Barack Obama is most pleased with this news...
WASHINGTON
— If you doubt there’s an American welfare state, you should read the
new study by demographer Nicholas Eberstadt, whose blizzard of numbers
demonstrates otherwise. A welfare state transfers income from some
people to other people to improve the recipients’ well-being. In 1935,
these transfers were less than 3 percent of the economy; now they’re
almost 20 percent. That’s $7,200 a year for every American, calculates
Eberstadt. He says that nearly 40 percent of these transfers aim to
relieve poverty (through Medicaid, food stamps, unemployment insurance
and the like), while most of the rest goes to the elderly (mainly
through Social Security and Medicare).
By all means, let’s avoid the “fiscal cliff”: the $500 billion in tax
increases and federal spending cuts scheduled for early 2013 that, if
they occurred, might trigger a recession. But let’s recognize that we
still need to bring the budget into long-term balance. This can’t be
done only by higher taxes on the rich, which seem inevitable. Nor can it
be done by deep cuts in defense and domestic “discretionary” programs
(from highways to schools), which are already happening. It requires
controlling the welfare state. In 2011, “payments for individuals,”
including health care, constituted 65 percent of federal spending, up
from 21 percent in 1955. That’s the welfare state.
No comments:
Post a Comment