Motherhood and apple-pie
A much wiser, fatter, and more Italian man than me may once have said, “Respect the family.” Family is the most important thing in the world, but in today’s Britain (that sounds a bit Daily Mail…), we don’t respect that basic building block of society (and as a good Conservative, I have to now deny that there is such a thing…). It is a sine qua non of the right – stable families produce good citizens, in every sense of that word. No politician would claim to be anti-family, but several generations of ‘liberal’ social policy have had unintended consequences, and I think it’s time for the left to reconsider some of their own sine qua non’s.
Let’s go back a little bit, to those innocent days before the last election. Labour published their pledge card (now with added truth!), with the following 5 pledges:
Your family better off
Your child achieving more
Your children with the best start
Your family treated better and faster
Your community safer
Your country’s borders protected
Huh, I hear you cry. Can’t really argue with that, but my colleague on Once More, Wat Tyler, applied his opposites test to a couple of these, and to a couple of David Davis’ policy pronouncements on his David Davis for Leader blog. Basically, the premise is that if you take a political statement, reverse the meaning to the opposite, and can’t imagine any politician saying the reversed version in polite company, the statement has no meaning. I think it’s a good rule of thumb. What has this got to do with social and family policy? Simple really, the vacuousness of the Labour pledge ‘Your family better off’ is obvious when you reverse it. Can you imagine a Tory running on a pledge of ‘Your family worse off’? The same is true of the constant refrain from New Labour circles of policies for ‘hard-working families’ – can you imagine making positive policy pledges for slackers and deadbeats? Welfare-to-Doss? So I have to be careful in challenging the left that I don’t go down the straw man route of claiming that they are anti-family. No one is anti-family. Even the doyenne of state-nationalised parenting and childcare, Polly Toynbee, has admitted in interviews that the best environment for raising kids is the 2-married different-sex parents set-up that we all know and love.
The question really is one of both focus, and of the unintended consequences of making policy to help the ‘weakest in society’. Note the same problem again – no-one makes policy for the strongest and fittest, do they? The focus on the left is on minority groups and the oppressed. Which set of victims can we empower today? Which of society’s outcasts can we lift up? How can we redistribute wealth to the poorest? All of those things are fine and noble goals, but when the focus is all about the few, rather than the many, the many get overlooked. We Conservatives are often criticised, rightly and wrongly, for being all about the rich. But Labour activists are all about the poor, and the rest are left with a kind of pseudo-independence of action that isn’t totally healthy. I don’t want to claim that either side has a monopoly on morality, but my side is genuinely trying to draft policy that benefits everyone, regardless of status, wealth, sex, colour, creed. That, in many ways, is a huge victory for the left. They’re in danger of being left behind once we get into gear. As much as I want my team to be in power with a whopping majority, I’m not sure how healthy that would be for democracy.
Often with social policy that focuses on the neediest, the next tier of people suffer. The victims are those on the margins. It is probably the basic tenet of economics that incentives are important. Incentives (not just in a financial sense) are what make us get out of bed in the morning. When the government enact policies that gives more than a safety net to the neediest, those on the margins suffer because the incentives that govern them change. Thus, the liberalisation of abortion laws has tended to lead to an increase in abortions. This post from Monjo states that the average UK woman now has 2.2 healthy pregnancies in her lifetime, and gives birth to 1.7 children. 1% of abortions are for reasons of foetal abnormality. Is that really healthy for society that we treat pregnancy and childbirth with such casual disdain?
This article, in the Torygraph, talks about the perverse financial incentives present in the welfare system. It makes economic sense for a couple on average income to be divorced, because then the female partner would be able to claim increased benefits, presumably for childcare. The result? Increased levels of family break-up, and, equally bad for those of us in the tax-paying community, a bigger bill for welfare. Family break-up is expensive in all kinds of ways though – the higher cost of supporting single parents, the economic cost of them not working, the increase in crime amongst the kids, lower educational achievement, an increase in abuse, poorer levels of health – the list goes on. And this is one example amongst many – name an area of social policy, and I’ll tell you who gets screwed by it.
