Common Man Government

Welfare

“America’s population is wealthier than any in history. Every year, the American government redistributes more than a trillion dollars of that wealth to provide for retirement, health care, and the alleviation of poverty. We still have millions of people without comfortable retirements, without adequate health care, and living in poverty. Only a government can spend so much money so ineffectually. The solution is to give the money to the people.”
- Charles Murray

I would love to say that this idea was my own, but Charles Murray deserves all the credit for this plan that is both simple and extremely effective in giving power back to the people and out of the hands of an ineffective bureaucratic government. The basis for the plan is that the United States scrap all of its income-transfer programs – including Social Security, Medicare, and all forms of welfare – and give every American twenty-one years and older $10,000 a year for life.

I strongly encourage you to read Murray’s In Our Hands : A Plan To Replace The Welfare State where he lays out in detail the benefits to the country as a whole and specifically to those groups of people that the income-transfer programs are suppose to be helping today. It is a surprising easy and fast read about such a weighty topic. To summarize the points that resonant with me:

Every American over 21 would have health insurance, in the same manner nearly every American driver has to have liability insurance
Every American would have the ability to guarantee themselves a better retirement nest egg than social security will every provide them
Americans living in poverty today will have the means to pull themselves above the poverty line
Single mothers have the means to collect the child support they should be receiving from absent fathers
Higher income individuals would have their payments gradually decreased as the amount of their income grew

If I Were President…

I would establish a group to create a workable model of the Murray Plan and would then work with Congress to get the plan passed into law. The ultimate goal would be the elimination of the Social Security, Medicare and other welfare programs as we know them today while at the same time ensuring that all Americans have the ability to gain health care insurance and provide themselves a more than adequate retirement. In addition, the poor would be given a better means to break the chains of poverty while maintaining their individual freedom and responsibility.

Unfortunately, this plan wrestles so much control from government and gives it back to the people that it would be a major undertaking. The attacks from those that oppose it would be relentless and “sound-bite friendly”. “He wants to take money and benefits from the elderly!” “No more food stamps! How will you feed your children?” would be predictable mantras, so supporters of the plan would have to be creative in combating these attacks with fact-based, easy-to-understand and feel-good messages.

This plan, along with a complete overhaul of the income tax system, would be the cornerstones of my economic policy platform.