Tag Archives: Dependency

News

Government now pays the rent for 1 out of every 5 homes in Britain

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Story from the Daily Mail. (H/T Weasel Zippers via ECM)

Excerpt:

Four in ten households in some parts of the country have their rent paid for by the state, Whitehall figures revealed yesterday.

They showed, on average, one in five homes is supported by housing benefit, the taxpayer handout which covers the rent for those on low incomes.

And in London, the figures revealed nearly a quarter of households are now reliant on the benefit.

The figures, disclosed in the Department of Work and Pensions’ spending tables, also show that in the North-East, the North-West and Scotland around one in four receive the benefit.

The payout, which was first introduced in 1992 to bring clarity to state rent payments, cost £14.7billion when Labour came to power in 1997.

That figure has since risen by 18 per cent to £17.4billion and is expected to reach almost £21billion next year.

I’m currently reading Theodore Dalrymple’s “Life at the Bottom”, which describes how the UK government promotes irresponsibility and immorality among the poor. I think we really need to be careful about moving in the same direction as the British. Things don’t seem to be working out to well for them. They seem to believe in taxing people who work hard and live morally in order to reward the most irresponsible people in society.

News

Bush spent $622B on Iraq, Obama spends $888B on welfare in 2010 alone

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Story from CNS News. (H/T Weasel Zippers via ECM)

Excerpt:

During the entire administration of George W. Bush, the Iraq war cost a total of $622 billion, according to the Congressional Research Service.

President Obama’s welfare spending will reach $888 billion in a single fiscal year–2010–more than the Bush administration spent on war in Iraq from the first “shock and awe” attack in 2003 until Bush left office in January.

Obama’s spending proposals call for the largest increases in welfare benefits in U.S. history, according to a report by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank. This will lead to a spending total of $10.3 trillion over the next decade on various welfare programs. These include cash payments, food, housing, Medicaid and various social services for low-income Americans and those at 200 percent of the poverty level, or $44,000 for a family of four. Among that total, $7.5 trillion will be federal money and $2.8 trillion will be federally mandated state expenditures.

I personally know a lot of people who voted for Obama because we were spending too much on the war. The government’s job is to fight against the enemies of the United States. The government’s job is not to equalize life outcomes regardless of lifestyle choices. But I guess Obama has to buy votes somehow! How else will he be able to get re-elected unless he takes from the productive minority to pay for the votes of the irresponsible majority?

Don’t forget my previous post on the CBO’s projections about Social Security running cash deficits in starting in 2010.

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