A young lady wrote to me this week asking what I think should be done
with regard to “the problems of the poor.”
“After all,” she wrote, “you criticize various plans for government
intervention to help poor people. Instead of telling people what you don’t
like, why not tell us what you would do, or how you think government should
act.”
This question, of course, assumes that there is something government can
and/or should do to address the inability or unwillingness of individuals to
support themselves and their families. I believe most everything government
does in this regard is counterproductive and immoral.
But if I were made king for the day, my first action would be to
eliminate the income tax, which is the single biggest barrier to wealth
creation faced by Americans today. I would also repeal all laws that
regulate commerce between individuals — including, but not limited to, the
minimum-wage requirement.
Free people have the right to work for whatever wage is acceptable to
them. Free people have the right to make agreements between themselves
without the government getting involved, establishing ground rules and
cutting themselves in for a piece of the action. Free people have the right
to collect their wages without government confiscating a percentage of their
wealth in advance.
How would such reforms help the poor? Instead of subsidizing poverty and
slothfulness, as the U.S. government does with its many and varied
wealth-redistribution schemes, this action would remove the heavy baggage of
government from the backs of millions of the most productive people. Thus,
the action would create incentives to be self-supportive as opposed to
creating incentives not to work.
Is that enough? Not by a long shot. No economic system can solve the
problems that are problems of the heart, problems of the soul. No economic
system can hold families together. No economic system can miraculously
inspire people to become more loving and charitable. But we must begin by
removing the disincentives, and there are many in our increasingly socialist
system that turn individual problems into societal problems.
President Clinton is right now quietly promoting yet another scheme of
this kind. He proposes that government begin paying unemployment benefits to
new parents who stay home with their kids. He has, without the approval of
Congress, created a pilot program to try this in four states at a cost of
$68 million. In other words, it’s a way of taxing employers again for a new
program without going through all the constitutional hassles of creating
another tax.
Once again, government would be forcibly confiscating money from the
productive sector of society and transferring that money to a less
productive sector.
People who promote such schemes do so not because they are compassionate
for the poor or, as President Clinton suggests, because “families are our
most important natural resource.” They do so because it empowers government
rather than free individuals. It’s a trap. Go further down that road, and
there just may not be any return for a free America.
In 1993 Clinton pushed through the Family and Medical Leave Act, which
forces employers to give workers unpaid time off to take care of their kids.
Very few people took advantage of this government largesse with other people’s
money. So Clinton wants more dramatic action.
“… The current law meets just a fraction of the need, and the number one
reason families give for not taking advantage of family and medical leave is
that they simply can’t afford to take time off without a paycheck,” he
explains.
That sounds good. That sounds compassionate. But it’s nonsense. Yes, it
is in our best interests as a society if one parent stays home to rear
children. That has always been the case. Remember, though, it was Clinton’s
political philosophy that persuaded Americans years ago that kids would turn
out just as well if they were raised in day-care centers — particularly
government day-care centers. Now we know what a lie that was. Yet, we’re
supposed to believe these geniuses have seen the light and have a new
magical solution for us that just happens, once again, to empower government
over the individual again.
This is precisely the kind of backwards and illogical policy that has
increased dependency in the last 30 years.
Government, through heavy taxation, has created the need for both parents
to enter the workforce. Now, government, which created the problem in the
first place, comes up with a plan to solve the problem, which, in reality
will only worsen it.
Shouldn’t we stop looking to government to put Band-Aids on injuries it
has inflicted?
Wouldn’t it be better if one parent had the option of staying home to
take care of kids because a single income was enough to support a family?
That’s the way it used to be in America. That’s the way it ought to be. That’s
the way it can be again if we get government off our backs and out of our
pockets.
And, yes, Virginia, that’s the beginning of my answer as to how we can
really help the poor in America.
