RSSWhen Did We Become a Dependent Society
Rob | July 20, 2008
When Did We Become a Dependent Society
“We are taxed twice as much by our idleness, three times as much by our pride and four times as much by our foolishness.”
Benjamin Franklin
Are we moving down the road of becoming a Dependant society and away from a Independent one? It is not a matter of not wanting to pay taxes because we do and because we have to , it is not only a matter of wanting more of my hard earned money for myself and my family , it is a matter of trying to keep funding these social welfare programs at the expense of the future generations and at the expense of other programs that are being neglected.
Is the Medicare program beneficial to the health of the elderly and disabled ? Yes it is , it does help offset the costs associated with the rising costs of health care , that is not and has not been my argument. Neither is Social Security assistance , and that is what it was intended as ASSISTANCE not as someone’s complete retirement package. We for some reason in this country have become a country of dependents instead of a country self reliant individuals.
Oh we can blame the Government and the politicians for all of our wows , we can blame big business for all of our problems , but we never blame our selves for the actions and decisions that we have made throughout our lives. Is it truly the Governments responsibility to take care of us personally from cradle to grave ? Is it the Governments responsibility to pay for and take care of all of our medical bills and to pay for and take care of our expenses in retirement? No I don’t think so , we are supposed to hold ourselves accountable for taking care of ourselves and those of our family that is personal responsibility and accountability that is the core factor in making us a independent free society, once you become overly dependent on the Government for everything you loose the freedom that sets you and I apart from a totalitarian society.
No where in the Constitution does it state that it is the Government responsibility to take care of and fund all of our medical expenses and fund our retirement at the expense of what the Government was truly set up to do in the first place, and that was to provide protection from enemy’s foreign and domestic , provide a viable infrastructure for commerce and trade , and to enforce and enact laws and regulation for the protection of the country in aspects of treaty’s , imports , taxation , tariffs and imposts, and general safety of the citizenry. It was set up to protect us from an overly oppressive dictatorship with checks and balances at all levels down to the courts and law enforcement , we have slowly allowed this to creep back into this country by continually electing officials back in office time after time when they should have moved on to other ventures and not been able to hold so much power and control of what is done in this country and we should not have enabled them to become so corruptible by reelecting them in the first place ,instead of actually doing good for this country their sole purpose once their is reelection and that is where they become susceptible to corruption.
Until recently the General Safety part of that did not include all of the Social Welfare programs that we have now , that was added in the 1930’s and 1940’s expanded upon and surpassed any other aspect of what this government was originally set up to provide. Before this time it was up to the independent individual citizen to provide for themselves and their family’s.
We are sacrificing funding to all other programs to fund these social welfare programs and it is starting to show , we are seeing the strain on our infrastructure at a alarming rate. We see our roads crumbling before our eyes , our bridges collapsing , our levies breaking . We are seeing the strain on our criminal justice system by not being able to properly fund new prisons and expand the ones we have , we are seeing criminals released to commit crimes and terrorize our population again instead of keeping them where they belong . We see our law enforcement on all levels and agency’s under funded and understaffed due to lack of funds from the federal level , we are witnessing the all out invasion of this country from foreign nationals because of lack of funding and willingness of our government to let it happen , we are witnessing the importation of tainted produce, consumables, and consumer items because of the lack of funding to provide a proper inspection force. On a daily basis we are witnessing the education of our children deteriorate due to overcrowding in the schools , part of that is due to lack of funds to build new schools and rehab old ones and part of that is do to the mass influx of immigrants legal and illegal , and the children of illegal. A good portion of it is due to the fact that we are having to provide special education for them and provide the social welfare programs to feed , cloth , and to provide medical assistance to them.
We are seeing and hearing politicians state that they would rather reduce our military capacity and development to fund social welfare programs at the expense of our national security , at a time in history that it is most needed to be funded with all of the violence around the world , and with those that would wish this country harm just waiting for a opportunity to strike when we are weak.
We are funding Social Welfare to a large portion of the world population with all of our foreign assistance programs and the trillions of U.S. Dollars that goes overseas , all the while neglecting our own needs. We have evolved into the mentality that it is good for society to take care of all the wants and needs of the world at the sacrifice of our citizenry , we justify redistribution of our wealth and happiness in the hopes of better recognition and standing. It has been going on for a long time now and it has not gained us in America one bit of progress in the way other people of the world looks at us , we are the first their when something happens with assistance and aid , we are the first their when people are attacked and oppressed , we always have been and most likely will be in the future , all we have ever asked is a place to bury our fallen and a bit of recognition.
But the time has come that those bills are due and the time has come that with the continual strain on the tax payers of this nation with the welfare mentality we can no longer afford to even fund the basic things the government was set up to provide for us.