I am not calling for a draconian removal of people’s current entitlements. We have been discussing welfare reform in some detail over on Once More, and it has to be a slow and steady process, much like weaning an addict off heroin, I guess. As much as we love old-school brutality on the right, putting people on benefit cold turkey isn’t something we want to try. So what’s my point? Just that power necessarily leads to complacency – there is a myopia that sets in after a while where you think you have all the answers, and you have to be doing something to fix the many day-to-day problems that keep jumping up. It isn’t an atmosphere which engenders long-term strategic planning. I think it’s time for the left to take a step back a little and reconsider some of their axioms. The weakest in society need a safety net, sure, but do they need a blanket and a nice, cuddly teddy bear as well? Are we not better off working for everyone in society, rather than minority interests?
Even the doyenne of state-nationalised parenting and childcare, Polly Toynbee, has admitted in interviews that the best environment for raising kids is the 2-married same-sex parents set-up that we all know and love.
Err…did you mean parents of different sexes?
Oops – yes. Must edit that. Thanks.
Note to the Sharpener crew: We need a sub.
To me it seems the major aim of politicians, especially the left-wing, is that of being a spokesman for the poor — a political Robin Hood if you like. Thus politicians need victims to further their political ambition regardless of the consequences to society as a whole. This is never more true than of New labour today.
Yet, as has been discussed in the debate on welfare in another place, the unintended consequences of aiding the poor may increase dependancy & the very conditions the politicians are trying to alleviate along with penalising those who struggle & succeed. The response then should be to reconsider the policy yet what we find is the paradoxical behaviour of more of the same leading to more harm.
Labour’s five pledges seem to consist of six!
Maybe they had their fingers crossed for one of them?
I believe they added one once the whole immigration ‘debate’ kicked off.
…Labour’s five pledges seem to consist of six!…
Thats typical Nu Labour.
If you look at the average number of times each “new” policy is launched you’ll see that they have far less policies than they claim to.
I think you accept too easily that being on the Left means you’re somehow feelin’ the poor whereas being on the Right means you’re relatively indifferent. Myself, I tend to think that the society created by the Left is one that works much better for articulate, intelligent and (because essentially meritocratic) rich folk than it does for poor people. Some (not all) on the Left seem to equate compassion for the poor with material redistribution, as if a few quid can solve a dysfunctional life. The problems you talk of, of family breakdown, disproportionately afflict the poor and they have much less to lose anyway.
Blimpish: Not at all, just that there is such a perception that damages us on the right, and we haven’t yet cracked it, although we’re working hard on it. I also don’t really think that left-created-society is particularly meritocratic, with much still essentially depending on the (random) good fortune to be born into a wealthier family. My point is that the left are in danger of marginalising themselves with this chase after increasingly small victim groups to represent. I hope they do, to some extent… I think we’ll be discussing the terrible near death of the Labour party and the social democracy movement in 20 years time, as they discuss the death of the Tory party now. The world loves an optimist.
The question really is one of both focus, and of the unintended consequences of making policy to help the ‘weakest in society’. Note the same problem again – no-one makes policy for the strongest and fittest, do they?
Self-styled ‘trickle-down economics’? As in, directly help the rich, and, by-the-by, indirectly help the rest, which is surely the converse of left-reformist rhetoric of helping the weakest in society, because the implication of the latter is that by directly helping the poorest, one by-the-by indirectly helps the rest by making a better society overall.
The focus on the left is on minority groups and the oppressed.
Well, traditionally the (socialist) left claimed to represent the mass of the workers, considered as neither a minority nor especially ‘oppressed’ in a life-denying sense.
Often with social policy that focuses on the neediest, the next tier of people suffer.
E.g.? Presumably you apply, or did apply, this principle to the minimum wage? Reading on, however, your argument then switches to say that the neediest themselves suffer because of the resulting change in incentives… I’m confused!
the liberalisation of abortion laws has tended to lead to an increase in abortions … Is that really healthy for society that we treat pregnancy and childbirth with such casual disdain?
If the killing of one foetus is not wrong, then abortion rates aren’t a matter of moral health at all. And as for the concept as such of treating pregnancy with distain – well, nature was allowed to treat it with quite a distain before medical science got its act together in the twentieth century, for historically, infant mortality was atrociously high.
It makes economic sense for a couple on average income to be divorced … The result? Increased levels of family break-up
Genuine question – do you know of any recent stats for the UK that show rates of divorce and single parent households by social class? A second query would be as whether certain measures of the welfare state or the end of British manufacturing (and the resulting dislocation of old working-class communities) would be a more important factor vis-a-vis changes in family structure amongst the less well off.
