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Comment by pjc50 | Hacker News Reader

The drive from this comes out of the right, who believe that work is the only valid route out of poverty. Regardless of actual capacity to work.

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Actually you can find strong feelings in favor of strictly demand-based transfer on both sides, that's the one thing they agree on. On one side it's "the money should be given to someone who needs it even more" and on the other it is "the money doesn't need to be transferred at all", but the result is the same. Effective tax rate in the vicinity of 100% (sometimes higher!) for people at the threshold and all that (like the lady who dared to save).

Believe me, this drive also comes out of the bureaucratic left too, because dependent people give them far more power then a liberated people with means of their own. Panem et circenses!

> only valid route out of poverty

well, what other routes are there?

If you can't think of any, do you think that means that those who can't work (disability, illness, dependents) deserve to be poor forever?

i'm not saying the deserve to be poor, but they cannot be rich - and at best, society can keep them alive and provide the minimal, necessary sustenance for survival. While they wait for technological improvements to cure them of their illness (if such tech comes to pass).

What would be a viable alternative? If this had happened in the jungle pre-historic times, they'd just be dead. So is it not an improvement?

Some of the richest people in the world do no work at all. Their parents give them an immense fortune, which is moved around by employees in such a way that earns in a day what most people get in a year. They consume to their heart's content, without ever having to actually work. Breed, die, repeat.

Indeed.

The person above clearly doesn’t value the lives of the those who are unable to work like those who can. Thus, why they think giving them the littlest as they can is fine. After all, we as a society are only mildly capable of being better than a pack of wild animals. It says a lot about how this person views others, themselves, and humanity in general. Overall, they believe humanity has no hope or worthiness of existence.

> at best, society can keep them alive and provide the minimal, necessary sustenance for survival

There is no constraint on a society enforcing this level of support as an upper bound. A society can dedicate as much or as little of its resources as it chooses to supporting those unable to support themselves, each possible amount having a different set of consequences.

> If this had happened in the jungle pre-historic times, they'd just be dead.

You're arguing for "The Protestant work ethic", which certainly isn't pre-historic. It's associated with the advancement of capitalism.

For the fuckers currently running the UK, primarily a combination of inheritance and corruption.

It's worse than that. The drive comes from people who employ labor who believe that poverty is the only way to keep wages low.

This attitude is very topical right now, playing out in US politics: https://theweek.com/articles/982343/republican-theory-unempl...

(Ignore the Republican part; most Democratic politicians would go in the same direction, but Republican belligerence gives them the cover to be silent, and to not alienate a portion of their base which would endanger their tiny majority.)

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