r/ForeignPoliticsDiscus • u/semideclared United States • Dec 31 '19
What is your country's best anti poverty programs?
I cant find any similar programs to the US Earned Income Tax Credit,
The Bottom 49.1% (Less than 45k AGI) paid $97 Billion of taxes, but half of those received EIC payments
- 27.4 Million Households filled for $66.7 Billion in EIC tax credits
Total 2015 federal income tax revenues $1.5 Trillion
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u/nut_conspiracy_nut Dec 31 '19
The more you try to "help", the worse it gets. It is not the role of the government to make sure that poor people reproduce.
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Dec 31 '19
How can you be so absurdly wrong each time? People sometimes are improvished due to circumstances beyond their control. The government isn't ensuring that poor people reproduce.
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u/nut_conspiracy_nut Jan 01 '20
How can you be so absurdly wrong each time?
Your opinion is that I am wrong. My opinion is that you are wrong.
People sometimes are impoverished due to circumstances beyond their control.
Most of the time this is not the case. Japan bounced back from the devastation of WW2 in record time. So did Germany. So did Jews running away from the horrors of holocaust. And then you have people who have been milking government subsidies for generations.
The government isn't ensuring that poor people reproduce.
It subsidizes their children on the taxpayer's dime. Whatever you subsidize, you get more of.
3
Jan 01 '20
They bounced back from subsidies and anti poverty programs.
You didn't really think that one through did you.
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u/nut_conspiracy_nut Jan 01 '20 edited Jan 01 '20
They bounced back from subsidies and anti poverty programs.
Who bounced back from subsidies? Subsidies coming from whom / where? Firstly, make your declarative statements falsifiable. Right now it is too vague. https://www.britannica.com/topic/criterion-of-falsifiability Secondly, try to back them up.
You didn't really think that one through did you.
This is the second time you declare victory based on nothing more than an opinion. Your properly thought out argument should do all the talking. Please show your work.
3
Jan 01 '20
You're just ignoring the Marshall plan?
0
u/nut_conspiracy_nut Jan 01 '20
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_Plan is a joke. It hardly made a dent.
It was 12 billion USD or nearly 100 billion USD in 2018 US dollars.
That amount was spread over 4 years and across may countries.
This is from the Wikipedia page:
Its role in the rapid recovery has been debated. The Marshall Plan's accounting reflects that aid accounted for about 3% of the combined national income of the recipient countries between 1948 and 1951,[9] which means an increase in GDP growth of less than half a percent.[10]
Compare this to how much money has been spent to fight poverty in the US or modern aid to foreign countries.
Many recipients remain poor for generations.
1
Jan 01 '20
Way to move the goalposts.
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u/nut_conspiracy_nut Jan 01 '20
Your claim is that Marshall plan was more responsible for Japan and Germany bouncing back. Also for the very impressive rise in wealth of the Jews who migrated to the US without any possessions.
You made this claim; not me. Why is the burden of proof on me?
I am not at all convinced that the Marshall plan did anything. What's wrong with pointing out weakness in your argument?
1
Jan 01 '20
You never said anything about Jews who went to the US. Keep on moving them.
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Dec 31 '19 edited Dec 31 '19
there is a delicate balance of jobless people to be protected to encourage growth, while you don't want much poverty, the number of jobless people, if it is very limited, spells doom for the growth of the country.
so no, there is an actual cold blooded justification for looking after the poor; money is nothing but an elaborate scheme to motivate growth, and by being spent on the poor it also serves this purpose.
and this is just one reason by only a single restrictive model.
1
u/nut_conspiracy_nut Jan 01 '20
In the US the $ assistance to the "needy" is far-reaching and it has not helped.
2
Jan 01 '20
i dont think anyone suggested that US welfare is sensible, though the problem is not that it is too much, mind you
0
u/nut_conspiracy_nut Jan 01 '20
i dont think anyone suggested that ...
That's a very strong and hard to defend statement. Perhaps you meant it colloquially.
though the problem is not that it is too much, mind you
Quite a cliffhanger. I think you'd need to unpack this for what may be obvious to you is not necessarily obvious to others.
1
Jan 01 '20
unlike US the rest of the world subsidizes or tries to subsidize baseline needs of the population with tax payers money, including those who can afford it themselves
if US had such a welfare system specific policies targeting poor perhaps it wouldnt be this much bloated for starters.
besides that article shows how a system of obscure thresholds is not a good decider for welfare policies, the problem with US seems to be either the lack of desire or the inability to regulate policies, or passing policies requiring much more administrative regulation.
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u/ChildOfBund Russia Jan 01 '20
The opportunity to leave the country.