Free land, free housing, free education, free healthcare, free cash transfer, and so on. And soon free iPad, free tricycle or free car for the poor.
If this is done in the Philippines or in any other country, then many people will stop working.Or
they may work 6 days a week but also drink and party 6 nights a week and have
zero savings. 100% formula to be poor. Then they will be entitled to those
freebies that will not be given if they are not poor.
The targetted beneficiaries will expand every year, or
every month. When anti-capitalism, anti-inequality NGOs, politicians, academics, etc. advocate that "If you are poor, you
are entitled to lots of freebies", then more people will declare themselves
poor, they will scream and curse if government does not give them the freebies.
About four decades ago,
it was estimated that about 1/3 of the population was poor. Today, it is
estimated that nearly 1/3 of the population is poor. And 3-5 decades from now,
various measurements will say that nearly 1/3 of the population is still poor.
Meaning the endless subsidies and various welfare programs will continue, and
gov't will keep expanding the budget and public debt, will further raise taxes
or create new ones, because "poverty remains high". Raket na, large
scale.
Before, the poor were mostly walking or riding cows, horses and
bicycles. Now the poor are mostly riding motorcycles, tricycles, e-bikes,
jeepneys. Before the poor were using smoke signals or doves or snail mail to
communicate, now they use cellphones with fb, twitter, emails. There is marked
improvement in the quality of life of the poor yet by official measurements,
"poverty remains high". Raket na, large scale.
I can understand new welfare programs, they are implicit
and explicit admissions that some old but still existing welfare programs are
not working and simply waste of taxpayers money. So if new welfare programs have to be created like the CCT, some
old welfare programs should be abolished and defunded. This is not happening.
The racketeers in these non-working programs create endless alibi that they are
still relevant, and OP and Congress agree, so tuloy-tuloy ang over-spending,
over-borrowing.
Now these two developments -- CPP-NPA-NDF negotiators in Europe who are mostly non-Filipinos anymore and have acquired European citizenship -- demand free land distribution to farmers. And squatters or illegal land settlers have moved further, became illegal housing settlers. And they were rewarded by the President, the houses they illegally occupied is given to them for free.
Now these two developments -- CPP-NPA-NDF negotiators in Europe who are mostly non-Filipinos anymore and have acquired European citizenship -- demand free land distribution to farmers. And squatters or illegal land settlers have moved further, became illegal housing settlers. And they were rewarded by the President, the houses they illegally occupied is given to them for free.
Many people are demanding for social revolution -- towards more citizen dependence on the state,
towards more state worship. Society of batugan, tamad and irresponsibles. A
government that's big enough to give everything you want will also be big
enough to take everything you have.
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See also:
Inequality 29, More on Oxfam, squatters and a lamborghini, February 14, 2016
Inequality 30, Filipinos in Forbes' world billionaires, March 04, 2016
Inequality 31, Economics, politics and forcing equality, January 16, 2017
Pol. Ideology 70, Socialism and the politics of envy, April 08, 2017
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