Social Justice... Does it really mean the lazy never have to work again?

[English assassin]

the meaning of social justice seems to have changed in the UK. In the fifties, the left were for "equality" and the right for "justice" (amongst a lot of other things in each case).

Now I notice, just as spending has become "investment" equality seems to have become "social justice". Yet if you look t what is being touted as social justice it is fairly clearly an equality agenda.

IMHO social justice means equal opportunities. That does mean quite a lot of public (or it may be charitable) spending, since to have equal opportunities you do need to make sure everyone can get a good education, has good health, that no one is denied a job because of their race or disability and so on. I vote for that, yes please.

ocial justice does not nmean equal outcomes. it is no part of justice that you are sheilded from the consequences of your own freely chosen actions. In fact that strikes me as the opposite of justice. I really can't understand why the left thinks taking money (which I work for and which no one has to pay me) from me and giving it to someone else is a good thing (unless the someone else is, say, a teacher doing a good job at the right wage in which case I am all in favour of it, see above.)

So, sorry Don, but I am violently agreeing with you.

[Don Corleone]

IMHO social justice means equal opportunities. That does mean quite a lot of public (or it may be charitable) spending, since to have equal opportunities you do need to make sure everyone can get a good education, has good health, that no one is denied a job because of their race or disability and so on. I vote for that, yes please.

Hear, hear. (Or is it, here here. Or, hear here? ) Couldn't agree more.

So, sorry Don, but I am violently agreeing with you.

That actually strongly implies to me that I must be in a good train of though.


Big Tex... agree 100%. You ever wonder if actually raising the minimum wage would even be necessary if we actually enforced our immigration policy?

Seamus... I agree with you. But, at the end of the day, what is the greater good: your ability to freely give, or that those in need receive aid? I know plenty of Christian people (I would argue they are no such thing) that do not believe in any charity beyond passing money to the collection plate. Apparently, they missed where Jesus mentioned tithing and alms separately. I'm not even certain that they require (or inquire) whether their church is actually meeting the needs of the poor with it. In an ideal world, yes, we'd all give enough to make certain that a woman with 3 kids who just left her abusive husband has a place to stay and food to eat within 12 hours. But the reality? Eh....

[BDC]

People will always play the system. It's inevitable.

You either feed those who really need it and end up sucking up a few lazy idiots, else you let the genuinely poor and vulnerable die.

[Don Corleone]

I actually agree with you on this point BDC. At the end of the day, any human system is going to come complete with human error. On which side do we want to err?

That's not my point. I'm talking about actually designing the system so lazy bums are ENTITLED to these benefits, not sneaking around and picking them up by exploiting loopholes.

In the mid-90's, welfare reform was a huge issue. I was at a public forum where an economics professor and two sociology professors claimed that making able bodied adult men work for welfare benefits was sadism. The woman on the panel started crying, saying we were right back to the days of slavery, because black men on welfare would be forced to work for the plantation owner (she was white, for the record). It was at this point that I got up to leave. It's this mentality... that we must design a system that rewards people for their own pre-chosen laziness and worthlessness that I am railing against.

There's always holes in any policy meant to contain spending... that doesn't mean that you abandon the concept of constraining spending.

[Big King Sanctaphrax]

the meaning of social justice seems to have changed in the UK. In the fifties, the left were for "equality" and the right for "justice" (amongst a lot of other things in each case).

Now I notice, just as spending has become "investment" equality seems to have become "social justice". Yet if you look t what is being touted as social justice it is fairly clearly an equality agenda.

IMHO social justice means equal opportunities. That does mean quite a lot of public (or it may be charitable) spending, since to have equal opportunities you do need to make sure everyone can get a good education, has good health, that no one is denied a job because of their race or disability and so on. I vote for that, yes please.

ocial justice does not nmean equal outcomes. it is no part of justice that you are sheilded from the consequences of your own freely chosen actions. In fact that strikes me as the opposite of justice. I really can't understand why the left thinks taking money (which I work for and which no one has to pay me) from me and giving it to someone else is a good thing (unless the someone else is, say, a teacher doing a good job at the right wage in which case I am all in favour of it, see above.)

So, sorry Don, but I am violently agreeing with you.

I mostly agree with you on this issue-acheiving social equality should be paramount, and, if this were acheived, we would not need any kind of the second sort of justice that you mention. However, until this is acheived it must be conceded that some people are disadvantaged through no fault of their own, and an arguement can be made for some limited government handouts on this basis.

On the whole though, you're bang on.

[Duke Malcolm]

I have never understood the concept of "social justice"...