Oh shite, I missed out a backslash: ‘If the killing…’ isn’t a quote but a response, of course…
CCR:
For your statistical enquiries a search on National Statistics Online is indicated:
Divorce
Lone Parent
CCR:
well, nature was allowed to treat it with quite a distain before medical science got its act together in the twentieth century, for historically, infant mortality was atrociously high.
Disdain is a human emotion & is a result of judgement, natural phenomena are simply mechanistic cause & effect. You cannot equate the two.
Yes, you can.
Self-styled ‘trickle-down economics’? As in, directly help the rich, and, by-the-by, indirectly help the rest, which is surely the converse of left-reformist rhetoric of helping the weakest in society, because the implication of the latter is that by directly helping the poorest, one by-the-by indirectly helps the rest by making a better society overall.
Trickle-down economics hasn’t been in vogue recently, has it? And my point is that directly helping the poorest isn’t making a better society – it is screwing over the not-quite-so-poor.
Well, traditionally the (socialist) left claimed to represent the mass of the workers, considered as neither a minority nor especially ‘oppressed’ in a life-denying sense.
Yes, traditionally, but not any more.
Presumably you apply, or did apply, this principle to the minimum wage? Reading on, however, your argument then switches to say that the neediest themselves suffer because of the resulting change in incentives… I’m confused!
Yes, the minimum wage destroys marginally productive jobs. That’s a bad thing. My argument doesn’t switch – the marginal cases are the ones that suffer.
If the killing of one foetus is not wrong, then abortion rates aren’t a matter of moral health at all.
Okay, but the killing of one foetus is wrong, so your point is irrelevant.
historically, infant mortality was atrociously high.
So what? Historically, the average age at which people died was atrociously low. That doesn’t justify euthanasia.
On the stats point, Thersites has provided some links – I’d also check out The Welfare State We’re In website – James Bartholomew regularly covers similar topics.
“Note the same problem again – no-one makes policy for the strongest and fittest, do they?”
Wha? How about abolition of inheritance tax?
Wha? How about abolition of inheritance tax?
And which serious politician is advancing that then?
“It makes economic sense for a couple on average income to be divorced ”
Not if they used to own & share a house it doesn’t. Lots of divorces are over money but very few are to make money.
Not if they used to own & share a house it doesn’t. Lots of divorces are over money but very few are to make money.
Okay. I’m phrasing it badly. The fact that the economic discrepancy exists disincentivises couples from marrying in the first place.
Andrew,
my point is that directly helping the poorest isn’t making a better society
Yes it is, because the fact of an actually-existing ‘underclass’ is immoral.
it is screwing over the not-quite-so-poor
On this principle, you would’ve been opposed to the emancipation of slaves in nineteenth-century America on the (correct) basis that the new labour market would have ‘screwed’ the poorest whites in the Deep South.
Yes, the minimum wage destroys marginally productive jobs.
Evidence? And, if you don’t mind me asking, how much do you earn, and expect to earn in ten years time?
the killing of one foetus is wrong, so your point is irrelevant
If you believe that, then *your* first point was irrelevant, that is, your emphasis on an ‘increase’ in abortions.
On the stats point, Thersites has provided some links
Call me dumb, but having a quick look, I couldn’t find any breakdowns by social class.
Finally, what about my point vis-à-vis the end of British manufacting? (The old mining communities were not exactly hotbeds of social liberalism and/or fragmented familes.) You Thatcherites with your ‘get on your bike!’ attitude to structural change in the economy is all very well, but from a state of social breakdown, communities don’t magically recreate themselves at a drop of a hat.
CCR:
You state ‘Yes it is, because the fact of an actually-existing ‘underclass’ is immoral’ so I take it you would extend the immorality judgement to the causes of the Underclass?
Yes it is, because the fact of an actually-existing ‘underclass’ is immoral.
That underclass largely comes from failed social policy. I hardly think more of the same is the best way to combat it.
On this principle, you would’ve been opposed to the emancipation of slaves in nineteenth-century America on the (correct) basis that the new labour market would have ’screwed’ the poorest whites in the Deep South.
What a ridiculous argument. Is there anyone who bases their entire worldview on one single, immutable principle, to the exclusion of all others? Either make a coherent, logical argument, or don’t waste my time. Liberty and morality were clearly of fundamental importance in the emancipation.
