Fiscal conservatives argue against social programs provided by the government for many reasons, but in part because they claim to believe in self-sufficiency and that people should “pay [their] own bills”.
However, won’t there always be people who are legitimately trying to make ends meet but are still in poverty?
I’m not sure who you are talking about when you use the term “fiscal conservative”, but other than Libertarians (of the large “L” type], are there any politicians who argue for the complete elimination of all social programs?
I’m not sure what you mean by “poverty”. Any definition I know has at least some element of subjectivity/relativity in it: if you live in a subsistence economy, but everyone is in more or less the same position relative to each other, and from year to year, and there’s enough for everyone to feel satisfied because that’s all they know, who’s “poor”? But if you live in a system predicated on constantly churning production and consumption of new, different products to meet wants or needs that people might not otherwise have known they had - you can be “poor” with a lifestyle people in the subsistence economy might regardless as incredible riches.
So, no, in a free-market capitalist system, “the poor are always with you” - because if people don’t have an idea of poverty, they have no incentive to keep on getting and spending. The difficult question is, how much “poverty”, how is it distinct from “destitution”, and what reconciles our idea of incentives to get and spend with our ideas of what is a just distribution of income, wealth, life chances and capacities to use those chances? Or do we just accept that life is a “war of all against all”?
The definition of “poverty” is of course arbitrary.
And also, the distinction between possible and practical is important here. Since you asked about possible, and indeed used the word “theoretically”, then the answer is of course, yes; wherever you draw the poverty line there is no Law of Money that says at least one person must be below it.
In practical terms, with a typical definition of poverty, the world as it currently is, and no guaranteed income (as you’re implicitly ruling that out), it will pretty much always be the case.
I was with you up to this point. As alluded to above, I think there is no *theoretical * reason why there must always be poverty.
Humans may always see wealth in relative terms, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll always be (or indeed, must be) a lower bracket that we look down on or feel sorry for. The lowest bracket could eventually be the default one that most people are in.
Anyone who’s been in a wealthy community has seen this; where some of the group may stand out as more wealthy, and people may aspire to that, but no-one considers themselves or any of their peers to be poor.
There will always be people dependent - for whatever reason - upon the charity of others. There will always be people who make poor choices. And shit happens.
Indeed, perhaps the threat of poverty needs to be there to make everything work.
life isn’t fair. Not everyone can be winners.
It definitely depends on your definition of ‘poverty’.
If you define it as the lowest XX% income for people, then by definition there is always something there.
Of course even in a socialist system with a universal basic income, you’ll still have folks who join the convent, take on a vow of poverty and give away any free thing that charity or the government offers them.
I think that’s the wrong way of thinking about it: for me, the object of the exercise is to minimise the number of losers.
0%, rather than 1% or 1.5%, kind of implies you think it could be in the realm of possibility that zero poverty exist.
Maybe I’m missing something.
Can a capitalist society be like unto that wealthy community where no one considers himself poor? So a guy with a nice house and a fine car and plenty of good food and so on would, on occasion, ask himself, self, what is poverty? And after a moment’s reflection, he’d say oh, yeah; those homeless guys I saw in that other country last week, who barely had enough to eat: that’s poverty. You know, I think one of them had the bubonic plague! Ha! I have scotch that’s older than he’ll ever get to be!
Is it hypothetically possible for that “free-market capitalism system” to thus have no poverty, so long as everyone in it can see and compare themselves to folks in other systems who are mired in for-real no-foolin’ poverty?
Yes perhaps I didn’t make my point clear enough.
I’m not talking about no poverty within a system because people could compare themselves to another system. I am talking about essentially no poverty, period. I’m speaking hypothetically, but that’s what the OP asked.
The best I can put it is like this: think of a MMORPG.
Most of them you start out with few resources and accumulate more over the course of the game.
But there is usually no concept, among human players anyway, of “poverty” partly because your situation is the same as many of your peers, but also I guess because many aspects of the concept of “poverty” are not relative:
If, in a MMORPG, when you start out, your mission is just to put food on your table, and you have to do a menial job to accomplish that, and it’s very difficult to accumulate enough money to get out of that situation then you have poverty.