In the past our Government did not rely just on income taxes to fund these programs , that is actually a recent development , in the past large portions of our country’s income was paid with Tariffs and Duty’s but that has been reduced and eliminated with all of the ” Free Trade ” agreements , along with the higher paying jobs where you actually do get more income in taxes from higher wage earners. This in turn has moved us into lesser paying positions and brought about the rise of dependency , add in the fact that you have such a large influx of people entering the country working at those lower wages bringing along relatives and dependents that rely on social welfare programs and you have a recipe for disaster.
With the pay as you go system that has been in place since the 1960’s when our Government broke into the funds for Social Security to pay for the Vietnam war , the large increase in demand with a aging population , the outright abuses from some who collect and those that administrate these programs we are putting to large of a burden on follow up generations who have come to realize that yes these programs are essential and needed to Assist in the general welfare of society , but feel as though when the time comes for them to actually start to collect their will not be anything for them. They see and hear on a daily basis that their time for eligibility is moved further and further away from them , they see their tax dollars miss spent and they see those that would like to increase what they pay even more. That is where you get such a resistance to the increase of taxes to pay for social programs , it is not a matter of not caring or being compassionate enough it is a matter of economics and the abuses and corruption related to these programs.
We have politician’s both in congress and on the campaign trail willing to propose patches to the system with no clear resolutions to the problems that face funding and implementation of these programs that includes Social Security and Medicare , none of them are actually willing to address the abuses and corruption , and none of them have a clear plan to alleviate the burden on the next generation. Yes the current president and presidents in the past can be attributed to this crisis and the blame does need to be placed upon them equally for their lack of direction and willingness in addressing the problem facing these programs and the programs that make up the core problems facing this country. In the recent Proposals and Actions we did not see any movement to help alleviate the over burden of those that are going to be faced with funding these programs down the road , we did see the movement to insure that what we currently have in place continues to raise the overall debt with no clear direction of cutting costs to you and I when it comes to funding.
In researching this subject I came across some articles from Europe where some of these countries are actually looking at reducing benefits due to the over burden and strain that Social Welfare programs puts on their economy , they are seeing a large portion of their GNP go directly into funding these programs at the expense of other pressing needs. Some of that can most likely be due to the mass migration of people around the world and the stresses associated with that , where you are forced to redistribute the resources to compensate to the growing influx. We are seeing these same problems here in the United States and it is getting to the point that we can no longer be able to afford to take care of all in need.
Oh yes we can continue to raise taxes on All classes of society , we can demand that those with more wealth contribute more , but we need to realize at the same time that these people that we are demanding this from are also the ones who contribute large portions of their wealth in charitable causes and they are the ones that provide us with the jobs that we have , if you put to much of a demand on them they will start to reduce those contributions and they will look to other avenues to increase their wealth be it that they decide to move their company’s to other nations where labor is cheaper and where they are not taxed as much. I am not defending the wealthy by any means I am just pointing out fact’s , if it was you or I in the same situation we would do the same. That would lead to more and more of society becoming dependent on Government to take care of them and put an even greater strain on those who actually pay the way.
No the solution is not higher taxes to pay for Social Welfare in what ever form it manifests itself , the solution would be to implement the programs as they were set up as in the first place , and take the funding away from the general fund of the nation and move it back into a form of a savings plan that would draw interests of some sort or another , instead of relying on credit and loans to cover the costs. Re-investigate the pork associated with any program , bill , or any other spending the Government does , possibly reduce some of the benefits associated with the programs until the time that the accounts are balanced properly , take out such wasteful spending included in these programs such as (and I am only going to use this as an example) paying for Viagra for those on Medicare and Medicaid , and Deny eligibility to those from other nations abusing the system , I am not being heartless in stating this I am being practical. If we would start to demand from the country’s of origin repayment of the costs associated with caring for their citizens and to hold their citizens and Governments accountable for the increased cost and demand they put on us it would start to send us down the path to recovery , if we would stop giving free incentives to those that would abuse foreign and domestic , and if we would for once hold our Governments accountable maybe then we can move away from the Mentality of Dependency and become Independent once again.
Yes we all do need to become advocates of “Change” we all need to demand better from those in control , and we all need to realize that empty platitudes and no real substance from elected and unelected officials is not going to change a thing , we need to hold our elected officials to the fire and make them accountable for the spending and the taxing of our Money , we need to become once again a nation that practices participation in our affairs , and we need to examine who we send into government to carry out our business and our needs , we can not keep sending the same people back who have lost true interest in what we demand and what we require. Most office holders at this point do not need or require the same services that you or I require , they are not dependent on the same programs you or I do and in all cases they have separate retirement packages and medical packages that are fully funded by you and I that they look after first and foremost , while moving us down the dependency road.
No it is long over due that we start to change our mentality from Dependency and back to Independency and relying on tax hikes to foot the bill is not one of them , neither is the demand for increased coverage until the time that we can actually afford the true burden.
“There is no dependence that can be sure but a dependence upon one’s self.”
John Gay
Rob
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