The article is intentionally being arch by using "welfare", a word that's usually used to refer to programs that give to the poor to refer to one giving money to the rich. It's making the point that "government handouts" are reviled when they go the poor, and accepted relatively uncritically when they go to the rich
The logic likely used by many in the group doing the accepting or reviling is whether the end result is a net contribution or not.
The above list will vary depending on your location.
The analogy is pointless. Discussing the actual situation is more productive.
> When the mugger paid for your healthcare, education, roads, services, safety and security, the equation is a little different.
Why did you leave out corruption?
Are you implying none of our tax dollars go to waste and corruption?
https://calmatters.org/commentary/2021/10/california-sees-wa...
https://missionlocal.org/2021/03/san-francisco-corruption/
I am okay not having million dollar toilets
https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/bayarea/heatherknight/article...
Interestingly, the article does not classify money lost to corrupt state officials as welfare. Why?
A slightly intelligent satire piece would have used corruption as welfare :)
In New Zealand this is a very small problem and we are arguably the least corrupt place on earth. I forgot it exists.
https://www.transparency.org.nz/corruption-perceptions-index
I am not sure how that is relevant.
Also, New Zealand's population is less than that of SF Bay Area and one of the lowest density states in the world (hence more per capita access to resources).
There will be similar sized patches in the US with similar levels of low corruption.
This always ends up being a metaphysical debate. It’s all relative.
Suppose I make $100,000 and after taxes $80,000 is left. After a new law is passed, I now take home $81,000 after taxes on the same income.
Does it really matter if the government gave me an untaxed $1,000 “handout” check or if they “reduced the money they take from me” by cutting my taxes by $1,000?
Politicians play this game all the time, implementing social spending as tax credits and rewarding the wealthy with tax breaks.
Yes, it matters.
First, reducing what they take is more efficient than inventing new bureaucracy to send out checks.
Second, I cannot rely on a random bonus but I can rely on the taxation tables therefore I am more likely to plan on doing something useful with reduction.
It's the exact contrary of bureaucracy. Bureaucracy is deciding for the poor what they are allowed to do with the money on the wrong assumption that they wouldn't know better than you what to do with it. In fact the less money you have, the more careful you are with it. Obviously. And at the extreme end of the spectrum, if you are rich like Elon Musk, you spend 44 billions on something dumb.
No, this depends on the specifics. If they are sending every tax filer an extra 1000 then that would be very efficient (setting aside those people who do not file federal taxes). If the tax reduction is complex, requires knowledge of complicated eligibility criteria, going in person to a local SS office or for a notary public, it's very inefficient.
As a general rule, then, this claim is bogus.
If we send every person a check it requires, at the very least, envelopes and postage.
My first claim is not about the efficiency of how the money is used by the beneficiaries. My claim is about the efficiency of getting the money gets into people's hands in the first place.
We already have an efficient system for sending out checks—the Social Security Administration
California also probably runs one of the largest most efficient welfare programs in a literal sense, and if I hadn't seen these comments that's what I would have assumed this article was about.