Evidence? And, if you don’t mind me asking, how much do you earn, and expect to earn in ten years time?
None of your business, but let’s just say it’s more than minimum wage. It’s also totally irrelevant to the point.
On the evidence, how about this, from the Low Pay Commission: http://www.lowpay.gov.uk/lowpay/report/pdf/DTi-Min_Wage.pdf
Chris Dillow from Stumbling and Mumbling wrote this about employers actions after the 2003 rise in the minimum wage, paraphrasing from that pdf report: ’37 per cent of them cut staffing levels, whilst only 4 per cent raised them; 31 per cent cut basic hours worked whilst 3 per cent raised them; 28 per cent cut overtime hours; 81 per cent said their profits fell; and 63 per cent said they raised prices.’
If you believe that, then *your* first point was irrelevant, that is, your emphasis on an ‘increase’ in abortions.
Not at all. That’s just my own moral belief – I have no intention of forcing it on anyone else.
You Thatcherites with your ‘get on your bike!’ attitude to structural change in the economy is all very well, but from a state of social breakdown, communities don’t magically recreate themselves at a drop of a hat.
I don’t know why you think I’m a Thatcherite – the world has moved on in 20 years, you know…
But your point is a good one – there are different factors involved – I wouldn’t blame bad social policy for everything. I don’t personally have any stats on the link between manufacturing employment and social cohesion, but if any readers are more enlightened, I’m sure they’ll help out. I’d be surprised if there wasn’t an effect.
That underclass largely comes from failed social policy. I hardly think more of the same is the best way to combat it.
I never said it was. I’m not the one calling for ‘one stop’ solutions!
What a ridiculous argument. Is there anyone who bases their entire worldview on one single, immutable principle, to the exclusion of all others?
Er? You appeared to put forward a principle that social policy directed towards the worse off is wrong because it screws the next-worse off. I then merely suggested a counter-example. Generally, ‘logical argument’ works by suggesting principles, then pushing them to their limits to see how far they go without becoming absurd.
That’s just my own moral belief – I have no intention of forcing it on anyone else.
‘Just’? Is morality merely a matter of superficial emotional responses of the individual? If you *do* believe the human killing of a foetus is wrong, then you must also see it as wrong that others don’t see it that way.
I don’t know why you think I’m a Thatcherite – the world has moved on in 20 years, you know
Only intended as a generic term – you wouldn’t prefer that awful appellation ‘neoliberal’ would you?
I never said it was. I’m not the one calling for ‘one stop’ solutions!
Me neither. I’m calling for an approach which considers the effects on everyone, particularly those that may get screwed over in the aftermath. It’s an amalgamation of lots of simple ideas, like making marginal tax rates for the unemployed poor either zero or very low, to encourage labour, rather than in the high 70-80 percent range to discourage it.
You appeared to put forward a principle that social policy directed towards the worse off is wrong because it screws the next-worse off.
I wouldn’t call it a principle. Just a couple of examples where specific social policy had failed a group it wasn’t targeted at, and a general feeling that much social policy over recent decades has had a similar problem of unintended consequences. It wasn’t a strong argument, by any means.
Generally, ‘logical argument’ works by suggesting principles, then pushing them to their limits to see how far they go without becoming absurd.
No, that’s a specific type of logical argument – the reductio ad absurdum. Generally, logical argument works by suggesting an unprovable, but self-evidently true, set of core axioms or principles, and then building assertions on top of those axioms until a statement emerges and its truth is either indisputable, or the argument is so complex and convoluted as to render arguing against it effectively pointless. I prefer the second style, lacking ability in the first. My own social policy piece above, of course, fails at the first hurdle – my axioms are by no means self-evidently true.
‘Just’? Is morality merely a matter of superficial emotional responses of the individual? If you *do* believe the human killing of a foetus is wrong, then you must also see it as wrong that others don’t see it that way.
No, I’m not so black and white. Post coming up about abortion soon, after I clarify some thoughts in my own head, and discuss with others. Basically, though, I don’t believe in imposing my own morality on others, except in cases where that morality is shared by a large majority of the population (e.g. prohibiting murder, theft, etc…).
Only intended as a generic term – you wouldn’t prefer that awful appellation ‘neoliberal’ would you?
