Remove UK government support for food for the poor. This includes school lunches and whatnot. Will the charities be able to fill the need? The answer is no. Charities can fill gaps but not beyond that.
I've heard a similar idea with giving free food to an area. Influx of free food puts local farmers out of work - they can't compete with free. When the charity dwindles the former farmers can't spin up their production in time and famine reoccurs.
Vastly increase the size and scope and eligibility of SNAP. I mean these things are not hard to solve, just hard to pass politically. Remember, increasing the Child Tax Credit, it's refundability, and sending those payments as monthly distributions nearly halved child poverty. The answer is send people money.
That's an interesting idea, and not without truth.
I'm strong left in the UK, and would gladly contribute more taxes to go towards social policy for helping with healthcare, welfare and similar. I still contribute to charity now and then, but more random acts than regular contributions.
Interestingly in the UK with the double dip recession we've seen a great many people fall into severe poverty where they cannot feed, heat or home themselves. With this we've seen an explosion of Foodbanks, places you can donate foodstuffs to which are then redistributed to those too poor to be able to afford to feed themselves.
Some on the Right have said that the growth of foodbanks are evidence that everything is working as it should be, with the needy being provided for by private donations. People like myself on the left say instead that this is evidence of failure of policy by the government, which is not helping people in desperate need of even the most basic things.
- Government provided meals. This can be in the form of communal kitchens much like British Kitchens [1]. This can then be used to ensure that everyone gets fed, that it is nutritionally sound and that it uses home grown produce. That way, it in effect subsidises farmers which means we can remove farm subsidies at the same time.
- Free public transport. Make all buses and trains free to use for everyone. This will help to reduce reliance upon cars and ensure that everyone can get around, so that it is possible to get to work.
UBI sounds wonderful, but it seems to be more of a subsidy to landlords, and those who are involved in selling. It would potentially provide for everyone but we'll then have the same problem as now where some children are going hungry [2] because there is no way to make sure that they are being fed. Without subsidised public transport, you have to use some of your UBI to get to work before you get your first pay cheque. This is a disincentive, as you are effectively investing up front for a future payout when you can just keep the money and enjoy it now.
My point is that there is no comparison to feeding the hungry, and we have all the proof we need that your and everyone else's private donations are not enough.
So, is there a solution in there that doesn't leverage government, or are we going to continue to complain about the baldly positive sides of government because "government bad, situation too complex"?
I very much agree, we don't have a complex understanding of the issue here, so maybe we should stop attacking it.
1. I address this somewhere else. I agree this is broken, but this is not a problem with the benefit system - it's something to do with wages not rising accordingly with everything else.
2. Perhaps, although if they do something stupid with that money, they still need supporting - so you either let people go homeless / starve or help them (which creates a new layer of welfare)
3. I'm not saying twice the food would be consumed, I'm saying prices would rise accordingly which would mean consuming the same amount of food costs more than it does now. The goal posts will just be moved and the poverty line will be above the basic minimum everyone gets paid.
Thanks for your comment. I would say the high level causes you have delineated need to be addressed. There certainly are political & structural issues that can be worked on. I am not sure how I would solve these issues.
What specific actions would you suggest to solve the political, structural issues and to resolve the perverse incentives?
That being said, I think the need of a hungry person is food, a cold person warm clothing and a homeless person shelter.
These are immediate every day needs that an individual can help with now.
A good charity is a vehicle that can help. A direct approach is to go to a mall or shelter or food bank and directly help people in need.
If so, turn it into a perpetually profitable self-funding charity that fronts the poor the money to get the cheaper option in return for a cut of the savings.
It's probably not possible because there are factors other than what you described.
Giving money to parents doesn't necessarily fix the problem of hungry children (this is not a slight to minimum income policies generally; I think all adults should be guaranteed a minimum quality of life regardless of if they've "earned" it, but I understand this is a much larger lift politically and will not necessarily fix everything). I want to fix the problem to hungry children directly by feeding them regardless of the parents capacity to feed them from their own wealth.
Abolish all welfare, phase out social security, and have the poor rely on private charities. If people don't want to donate to the charities that's their choice, it's their money. You're not entitled to money, food, a home, or a job -- you're entitled to nothing. You're entitled to starve in the gutter. If you want something more you have to earn it or have someone voluntarily agree to give it to you out of their own free will.
Let's back to basics. How do we cover the needs of one person? Better, how do we cover only the need for food? You need to produce rice, beans and meat. How do you produce all that? A lot of ways ... but you need to produce. And that word alone is the problem here.
The moment someone stops producing, he is a burden. He must be carried on by someones else production. The government does not produce anything. The moment he starts handing over cash to people who do not produce, he is transferring the production of someone who works hard to someone who does not.
You want to help those people? Pay them to study, get some skills. Pay then to clean the streets or the public bathrooms.
But for God sake, do not pay them to do nothing. It's unfair with the rest of those who actually work really hard for this handed cash.
Yes, they solve one problem related to poverty. But because their motive is profit, they can do so only at a cost that exacerbates the underlying problem of not having enough money.
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