But It's "Free" .....
One of my favorite acronyms from the land of free market economics is TINSTAAFL: "There is no such thing as a free lunch". The underlying principle is pretty simple to grasp. Regardless of whether you or someone else actually paid for it, all things – time, goods, services, etc. have value, and some poor bastard gets stuck with the bill. I've been reflecting upon this mightily over the past few weeks, as I've been visiting one of Europe's premiere free lunch welfare states: Germany.
It's almost ironic that a large section of the American electorate in one form or another looks at European social democracy as something we really need to import into the US. Even our esteemed Community Organizer in Chief is often heard advocating the same kind of wealth-spreading, equalizing government intervention in life that is the norm in Europe. Personally, I'd suggest that this is one case where being careful what you wish for is good advice, because cradle to grave security comes at a high price, and it's not just a price measured in dollars and cents. There is a profound moral and ethical cost to the proverbial free lunch.
One thing you immediately notice when you follow European politics is that there's this vicious circle that is slowly spinning out of control. On the one hand, there are always an almost limitless number of people with outstretched hands insisting that they have a right to money from the government. On the other hand, the governments themselves are slowly coming to realize that the money they're paying out is outstripping the money coming in at an alarming rate. In fact, as Europeans watch Greece, Spain, Portugal, and Ireland spending themselves into oblivion, it's almost accelerated the rate at which everyone's trying to get something out of the system before the whole damned thing crashes and burns.
On top of this, economic initiative is a generally unknown thing. In Germany, I can think of no form of economic activity that isn't licensed, regulated and thoroughly bureaucratized (even hookers have their own trade guild and pay into the social welfare system). Moreover, "regulated" means really, really regulated … down to the last minute detail … and then some. So if you've got some seed money and the desire to start a business, your best bet is to get a whole lot more seed money, at least one good lawyer, a doctor for sedatives, a therapist for the inevitable stress-related issues, and then start the treacherous climb up Mount Paperwork. That's the funny thing about a society where things are "free": if you're generating any money at all, you're a social resource to be mined and exploited as much as possible … at least unless you're rich and connected enough to get subsidized by the state one way or the other.
To be fair though, I did notice one form of initiative in Germany that was plentiful: trying to figure out how to play the system. I'd describe it as being something between a hobby and a passion depending upon the individual in question. It's so pervasive, that even people who are otherwise decent, motivated, inherently industrious types can be sucked into the endless cycle of trying to get someone else's resources reassigned to them. Moreover, the very process absolutely strips away any remaining human dignity you may have, because while the welfare state is often marketed by politicians and socialist weenies as the warm hands of the state catching you when you fall and helping you back up again, in practice you're simply reduced to the status of a case number and treated with all of the respect and tenderness of a cow in a stockyard.
This happens because bureaucrats suddenly wind up with almost dictatorial control over your life. Your every activity – economic or otherwise – must be duly reported and calculated. I've seen the forms … they don't forget anything. Some wormy little unionized government employee takes a book the size of War & Peace off the shelf, and that book determines everything. It's all "free" if you're "entitled" to it, but that doesn't mean they actually want you to get it. You have to convince them.
For instance, an old friend of mine is currently unemployed. Not his fault actually – he's worked for years and still wants to work -- but that last dip in the economy did him in. So now his life is governed by a wonderful German law known as Hartz-IV. As a long-term unemployed person, his apartment is paid for by the state, and he receives a monthly payment as well to live on. His better half is officially physically disabled (there's a license for this … and she has it naturally), which means that she too is "entitled" to certain things for "free". But, in order to save money and motivate the long-term unemployed to seek employment, the amount of "free" they get is being reduced.
Now, in practice, this makes sense: get people off the dole and back to work. However, when you've already hamstrung your economy by choking off the job-creating forces of the free market with an endless series of laws, regulations and taxes, this is easier said than done … especially when one is older. But there would still be an incentive to hit the pavement and look for work … unless, of course, you take the time to actually read the laws and figure out that you're entitled to more "free" than the bureaucrats think you are. Then, you can literally have a new full-time job doing nothing more than fighting bureaucrats, filling out forms, and making trips to various magistrates and pleading your case. And since the longer you're unemployed the more they come after your assets, the more incentive you have to take on the state in the quest to keep what you have and/or get more "free" rather than going out and trying to find work.