I’d prefer something that doesn’t make me mentally dismiss your argument as emotive name-calling and playing to the gallery. If you feel that neoliberal covers that, fire away.
Andrew: Stop escaping the issue. If you are happy to assert your own morality on an issue like murder, then you must also be willing to do so on abortion.
In 2003 181600 babies were aborted in just the UK. Only 1950 of these were because the child was likely to be born handicapped, and I doubt very many were by the victims of rape.
600 babies MURDERED every day. 30 per cent of ALL UK pregnancies end in an abortion. We would actually have a child per woman ratio of 2.2 rather than 1.7 if there were no abortions.
Once you have considered those figures then go take a look at what a foetus looks like at just 12 weeks. Then look at 13,14,15 all the way up to 24 weeks. Using the term foetus legitimises abortion as we are dehumanising it all. I prefer the term UNBORN CHILD.
We hear all the time about “women and children” when talking about deaths, as if somehow women and children dying is worse then men and old people. Well if women and children are more precious, then UNBORN CHILDREN should be the MOST precious.
The basis of liberty and liberalism to me is that people are 100 per cent free to have their own morality and to act how they wish (smoke, have sex – even at the age of say 12 – get drunks etc.) as long as their action does not harm another human: rape, murder, physical violence, smoking in a public place. Well I had abortion to this – we are free to have sex when we like, with whom we like, how we like and where we like (except public places), but this means there are consequences. Pregnancy is a potential consequence of a free act, murdering the unborn child is not a morally legitimate response.
Monjo: I agree with you, but a majority don’t. I don’t see how to win that fight. It’s then a question of strategy more than morality. Why expend political capital fighting a lengthy and, in all probability, fruitless battle?
Let’s face it, people have played around with the language of abortion on both sides (unborn child vs. foetus, pro-choice vs. pro-life, etc…), as you’ve described, for 2 generations, and we still have an uneasy compromise. Even the US still has an uneasy compromise. I don’t see this as a fight which can be won.
With all due respect, Andrew (and I really do mean that), I think you lost the debate when you wrote. “How can we redistribute wealth to the poorest? All of those things are fine and noble goals.”
CCR, let me attempt to tackle some of these issues one at a time:
Abortion: Most people, while wanting abortion to be legal, also realize that it is morally wrong. Not everything that is wrong is illegal. Former U.S. president Bill Clinton used to say that abortions ought to be safe, legal and rare. I think that most people want abortions to be permissible, but they would also like to see them used as sparingly as possible, as a last resort measure.
Minimum wage: I noticed that you have abandoned debating this point. Every economic study of the issue has shown that increasing the minimum wage raises unemployment, especially among entry-level workers with the lowest skills. This is one reason why the biggest supporters of this are always trade unions, who want to keep down the competition.
Finally, I find this statement by CCR to be extraordinary:
“…[T]he fact of an actually-existing ‘underclass’ is immoral.”
How can there ever not be an underclass, short of perfect equality across the board? Do you honestly think such a result is possible, without the modern equivalent of a Procrustean table working day and night? Haven’t Lenin, Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot (to name a few) already given this goal their best shot, only to fall short — and kill 100 million or so in the bargain?
The fact is, no matter how prosperous a society is, there is always an “underclass.” The underclass in a successful industrialized society, however, is a far cry from one in an underdeveloped country. For instance, in the U.S., most members of the “underclass” can still boast a car, a roof over their heads, a color TV set with cable, a DVD player, a washing machine, a telephone, three square meals a day, and many other amenities that the poor in much of Africa can only dream of. To put it another way, the average lower-class American is better off than any medieval king. It’s all relative, isn’t it?
With all due respect, Andrew (and I really do mean that), I think you lost the debate when you wrote. “How can we redistribute wealth to the poorest? All of those things are fine and noble goals.â€Â
And with all due respect, Inkling, I didn’t put a full stop at the end of that sentence.
My view on that particular issue is that some redistribution is probably necessary, firstly to silence the lefties, secondly, because society should provide a basic safety net, and thirdly, because economic changes are not distributed equally amongst the population, and it is morally right to provide those who lose out, through no fault of their own, with a form of insurance payout.
I support the concept of a basic safety net — with an expiration date (except in the case of the disabled and elderly). What I object to is the notion of redistributing wealth to the poor. I don’t consider that a “fine and noble goal.” I think it’s a recipe for dependency and ultimate economic disaster.
