wkmac
Well-Known Member
Instead of treating those who, often through no fault of their own, have fallen on hard times like children who are incapable of making the right choices about the food they eat or the drugs they may or may not choose to take, why not just give them cash? Doing so would not only cut down on the huge administrative costs of America’s welfare programs, it would also promote personal responsibility and abolish much of the humiliation and stripped dignity associated with the current welfare system.
Although a basic or guaranteed income would have to be financed through taxation it has been proposed by a number of classical liberals and libertarians.
One of the most prominent proponents of the negative income tax, which guarantees a basic income, was Milton Friedman, the nobel-prize winning economist and free-market advocate. Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek express support for a “minimum income for everyone” in the third volume of Law, Legislation, and Liberty. The American radical Thomas Paine proposed a national income in this pamphlet Agrarian Justice, and libertarian author Charles Murray has also argued in favor of a guaranteed income.
Scrap the Welfare State and give People Free Money
