Compounding the Welfare Mess

Ironically, the professional staff of the House Ways and Means Committee, a group controlled by the Democrats, has criticized the Republican Nixon welfare program chiefly from a conservative point of view.

The staff analysis asserts that, by extending welfare to working families, “the government, in a sense, would be telling a working father that he is officially not capable of supporting his family at what the government believes is the necessary level. One possible reaction of some fathers may be to let the government take over the job of completely supporting his family.” Another criticism is that when he looks at how the plan applies to his family, a father “may soon realize that the only way for him to increase his income is to have a larger family. …” A third criticism is that some families might buy goods to reduce their cash assets, “a color TV, for example.” A fourth is that “government supplements to the wages of the working poor could create a subsidized pool of cheap labor to employers.”

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Henry Hazlitt

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Ironically, the professional staff of the House Ways and Means Committee, a group controlled by the Democrats, has criticized the Republican Nixon welfare program chiefly from a conservative point of view.

The staff analysis asserts that, by extending welfare to working families, “the government, in a sense, would be telling a working father that he is officially not capable of supporting his family at what the government believes is the necessary level. One possible reaction of some fathers may be to let the government take over the job of completely supporting his family.” Another criticism is that when he looks at how the plan applies to his family, a father “may soon realize that the only way for him to increase his income is to have a larger family. …” A third criticism is that some families might buy goods to reduce their cash assets, “a color TV, for example.” A fourth is that “government supplements to the wages of the working poor could create a subsidized pool of cheap labor to employers.”