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Comment by ktizo | Hacker News Reader

Seeing a number of moochers feigning disability for unearned dole outs, is surely the most common disgust of our times.

If you really think that is true then you possibly need to get out a lot more, we got this whole banking crisis, massive depression and unemployment, corrupt politicians, ecological collapse, huge civil unrest across previously stable democracies and loads of wars and all sorts of crazy shit going down.

On second thoughts, scratch that, could you please stay indoors. It is probably for the best.

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Thanks but no thanks, and I could do as I please. Not that it is any of your business.

But lets see what we got on your list: - whole banking crisis, last I checked my savings bank account was secure. And although my livelihood may be intricately connected to Big Banks, I don't think all the banks in the world are going bust. Nor is the age old concepts of banking. A lot of things which is complex and serious here, but definitely nothing here which disgusts me

- massive depression and unemployment, This is an era of massive changes, but there will always be human activity. No matter what cooked up and muddled GDP numbers say. Again no disgust.

- corrupt politicians, the moochers are a result of their policies, and they enable the corrupt politicians. So this is along the same lines as the disgusting stench of moochers.

- ecological collapse, huge civil unrest across previously stable democracies and, loads of wars and, all sorts of crazy shit going down more serious issues, and a lot of call for action. But disgust? Whom are we kidding.

Looks like you have a problem reading the import of the message. Maybe you sympathize with the blood sucking moochers, or maybe you are one of them. Whatever it is, the only thing more disgusting than the dole out leechers are people who knowingly give them unearned, undeserved virtual credibility.

The disgusting stench of moochers, as you so delightfully put it, by which I am guessing you mean the unemployed, is largely the end result of the automation of production starting with the agricultural revolution, and not a creation of the welfare state, which is merely a societal bulwark against violence by people who think, probably correctly, that bored people are very dangerous when they get hungry, so you either lock em up, or make sure they get fed.

Personally I would pay everyone dole, unless they really don't want it. Call it a national dividend and make it a function of GDP per person. No chance then of a benefit trap, and an incentive to work on things that benefit the wealth of all.

Also, on paper, as far as I can tell, it would cost roughly the same as the current system anyway, seeing as, at least in the UK, the bureaucracy of organising the benefits system costs multiple times the amount actually paid out in benefits.

Plus, the UK benefits system actually underpays, on average, when you sum the figures of accidental underpayments vs accidental overpayments and outright fraud, so there are actually more people not receiving benefits they are legally entitled to than there are people involved in illegally obtaining them.

Now cheer up and learn to mooch a little. You are obviously working far too hard, on stuff you don't enjoy that is making you angry as hell, and in this day and age, you don't really need to. Sorry for suggesting you should stay indoors, go live on a beach and make kites for a summer while drunk or something like that instead. You owe it to yourself.

> by which I am guessing you mean the unemployed

no, by moochers I mean people who live off unearned income. In this context, from forced government dole outs.

> the bureaucracy of organising the benefits system costs multiple times the amount actually paid out in benefits.

you got any citations for this?

> so there are actually more people not receiving benefits they are legally entitled to

the whole of your argument and point of view, is based on legally instituted perverse "benefits". We have instituted morally corrupt systems of welfare and people nowadays take it as a matter of fact.

> Now cheer up and learn to mooch a little

Thanks, but no thanks. You obviously feel a lot better if you spread your moral corruption to every one else. I work for my own bread.

I work, sometimes when I have to and sometimes when I find something interesting to do. The thing is, so many well paid jobs seem to consist largely of ephemera, while the people I see doing useful things within society are usually paid less. So I wonder how many of the people who are employed in the ephemeral economy, could stop pretty much everything they are doing in their job and society would be no worse off and in many cases wouldn't even notice.

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