au/2011/08/we-think-rich-are-too-rich-but-theyre.html

We are far too accepting of the scandalously disparate wealth distribution in this country.
The effrontery of Johns and his mates is breathtaking! They get over half the pie, they've got the cheek to say they "earn" it, and they complain about the peanuts they largely evade paying to the poorest!
Our most abject citizens are there thanks to the obcene wealth and indulgence of our societies drones.
Posted by Squeers, Thursday, 15 January 2015 4:18:26 PM
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Squeers, even if you could find guttersnipes with the ability, the value of doing the job well compared with mediocre performance means that the people in the job are not overpaid if they're doing it well.

The objective should be to grow the pie, not just to slice it more evenly.

Those on the Right like to claim that they're more interested in enlarging the pie and those on the Left are only interested in slicing it more fairly. In reality the reverse is USUALLY the case (with the Right regarding non interference as the fairest course of action regardless of outcome) but you seem to be a counterexample!
Posted by Aidan, Thursday, 15 January 2015 5:05:09 PM
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Whatever you may call it, pensions paid to bureaucrats, academia, & other government employees are still welfare, unless they have paid into a scheme like real people.

The Greeks have been retiring their public sector at age 55 & that is welfare gone mad. Surely you heard the scream when austerity was imposed on them, to secure the EU loans to keep paying some of this.

You may also have noticed they have just voted in a new government who has promised to abandon the austerity program, just as it was starting to work.

That is democracy voting it's own collapse, just as I mentioned in my earlier post.

Of course not everyone are bludgers, but it only takes about 10% to overload the rest, & we are beyond that.

Yes some vote on what is best for the country. However when I suggested I had always done this, & assumed most others did the same, I was howled down by many, including Poirot, who told me I was mad, & no one did.
Posted by Hasbeen, Thursday, 15 January 2015 6:08:13 PM
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Hasbeen,

"Yes some vote on what is best for the country. However when I suggested I had always done this, & assumed most others did the same, I was howled down by many, including Poirot, who told me I was mad, & no one did."

Could you give me a link to such - to refresh my memory?

You're as partisan as anyone on this forum - more than most....IMO
Posted by Poirot, Thursday, 15 January 2015 6:28:08 PM
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Aiden:
"...the value of doing the job well compared with mediocre performance means that the people in the job are not overpaid if they're doing it well."
I don't really follow?
My position is that our mode of production realises a finite gross profit, and that the remuneration to the top end is over the top. I'm not like other lefties in that I don't call for redistribution, though I would certainly insist on universal healthcare and subsistence welfare generally. I say that the wealthy get far too much of the pie, but I don't want it shared out more evenly; I want the surplus retained.

"The objective should be to grow the pie, not just to slice it more evenly".

No, on both counts!
What's the point growing the pie when the profits go to the rich? who reinvest it not in quality of life for all, but in expanding the enterprise: not better, but more infrastructure/consumption/population growth. The welfare class Johns despises is inevitable by-product of growing the economy.
You can't grow the pie indefinitely, and you can't grow it without growing demand. Consumers get sated and jaded; you need the next generation coming on, but that's not enough either. You need growing populations, on or off shore.
Johns doesn't want to stop population growth, the economy demands the population grow perpetually, he just wants rid of the economic drag the welfare class constitutes; it does generate subsidiary economic growth in terms of service industries--healthcare/the judiciary/beaurocracy generally--but this contributes little or nothing to GDP. The class also fosters/depends on the black market, fraud, milking the system etc. to survive, and are otherwise necessarily lousy consumers due to limited means. There's just no money in the welfare class. It was ok during the economic salad days to subsidise their spending, but not anymore, though the system goes on growing its idle rump. No 'efficiency' can change that; welfare is an indicator of the systems inefficiency, to put it in language Johns would appreciate.
Posted by Squeers, Thursday, 15 January 2015 7:32:41 PM
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