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Comments
Also, between Plessy v. Ferguson and Brown v. Board of Education, who's right?
Also, the Constitution aims to "promote the general welfare".
No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; in essence good call. though i'll have to look at context and meaning of the words in 1868. and from my current understanding the other case is a good call under that clause as well but again i'll have to check specific meaning.
Also i'm saying that if it is ever deamed nessecary it will make its way in to the constitution via the amendment process outlined in Article V
This is pretty subjective, not to mention that it's easy for someone to state (whether truthful or not) that they don't gain.
> not like in the modern "welfare" state where programs favor certain demographics.
Not everyone will gain equally from anything. Y'know, maintaining the stretch of I-84 near where I live is not going to benefit anyone living in Thermopolis, Wyoming. It's also not going to benefit those people who live around here but don't use cars. Or those people who live around here, use cars, but don't use limited-access expressways.
...well, why don't you name a program that you say is a "modern 'welfare' state [program that] favor
certain demographics".
Also people keep using roads as an argument without understanding that they are specifically covered in Article 1 Section 8 Clause 7
>
corpretcorporate welfare, bailoutsHelping out certain companies can prevent or minimize their layoffs when they're doing poorly, and help it retain its employees, who themselves have lives and will spend money in their livelihoods, more money than they would if they didn't have a job, which will in turn keep the local economy moving. And on top of retaining jobs, also allow the company to continue its operations, including such things as material purchases for its products/services and capital maintenance/replacement.
> subsidies
The above paragraph applies to subsidies to companies.
Subsidies to other organizations can be similar explained.
* schools: increase education level, which benefits both the nation's economy as a whole as well as the aspirations of local residents, decreasing crime as people have more to hope for in their lives and their children
* higher education: decrease brain drain, attract talent, help create high-paying jobs (which will generate more income taxes), attract investment in community, and those upper-middle-class people who are scientists and scholars are likely to seek wealthier lifestyles, creating local demand for more goods and services (especially luxury goods), causing people and companies to invest in businesses in the area; also,
* law enforcement: decreasing crime rate will make a neighborhood more stable and attractive to businesses as well as more affluent potential residents
* local governments: see above reasons for schools and law enforcement, as well as other large infrastructure projects; development of utility lines (electricity/water/gas/etc.) requires capital investment to encourage businesses and developers from other places to invest in and build up the locales, benefitting the town and the businesses from elsewhere. Not to mention that it's in any state and country's interest to fix blighted neighborhoods, by a combination of increased law enforcement, taking down old blighted buildings, building new residential neighborhoods, and more.
* need any more examples?
> affirmative action
Based on the assumption that certain minorities are disproportionately disadvantaged, and also noting that various minority groups are more likely to be found living in or near poverty and in less preferable neighborhoods, this is supposed to help even the playing field for them and ensure them economic opportunities that will aid in community improvements across the country, albeit most notably in cities. And then take the reasoning above, that no state or country likes to show off its poor people.
> federal regulatory agencies
These are to set rules on how commerce works. For example, it says that food has to be up to a certain standard of cleanness. If people don't have to worry about their food being unclean and constantly waste their own time and money checking it out, or if people don't have to waste time and money (and lives!) dealing with food-borne illnesses, this makes people have more time to devote to living productive lives, including more opportunities for personal economic advancement--which in turn, due to their consumer spending and to income taxes, generates more wealth for the state and nation as a whole. For an environmental protection example: It's better to tell people that they can each catch only so many fish than to let people fish everything willy-nilly and then come back next year to find no more fish, and it's better to tell someone not to pollute a lake than to have a lake that no one can fish from and that's a gigantic cesspool. Remember that many environmental features are prized for their ability to keep out dust, clean out pollution, block out noise, and provide arable land...which can go on to feed many people in faraway places. And this is on top of the tourism revenue that is provided by people who want to see environmental features.
----
Of course, whether any of these actually have these beneficial effects is up to debate. Just like whether some guy from Thermopolis will ever benefit from I-84 Connecticut exit 62 being maintained well is up to debate. Not saying that all of them are equally good or bad; just saying that they are equally subject to being up to debate. That said, affirmative action is probably the iffiest one of them all.
However, you should know these things:
1.
> only provides aid and money
Of the five categories you gave, only corporate welfare, bailouts, and subsidies are in the form of payments.
2.