But that’s an aspect of the real world that they generally don’t try to simulate.
I think it would help if the OP fleshed out his thesis more. The thread title is related to the OP, but it’s unclear what he’s really asking. Are you asking about the free market system or about whether or not so-called fiscal conservatives care about the poor? Do you really want to know what is “theoretically” possible, or what is practically possible?
When you say ‘theoretically’ in a case like this as you do in the title, it’s not very meaningful to then tie it back to reality with ‘fiscal conservatives argue’.
In the real case we have a mixed regulated capitalist/socialist economy. The debate isn’t really about having ‘social programs’ or not, but whether to keep increasing them (in size, scope and taxation/regulation effect on the remaining free market part of the economy), keep them the same or reduce them somewhat. In actual $ numbers ‘fiscal conservatives’ in the US are generally arguing to reduce the rate of increase, and/or point out the the promises made up to now (for US entitlement programs for example) are eventually unkeepable without major changes. The realistic discussion is not about having no transfer payment type programs.
But theoretically, sure, in a small homogeneous society it’s easier to sell redistributive transfer payments, because they are ‘for people like us’. It’s one reason it’s so unrealistic to advocate for more social spending in the US based on the experience of small Nordic countries, apples and oranges. But OTOH it’s more theoretically possible a small uniform society would have less natural variation in the economic success of individuals without any govt transfer payments. It’s the reason it’s pretty meaningless to ask why the US can’t have the pre-tax Gini coefficient of small Nordic countries.
However that would still only apply at most to able minded and able bodied people. Without either government or family support, some people in any society are literally incapable of earning money. And if those without families or family support are supported by private charity, to a certain mindset that’s never satisfactory (the ‘physic wounds’ of depending on private charity, which that mindset doesn’t recognize as existing if it’s government charity).
The problem with this is that it is human nature to compare oneself against peers. So to a starving North Korean someone who lives in a project, has no job, and is overweight has a standard of living that makes them seem rich. Yet most people would say that the person they are comparing themselves to is poor.
Likewise, if a country was rich enough those who only drove mercedes would consider themselves poor if everyone else drove Lamborghinis.
What about the disabled or retarded? Or those who have serious gambling addictions and throw all their money away? What about the elderly who can’t work?
Granted, the elderly (in a more wealthy society) will be able to save enough for the last 20-30 years of life. But what about people who are born without the physical or cognitive skills necessary to make ends meet? They will still be there.
I’m curious: do you, personally, actually believe that?
Like, can you picture yourself as a well-fed and silk-clad lover of the life of leisure, driving your Mercedes back to your mansion and necessarily lamenting your “poverty” because you of course know that other people have Lamborghinis?
Would you – yes, you – be thinking that while people in other countries starve?
Note that the government does massive number of things to make many aspects of life very expensive. For example you have an infection. Can you go buy a dozen pills of penicillin for a couple dollars to cure it? No. First you have to see a doctor for $100… Or can you build a small shack out of scrap materials to live in?
Me, yes me would not be thinking that but I am not the type to be envious of others based on materials goods. However, I recognize that I am not normal in that way.
According to the standards of the past we are already living in a 0% poverty country. Yet because standards have changed no one thinks poverty has been eliminated. I see no reason to think standards will not continue to change.
There are different kinds of poverty-- there is absolute poverty, as in the inability to meet the basic needs of life. This can be eliminated.
There is relative poverty. This will never be eliminated.
But what is relevant to us right now is the type of poverty that enables or inhibits a person from living up to their fullest potential. Income and consumer goods are just a small part of this. Education, meaningful work, protection from violence, health, having a strong community and culture-- these are all a part of it.
This, of course.
Another factor is for people who want money or power - for only the best reasons, naturally - to change the definitions out from under everyone.
“1 in 5 Children in the US Are At Risk for Hunger”! Everybody panic! Everyone should be ashamed! Just don’t ask what that means.
Cite.
Regards,
Shodan