Welfare - are you for or against it and why?

[TheDarkestOfAngels]

Business spending is far more efficient than government spending, not as efficient as personal spending.

That's... an entertaining opinion you have.

Corrupt businesses (save for those involved in the fraud of price fixing, something that is still illegal) can only really effect the public if they have an opportunity to gain unfair advantage through back door deals and favourable legislation - most of the corruption in business is isolated to the scope of the company, it is ultimately the share holders that suffer from business corruption, they are the ones who's resources are being stolen, very unlike the massive scope available to a corrupt government that can quite seriously effect everything.

I'll keep the 'doesn't affect the public' in mind the next time a city sues a company for dumping toxic chemicals in such a way as to affect the groundwater.
But hey, that's just india, it's not like companies never try to get around the evil EPA's enviornmental laws around here...

As far as responsibility is concerned I must ask, regarding what?

Oh... public health for example.
I believe cigarettes and smoke stacks that can cover an entire town in smog on a daily basis would each be an example of not being responsible.
Also: The BP oil spill and their blatant disregard for safety and environmental laws.

I don't care about business being altruistic, it's not their responsibility, they exist to make profit. Altruism should be in the domain of the individual as much as is possible, we shouldn't expect corporations to fork out money and when they do we should praise them for it, reward them by giving them our business, if we can make these actions something that will assist in their public image and customer base it will give more businesses incentive to do the same.

Indeed, and their desire to make a profit often supercedes that of their own customers and their own employees.

In New Zealand right now there is a round table of the 30 biggest corporate bodies providing altruistic services to the people in Christchurch such as free phonecalls, food, shelter, manufactured goods, rental cars, properties etc. To say that the big corporates don't have the potential for altruism is plain wrong.

And I've brought examples of companies behaving badly and for every corrupt, evil government that dared to get their hands in food safety, I can give twenty examples of governments that do just as well in terms of providing their promised services - regardless of relative power or influance - all the way from the federal level (the US government) to the local level (my own local city governments) who, every day, are making damn sure the roads are clear, people aren't freezing on the streets, and businesses have a good local climate in which to prosper, despite putting their filthy, filthy hands in the local economics and spending my money to do all of this.

Your drawing all of this back to corporate interests is a red hearing, what is more important is personal spending, giving people their taxes back so they can buy their own health, home, contents insurance, letting people build homes without the red tape forcing the prices up, letting people come to their own decisions about the risks they want to take and making them ultimately responsible for their decisions.

Indeed, at the cost of the civil services that provides free, clean water, police, road clearing services, healthcare, education, making sure my food doesn't have rat poison in it, and allowing me to have something for when I retire regardless of the condition of the economy or even my occupation.

There is a BIG difference between someone being exuberant with their own money that was earned legitimately and government taking that money on penalty of imprisonment only to squander a good portion of it, if they take money from someone who has obtained it through force, fraud or coercion then FINE I'm more than happy to see it taken from them, but just because someone earns a ton of money through a business that sells goods and services at a great quantity or at a great margin does not mean they should be stolen from by the state. It's even worse when government are talking 25% (through income and sales tax) of the money available to those who aren't wealthy and funnelling it through their wasteful system. Make the first $50,000 tax free, that way no broke people will have to pay any taxes, they'll have their own money to spend their own way, personal spending is FAR more efficient, they'll get far better value for money.

I'm not talking about their own money, I'm talking about people who buy private jets for corperate or company use (I suppose I should have said 'corperate jets' but I was thinking something completely different.) Be that as it may, you talk as if companies haven't figured out how to squander their own money on bad investments or inefficiency.

People are not obligated to help others, we may judge their character based on such things, but it would still be wrong to steal from a wealthy person to give to others, especially when his only "crime" is being a successful entrepreneur - Call them selfish or a money hoarder if you like, that's not a crime, it just makes them a selfish and a bit of an ass. Does someone being selfish give me an ethical imperative to take from them? Is it ethical to steal from someone just because they're an ass? Fuck no.

Is it wrong to collaborate with your copetitors to be able to sell your product at 100x their market cost to a customer base that literally depend upon your product (like the pharma companies?)
Is that legally theft?
It might be in a society that allowed its government to get its filthy hands into monopoly busting and customer protection, which is where my tax dollars go.

Um... That's part of the fucking problem, if the government doesn't have that power then you CAN'T buy off politicians to get them to create taxpayer supported market conditions in favour of corporate interests. This is an argument for LESS government, not more...