And so goes the vicious circle. The price you pay for the "free" you get is that you essentially become a ward of the state. Your privacy is gone, your freedom to make many choices for yourself is gone, and you have to justify your every need to someone whose job it is to say "no" as often as legally possible. Everyone who works (including the bureaucrats) view you as a parasitic deadbeat, and while they're not wrong, they're certainly doing their best in any number of ways to put as many roadblocks as possible in your way as you try to once again become financially independent.
All of which brings us back to TINSTAAFL. A Finnish friend of mine once told me that the difference between private charity and the welfare state is that the welfare state preserves your dignity because you don't have to say "thank you" and you don't have to feel like you owe anyone anything. But, in fact, regardless of whether it's private charity or public seizure of earned wealth followed by government redistribution, the end result is the same: nothing's free, and if you're the one footing the bill you're going to inevitably begin to resent those who are consuming the unearned. Moreover, all of that "brotherhood" that social democracy is supposed to unleash is nowhere to be found. Even the folks on the dole are happy to explain to you why they're entitled to what they get (and then some), but why [insert favorite scapegoat] most certainly is getting way too much.
Personally, I find it kinda creepy. For all the moral high ground the welfare statists and other assorted socialist weasels like to claim for themselves, the welfare state really brings out the ugly side of human nature. From the politicians to the workers, from the bureaucrats to the people receiving some kind of handout, everyone's fighting like the third monkey on Noah's gangplank for a piece of the pie. No one ever seems to happen upon the notion of baking another pie, however.
As allegedly brutal as a true free market may be, at least a poor person can become wealthier and there's a lot of economic upward mobility if you're willing to get off your ass and work. Europe is like a stagnant caste system. Unless you become a pop star or top athlete, chances are where you start is pretty much where you're gonna end up. It's a dehumanizing, incentive-killing, jealousy-promoting mentality where carefully watching what everyone else has and resenting anyone who has more than you is the norm. It's also the logical end result of the assumption that a free lunch is really "free".
It's almost ironic that a large section of the American electorate in one form or another looks at European social democracy as something we really need to import into the US. Even our esteemed Community Organizer in Chief is often heard advocating the same kind of wealth-spreading, equalizing government intervention in life that is the norm in Europe. Personally, I'd suggest that this is one case where being careful what you wish for is good advice, because cradle to grave security comes at a high price, and it's not just a price measured in dollars and cents. There is a profound moral and ethical cost to the proverbial free lunch.
One thing you immediately notice when you follow European politics is that there's this vicious circle that is slowly spinning out of control. On the one hand, there are always an almost limitless number of people with outstretched hands insisting that they have a right to money from the government. On the other hand, the governments themselves are slowly coming to realize that the money they're paying out is outstripping the money coming in at an alarming rate. In fact, as Europeans watch Greece, Spain, Portugal, and Ireland spending themselves into oblivion, it's almost accelerated the rate at which everyone's trying to get something out of the system before the whole damned thing crashes and burns.
On top of this, economic initiative is a generally unknown thing. In Germany, I can think of no form of economic activity that isn't licensed, regulated and thoroughly bureaucratized (even hookers have their own trade guild and pay into the social welfare system). Moreover, "regulated" means really, really regulated … down to the last minute detail … and then some. So if you've got some seed money and the desire to start a business, your best bet is to get a whole lot more seed money, at least one good lawyer, a doctor for sedatives, a therapist for the inevitable stress-related issues, and then start the treacherous climb up Mount Paperwork. That's the funny thing about a society where things are "free": if you're generating any money at all, you're a social resource to be mined and exploited as much as possible … at least unless you're rich and connected enough to get subsidized by the state one way or the other.
