From the data I have churned it works the best overall. When you try direct the forces through govt authority, you get very slippery slope creation long term which causes long term collapse....because eventually it turns into the have nots being able to extract from the haves too easily....and long term investment into everything is destroyed.
The argument must always be what is poverty and how to reduce that and eliminate it and what works best for that (free will charity is essentially the natural inclination of the society itself to help solve that for example). But inevitably when the govt gets involved (into forced commodity redistribution...be it subsidies from taxes or whatever), the issue does not focus on poverty anymore, it turns into forced equality (i.e getting rid of all inequality at all costs)....when it is the inequality in essence has arisen from far more complicated constructs in society and cannot be simply solved by throwing money at it (esp money you have extracted from far more potential productive purposes). In fact it does the opposite, inevitably you punish those that have succeeded and reward those that have not....by tyranny of majority essentially (given the perceived have nots will always outnumber the haves in a way a politician will draw and then exploit the definition made). The incentive to succeed and disincentive to fail is thus eroded mightily over time.....govt overreach essentially drastically shortens the cyclical time of boom and bust in a civilisation which to me is bad.
It is just very sad to me that most developing countries too early have fallen into this trap of arguing about and forcibly allocating the cake on perceptions.... rather than letting it grow naturally as big as it can (and the govt stays minimalist and focused only on the key things its there for in first place) till it hits/approaches its natural plateau cycle....when then the discussion can be broadened (and the govt and society itself hopefully has grown and matured to a level where it makes sense to do so).
Take the opportunity cost in Pakistan for example of how the govt has extracted this long from productive avenues to fuel whatever optics (in reality their offshore bank accounts etc) of helping the poor and needy...when really the Islamic Zakat is there in society already to address that organically and by free will.
@Joe Shearer @Gibbs @Chak Bamu