Indeed, if the government doesn't have that power, then those companies don't need to buy off those politicians. Instead, those companies can do whatever lying, cheating, or other activities that would be illegal in a nation like the United States currently.
It's like saying that there wouldn't be any crime if there were no laws - as if that was a desirable position to have.

The banks that should have failed are now richer than before, it clearly didn't work.

Yeah more jobs would have been lost short to mid term, but there would also be a more balanced economy right now, instead it's even more twisted as a result of the bailouts and job losses being a slight number less than otherwise will not make a better long term picture - Governments think in terms of election cycles, there is no doubt that the stimulus and bailouts had a short term impact but they are going to make things worse long term, for starters the teaser interest rates on the new set of loans are going to expire soon, the government debt will start climbing faster and faster than before - Countries will have to cut more services, jobs, raise taxes, print money and lower the value of savings etc to a GREATER extent if they had let the economy rebalance the first time, If Bush had let the NASDAQ and DotCom bubble burst the first time there would have been no housing bubble and the outlook right now would be FAR better - What does Obama do? The same damn thing that bush did to cause the housing bubble, only 4 fold MORE spending - Shit is going to hit the fan in a few years, wait and see.

And that is a problem (that politicians are always thinking about their election cycles), which is a good analogy for the way companies are always thinking of maximizing their profits, even over human life.
Yes, we could have let those banks collapse and possibly have even allowed America to collapse into a third world nation along with them, given the number of destitute and jobless people that would have resulted once these huge huge companies defaulted and went belly-up.
How dare the government think of doing anything to help the nation they're charged with protecting and the economy they're charged with making sure doesn't collapse....

1. Criminals don't give a shit about regulations so it doesn't matter how many you put in place, people like Bernie are going to try and rip people off all the same. Government regulations or the lack there of are COMPLETELY irrelevant in that case.

Oh really? Are you sure about that?
Wow. What insight about how criminals don't care about the law, so clearly because criminals don't care about the law, it's pointless to regulate them. Are you serious? With that logic, then the only thing keeping the world from a perfect utopia is all law, government, and society everywhere. We should just live in total anarchy ... because people totally won't take advantage of other people like that. Puh-lease.

2. Giving government the power to regulate is the same thing that creates the opportunity for businesses to influence politicians and get favourable conditions. A business with a tilted playing field can do far more damage than a business in a free market.

Of course it gives them the opportunity to influence polticians - because there's a law or regulation they want to work around. If it didn't exist, they would be able to do it anyway regardless of the harm it would cause.

Just as bad? Bullshit. Capitalism is how the USA became the most powerful nation in the world while retaining all of the liberties it was founded upon. It was only with the increased interference that both the liberties and the prosperity has dissipated.

Oh really? When was that? Was it after WW2 during the roaring fifties, when taxes was far, far higher than it was today? After the enormous number of social and regulatory laws that Hoover, FDR, and other presidents instituted?
Was this back during the industrial revolution after the civil war but before the depression when we were still on the gold standard and before things like big oil, the railroad monopolies, and other institutions that were dealt with through the institution of regulation?
I seem to recall the biggest and greatest American events (including the moon landing) well after the sweeping social reforms that made America much like it is today, which was a result of busting the monopolies that resulted from our far more unregulated history during the 1800s.
American Lassiez-Faire capitalism didn't last long until a few companies just fucking took over and started setting their own prices.

ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME????

Firstly, Name me ONE state manufacturer that, tax funding included, creates better and cheaper products than a corporate rival. Doesn't mean shit if Pr (private) Sells product x for $3.99 and Pu (public) sells product x for $3.50 when Pu has also received tax funding greater than the difference - It's like saying Public General Practitioners are cheaper by 20% even when you take into account the fact that half of their costs are subsidised - All you do is make it untenable for people to use a private GPs because the government is already taking their wages to subsidies Pu GPs and the money being used by the government suffers the typical 20-30% waste.

Amtrak, DARPA, the Post Office, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and others I don't have the time to look up now. I couldn't find any government run manufacturing businesses and I'm not sure why you limited your question to those.
Further, your example is cutting hairs. I'm talking about the quality of service but mostly the ability of people to actually run these businesses or government organizations - not the price of a manufactured product or whether or not it recieves subsidies.
I assume because you're trying to "get" me somehow by focusing it into such a narrow topic, but I don't really care either way.

Secondly, If you actually believe that public jobs are better why aren't you a full blown communist?

For the same reason I'm not a libertarian. I'm really not interested in having the wealthy elite in this country run my life as much as I don't want a government to do the same. What you don't realize is that you're advocating the same thing as communism under the same magical and unrealistic thinking that makes people think communism can work.