To be fair though, I did notice one form of initiative in Germany that was plentiful: trying to figure out how to play the system. I'd describe it as being something between a hobby and a passion depending upon the individual in question. It's so pervasive, that even people who are otherwise decent, motivated, inherently industrious types can be sucked into the endless cycle of trying to get someone else's resources reassigned to them. Moreover, the very process absolutely strips away any remaining human dignity you may have, because while the welfare state is often marketed by politicians and socialist weenies as the warm hands of the state catching you when you fall and helping you back up again, in practice you're simply reduced to the status of a case number and treated with all of the respect and tenderness of a cow in a stockyard.
This happens because bureaucrats suddenly wind up with almost dictatorial control over your life. Your every activity – economic or otherwise – must be duly reported and calculated. I've seen the forms … they don't forget anything. Some wormy little unionized government employee takes a book the size of War & Peace off the shelf, and that book determines everything. It's all "free" if you're "entitled" to it, but that doesn't mean they actually want you to get it. You have to convince them.
For instance, an old friend of mine is currently unemployed. Not his fault actually – he's worked for years and still wants to work -- but that last dip in the economy did him in. So now his life is governed by a wonderful German law known as Hartz-IV. As a long-term unemployed person, his apartment is paid for by the state, and he receives a monthly payment as well to live on. His better half is officially physically disabled (there's a license for this … and she has it naturally), which means that she too is "entitled" to certain things for "free". But, in order to save money and motivate the long-term unemployed to seek employment, the amount of "free" they get is being reduced.
Now, in practice, this makes sense: get people off the dole and back to work. However, when you've already hamstrung your economy by choking off the job-creating forces of the free market with an endless series of laws, regulations and taxes, this is easier said than done … especially when one is older. But there would still be an incentive to hit the pavement and look for work … unless, of course, you take the time to actually read the laws and figure out that you're entitled to more "free" than the bureaucrats think you are. Then, you can literally have a new full-time job doing nothing more than fighting bureaucrats, filling out forms, and making trips to various magistrates and pleading your case. And since the longer you're unemployed the more they come after your assets, the more incentive you have to take on the state in the quest to keep what you have and/or get more "free" rather than going out and trying to find work.
And so goes the vicious circle. The price you pay for the "free" you get is that you essentially become a ward of the state. Your privacy is gone, your freedom to make many choices for yourself is gone, and you have to justify your every need to someone whose job it is to say "no" as often as legally possible. Everyone who works (including the bureaucrats) view you as a parasitic deadbeat, and while they're not wrong, they're certainly doing their best in any number of ways to put as many roadblocks as possible in your way as you try to once again become financially independent.
All of which brings us back to TINSTAAFL. A Finnish friend of mine once told me that the difference between private charity and the welfare state is that the welfare state preserves your dignity because you don't have to say "thank you" and you don't have to feel like you owe anyone anything. But, in fact, regardless of whether it's private charity or public seizure of earned wealth followed by government redistribution, the end result is the same: nothing's free, and if you're the one footing the bill you're going to inevitably begin to resent those who are consuming the unearned. Moreover, all of that "brotherhood" that social democracy is supposed to unleash is nowhere to be found. Even the folks on the dole are happy to explain to you why they're entitled to what they get (and then some), but why [insert favorite scapegoat] most certainly is getting way too much.
Personally, I find it kinda creepy. For all the moral high ground the welfare statists and other assorted socialist weasels like to claim for themselves, the welfare state really brings out the ugly side of human nature. From the politicians to the workers, from the bureaucrats to the people receiving some kind of handout, everyone's fighting like the third monkey on Noah's gangplank for a piece of the pie. No one ever seems to happen upon the notion of baking another pie, however.
As allegedly brutal as a true free market may be, at least a poor person can become wealthier and there's a lot of economic upward mobility if you're willing to get off your ass and work. Europe is like a stagnant caste system. Unless you become a pop star or top athlete, chances are where you start is pretty much where you're gonna end up. It's a dehumanizing, incentive-killing, jealousy-promoting mentality where carefully watching what everyone else has and resenting anyone who has more than you is the norm. It's also the logical end result of the assumption that a free lunch is really "free".
posted by DrJDG @ 23:54
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