Occassionally it seems clear, obvious, but then I take a walk through the city centre and see a Scottish Socialist Party stall with "Fighting for Social Justice" emblazoned on a bed-sheet above a foldout garden table -- and they are about giving money to those who do not work and a myriad other bizarre and unworkable policies. And bandying about words such as "fascist", "imperialist", and a variety of others upon anyone who disagrees with the, as is the tendency of such socialists...

But how can simply giving money out be Social Justice? Surely social justice should be the equal treatment of all, not preferential treatment to the poor and penalising the rich? Shouldn't it focus on increasing the mechanisms for social mobility to both encourage people into worthwhile jobs with higher pay rather than reducing the pay gap by giving out money?

[Don Corleone]

I'm afraid I'm not familiar enough with British domestic politics, but let me offer an analogy from American politics (sorry for the provinicialism).

FDR with the Tenessee Valley Authority... this is what I have in mind when I think of positive Social Justice. Here, FDR recognized that because so many family breadwinners were out of work, the social fabric of the country was eroding. People were starving, losing generational wealth (such as family homesteads), the works. With the depressed state of the economy, he recognized that he had to infuse cash from the government into the hands of families: for food, for mortgage payements, etc. But he also realized 1) it should be a temporary solution 2) it should be a "hand-up, not a hand-out". So he created the TVA, and basically, if you were the family breadwinner and got laid off, you went to work for the government. You built hiking trails in national parks. You built dams. You built roads. You built all sorts of public works. The government became the USA's biggest employer, and much of our infrastructure hearkens back to those days.

However, what FDR proposed as a temporary solution became enshrined in law. Then the 60's came. LBJ declared war on poverty and launched the Great Society. Cash payments from the government went from being payments to entitlements. By virtue of the fact you were consuming oxygen, you had a right to expect cash from the government, and you got it. This is, in my mind, social justice at its worst.

What's wrong with requiring people receiving public funds to work for the public? If I go on unemployment insurance, or if I'm receiving WIC (food assistance labelled as Women, Infants and Children) or living in Section 8 housing (the government pays the majority of my rent/mortgage), why shouldn't the government have the right to put me to work?

[BDC]

why shouldn't the government have the right to put me to work?

Do you want lazy bums building your roads though? The work would be shoddy and you'd be better just advertising for the jobs anyway as otherwise more people would be out of work. I think it's difficult drawing comparisons from a time when the economy was genuinely destroyed and there was no work, even for those who were desperately looking for it, and now, when almost anyone could make in in America with lots of effort and some luck.

There's also an issue with management here - historically in Britain the parish would put you to work on something and then pay you for it. I think this sort of system is (or was until fairly recently) used in the Channel Islands. This doesn't work particularly well on a larger scale because of the huge amount of paperwork involved nationally in making sure everyone who can work can, and you aren't starving people who genuinely cannot work.

Ideally in Britain I think more money just needs to be put into educating and motivating bits of the country (i.e. if you live in a souless sink estate, it doesn't surprise me much if you have no ambition and don't try), and closing up silly loopholes.

[Ironside]

I'm not 100% clear with the rules to get unemployment payments in Sweden, but I do know that you have to work at least occationally (through work provided by the goverment, if you cannot get a work by yourself) to get payed.

[English assassin]

What's wrong with requiring people receiving public funds to work for the public?

Well (he says nervously looking over his shoulder in case an economist is listening) there might (or might not) be a few things wrong with it.

Basically you are saying the government will guarantee a job to anyone who wants it. That seems to be what the TVA did. We tried to manage our economy at full employment between 1945 and 1979, and in a sense the government did guarantee jobs (by nationalising failing companies), and it was a disaster. Now, I don't know enough economics to know if it HAS to be a disaster, or if it was just badly done (the nationalisation route removed much incentive for companies not to fail which would not have to be the case if the government simply employed the unemployed directly, so I guess you wouldn't repeat that mistake, but the effect on wage inflation of full employment seems fairly unavoidable).

Also you do need a lot of surplus jobs that aren't being done at all. Sounds like the TVA did have a lot of those jobs but today it might be more difficult.

Finally it might be better for them to be in training rather than working. and some might not be able to work due to disability or caring responsibilities, though I would guess you didn't mean to include those.

All in all I'm not sure about workfare. I think its better to pitch benefits at a level where the moral hazard of chosing a life on benefits is low (which to be fair, it is in the UK, really no one is living the life of Riley on handouts whatever the Daily Mail may think) coupled with good training and education opportunities and more childcare places.