But if you don’t support redistribution for the poor, then you’re basically saying there’s no role for fairness in society, only winner’s justice. A safety net ‘with an expiration date’ isn’t worth the name. Plenty of people end up poor through bad luck or having had limited or no chances in the first place. The question for me is how to do that redistributing without screwing up the economy, as you describe, means-testing being precisely the wrong (a.k.a. “Third”) way to go about it.
Inkling: I’m not sure why you’d make an exception for the elderly and disabled – they’re as likely to become dependent on welfare as anyone else is. Jarndyce makes my point – people do not always, or even often, become rich because they’re the hardest working, most gifted, talented, morally upright citizens. A lot of it is luck – being in the right place at the right time, knowing the right people. If you don’t account for, particularly technological, changes creating undeserving losers, you end up with a society full of resentment and envy. That isn’t a recipe for social cohesion, a concept which is becoming increasingly important as modern Britain slowly fractures.
No role for fairness? Well, there is the judicial system, and the electoral system, both of which I would hope would not distinguish between rich or poor. (Incidentally, I support the nationalization of the legal system — no private lawyers, all counsel assigned and paid by the government.)
I just don’t agree that people end up poor simply through limited chances — unless those limitations are due to physical or mental disability. The problem is, the more redistribution in a society, the less chances there are for economic advancement. A redistributive structure undermines free enterprise. And this reduces the opportunities available to the hard-working poor to lift themselves out of poverty.
And I haven’t even gotten into the whole issue of public assistance dependency, which has been proven to prolong poverty among recipients of public largesse. I can answer your question very simply — the answer to whether a society can be “redistributing without screwing up the economy’ is… no.
My previous comment was posted before I had a chance to see Andrew’s. I would just add that I agree we can’t expect everybody to become rich. Some become rich through luck, this is very true. But does anybody honestly think that redistributing wealth will create additional wealthy folk?
As for an exception for the disabled and the elderly, frankly, I don’t anybody really minds if they develop a dependency on government assistance. There is a categorical distinction between them and the able-bodied, working-age poor, don’t you think? If I have to elaborate on that further, let me know and I will.
No, but that’s not the point. The point is to compensate those who have been effected through no fault of their own.
Note that I’m not arguing in favour of current methods of redistribution – I just think some form of ‘insurance-style’ scheme is appropriate and moral.
“The point is to compensate those who have been effected through no fault of their own.”
Then we are in agreement. We shall compensate the disabled and the elderly. There is no way to determine which of the rest of the poor were affected through no fault of their own. Therefore we should “compensate” (provide a temporary safety net to — I abhor calling it “compensation,” as if they were victims of a tort) them, but not the able-bodied poor.
Again, I agree that we ought to provide a temporary safety net for the able-bodied poor. But to provide a permanent one is sheer folly. Anybody who knows anything about human nature knows that you will simply be prolonging their misery. More than that, you will be creating a multi-generational dependency, as the children who grow up in such an environment will adopt the same dependency.
Inkling, I can’t understand your radical (socialist) egalitarian commitment to the narrowest sense of justice (the legal system), but zero interest in far more important economic justice. What about differential access to the means of production, to capital? What about those who end up shit poor just because they are exceedingly stupid? Do they not deserve compensation? Was it their fault to be born dim? What about, say, steelworkers who worked thirty years just to find out that unfortunately technology and globalization has stymied them, and they are unwanted at fifty? Do we have no duties towards them? As Andrew says, I also see redistribution as a form of insurance payout (and hence tax as a premium).
If you can’t “agree that people end up poor simply through limited chances”, how do you explain the limited (and maybe even falling) levels of social mobility in especially Anglo-Saxon economies? There’s a determinism in the social class you enter life in – it’s not a favour we’re doing the poor by redistributing, but giving them what they are justly owed. At the very minimum, a living wage (not, though, a ‘living in Bel Air’ wage).
And:
_The problem is, the more redistribution in a society, the less chances there are for economic advancement. A redistributive structure undermines free enterprise._
…is demonstrably false. The OECD rates Finland as the freest economy in the world, the Fraser Institute rates its level of business regulation only just behind Hong Kong, and the crazyloon Heritage Foundation rate it (aswell as Denmark and Sweden) in their top tier of ‘economic freedom’. It’s one of the most dynamic economies in the world, and over 50% of GDP is spent by the government in redistribution and benefits.