> special interest groups
Once you start learning about politics, you will realize that everyone is a special interest group. In other words, the term "special interest group" is...pretty much a meaningless term used by people all over the place to criticize people, actions, programs, and ideas they don't like.
3. Sometimes, people's liberties come into conflict. If you are a policymaker (and this includes judges who have to decide how law is interpreted when it is vaguely written), you are forced to decide who gets to do stuff and who doesn't. You can talk about liberty and how great it is all you want, but if you're given the situation to deal with, and your job is to govern the town/city/county/state/country...well, you will have to make some tough choices, because things don't work in real life like you might think they do in philosophical rambling.
I thought I already showed you that collectives can be voluntarily created by perfectly nice people already. It's vertical collectivism that you don't like; horizontal collectivism is totally fine.
That said, as I noted, affirmative action is probably the most controversial of the items you mentioned.
However, the problem is NOT that it "violates the principle of voluntaryism"; it's that some people feel that it makes employers prioritize race/ethnicity over skill. That said, this is a complicated issue, when you're sorting out why a group of people is poor.
> many regulations are put in place to favor certain groups
Someone always benefits (at least in the short term) from any particular piece of legislation. Just because something favors a certain group does not mean that it is a bad or good idea.
> or collectives
What do collectives have to do with this? And why do you specially mention collectives? It seems that you're just oversensitive to the term. And a few other things.
> increasing work related issues because of the regulation placing strain on small business3es especially.
Actually, there are a lot of small business exemptions and assistance programs for employer mandates and business regulations.
> Subsidies and bailouts only serve to keep inefficent businesses and
companies afloat and removes the consequences for fucking up.
This is definitely a danger of subsidies and bailouts. I totally agree that things like the bailout of AIG had the result of removing consequences for fucking up from the mindset of some of these businesspeople. However, to their credit, the U.S. government did let Lehman Brothers crash and burn--something businesspeople really weren't expecting. That should teach them a lesson for starters, though I am not sure the lesson was enough. I would like to see those who champion the free market so ardently and so stridently rail against government regulations also die by the free market when it leads them to their doom. That said, that's another issue altogether. However, keep in mind that doing badly in business is not always the result of the company itself "fucking up", but may be due to completely out-of-their-control factors.
On the other hand, bailouts may be beneficial to society as a whole when the bad thing (allowing people to get off scot-free for fucking up) is outweighed by good things (keeping people who aren't at fault employed, keeping money in people's pockets for them to spend and help keep a local or national economy running, or keeping certain companies afloat for international reasons). Subsidies may also be beneficial by helping to promote business decisions that, while beneficial in the long term, may be seen as detrimental in the short term.
...and could you please learn to use punctuation?
OH BURNNNIf you're just going to simply distrust any "government" and its actions, then so be it. It would be nice if we each lived in our own worlds, and I could tell you, you live like that, and you deal with the consequences of things that don't work out when you don't have a government managing them.
However, unfortunately, we're forced to share this one world, this one country, for better or for worse, and we should all be prepared for our ideas to get outvoted by someone else.
also Article 1 Section 8 Clause 1 with relevent parts bolded.
Clause 1: The Congress shall have Power To lay and
collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and
provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United
States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform
throughout the United States;
propriety of resorting to the sense in which the Constitution was
accepted and ratified by the nation. In that sense alone it is the
legitimate Constitution. And if that be not the guide in expounding it,
there can be no security for a consistent and stable, more than for a
faithful exercise of its powers. If the meaning of the text be sought in
the changeable meaning of the words composing it, it is evident that
the shape and attributes of the Government must partake of the changes
to which the words and phrases of all living languages are constantly
subject. What a metamorphosis would be produced in the code of law if
all its ancient phraseology were to be taken in its modern sense!
supposed meaning is the actual meaning based on a Plain Text reading of
the Constitution.
The problem is that you assume that a plain text reading of the Constitution will definitely contain the information you need to govern any and every situation that will ever come up.
It doesn't.
they want the power they seek to have it amended as outlined in Article
V. You think like a nationalist and that scares me.
Well, by your logic, that means that the federal government can regulate anything that counts as business that crosses state lines.
That's just one example of where things are vaguely worded.
You cannot simply hold onto your ideal of "only do what the Constitution says" when it is not clear what the Constitution says. Or when doing literally what the Constitution says becomes silly.