I must apologize, but I’m at an unfair advantage when it comes to discussing the economy of Finland. My wife is from there and I have spent a fair amount of time in that fair land. Anybody who claims that Finland is a freer, more dynamic economy than America’s, for instance, is, quite frankly, either grossly misinformed or deluded. (As for the “crazyloon Heritage Foundation,” their “top tier of ‘economic freedom’ is a very easy plateau to reach, most Western industrialized nations fall in it.)
Let us note the following about Finland; their unemployment rate stands at about 10% — nearly double that of the U.K. or the U.S. Their per capita income is less than 75% of America’s.
It should also be noted that of the top 25 companies in the U.S., 19 did not exist 40 years ago. Finland has nowhere near that level of entrepreneurship.
Returning to personal experience (and I realize it’s far from dispositive), every small businessperson I know in Finland has failed. My wife would love to start a business in Finland, but she knows it would be virtually impossible, groaning under the yoke of so many regs and taxes. Ask anybody who’s done business in both countries, and see what they say. I don’t have personal experience there, but I’d wager anything that it’s easier to start a business in the U.K. too than in Finland.
On the issue of “differential access to the means of production, to capital”… well, it should be clear by now that “access to the means of pruduction” or even to capital is not the dispositive factor in whether one becomes wealthy or not in a modern society. The focus on the means of production is an archaic 19th century obsession, outmoded in our information age. It’s all about control over information, now.
I’d argue that it’s about more than that — it’s about hard work. How many incredibly smart people do you know who just flounder in book shops or other retail dead-end jobs, because they don’t have the cojones, or the motivation, to work hard and get ahead financially. Does the term “slacker” mean anything to you?
Some of the wealthiest people in my family, for instance, are not the smartest. In fact, the three wealthiest never even graduated university. They were simply the hardest-working among us. Meanwhile, here I am, an overeducated slacker wasting precious time posting on a British blog, while they’re out there earning millions. It isn’t fair, I tell you. There ought to be a program to help poor sods like me….
No, there shouldn’t, because you’re just a slacker. There should be something to deal with those unfairly disadvantaged by economic change, for example when the local steel mill closes down because manufacturing went to China. How is that even slightly contentious?
Okay, I’m not entirely adverse to paying for a retraining program to teach new skills to steel mill workers who lost their jobs to China. And I’m not adverse to providing unemployment benefits for said workers for a reasonable period — say, one year. But after that, they’ve got to find a job just like the rest of us. A vibrant economy is by definition a changing one. If we overcoddle everybody who gets an owie, they will never learn to get over it and get a new job. Tough love and all that.
And that’s my whole point. I’m not calling for a permanent safety net for the lazy and feckless. I’m a hanging-and-flogging right-winger. I think the long-term unemployed should be placed in stocks, pelted with rotten fruit and ridiculed in the town square, not given dependency payments.
I’m afraid there’s so much to disagree with it’s almost pointless continuing: we’re never going to agree. Just to say that I have sold into Finland (Denmark and Holland, too) and never had any problems. But again that’s just one personal experience. I would note, on your stats, that unemployment has halved in a decade and, again, the Fraser Institute rate business regulation in Finland just behind Hong Kong (i.e. virtually none). But, yes, if you measure everything in money, the US is among the richest countries in the world. Though if we take money as the ultimate arbiter, we’d all move to Luxembourg, but really who’d want to?
On capital vs. information: don’t accept that. If means of production are outmoded and indeterminate, then I guess you wouldn’t oppose a one-time redistribution along egalitarian lines of all the UK’s (or US’s) capital (and land, and property) among its citizens. The ones with all the information will remain unaltered, as so still advantaged as you say. Ditto the justification for hiking inheritance taxes (and lowering income taxes) to pay for redistribution. Take away the advantages of means and let proper free markets reign. And information is only of value to those who are able to use it. I’m guessing the differences in your family are between very intelligent and just plain intelligent. Hardly relevant here. I agree hard work should be rewarded, and handsomely; but bad luck, or accidents of birth and upbringing, shouldn’t be punished.
As I said, we’ll never agree. I don’t see redistribution as doing the poor a favour. Just giving them back what’s theirs.
Hi, I really feel that if the conservative party wants to speak to everyone than their image needs changing. I mean is that Latin in your first paragraph?