Curiouser and Curiouser! on charity

All the immorality money can buy

Wed, 19 Apr 2006 11:11:16 +0100

With each day that passes I question further the role of the state in our lives. In my opinion it does more harm than good but the argument I have often stumbled over is the role of welfare payments.

This morning I have read with a sense of glowing happyness an article by Jacob Hornberger (President of the Future of Freedom Foundation) about the separation of charity and state. He compares this to the US constitutions separation of chuch and state.

He also makes some good arguments that state welfare is immoral:

After all, what meaning does charity have when it is engaged in by government? Charity connotes a willing heart of one person that reaches out to help another person. Yet government is based on force, and how can force be reconciled with any meaningful concept of charity?

People who argue that "It's all in a good cause" are, I think, using the end (supporting the poor) to justify the means (forcing me to pay taxes).

Think of it this way: Suppose I hold a gun to someone’s head and force him to take $5,000 out his bank account at an ATM. I then go into the poorest part of Washington, D.C., and I give every cent of what I took from him to poor people. Would anyone say that I had performed a moral or compassionate act?

Isn’t that what the entire concept of the welfare state is based on: a perversion of moral values as well as a denial of the freedom of the individual to decide what to do with his own money? What would be wrong with a system in which people keep their own earnings and decide for themselves which charities, if any, they wish to donate to or which people they wish to help?

And this ultimately comes to the point. In a free society we would keep what we earn and decide where to spend it. If we wanted our society to reflect good values we would voluntarily want to support those charities which we, individually, felt reflected best on our society.

In doing this we would be taking ultimate responsibility for our society. I think this frightens people. They are more comfortable to let the state take their money and do what's right. No matter the evils committed in their name because of it.

Jacob's arguments are better than I have described and I do encourage you to read what he has to say.

Philanthropy

Mon, 26 Jun 2006 09:56:05 +0100

Don Dodge writes that Warren Buffet is donating a considerable chunk of his $44bn fortune to Bill and Melinda gates foundation.

Warren Buffet, the second richest man in the world, announced he is giving the vast majority of his $44 Billion dollar fortune to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. I said in an earlier post that "Bill Gates legacy will be humanitarian philanthropy". Microsoft was the result of his first 30 years of work. In his remaining years, Gates is just 50, philanthropy will be his main mission.

That's an amazing coupe for Gates and something that, well regardless of your stand on Microsoft, you can just like the man for it. Dodge also makes another interesting point:

Gates takes a business like approach to solving human problems. He is serious about producing real results with minimal overhead costs. Compare this to the way the US government or United Nations, or Red Cross, approach problems. The bureaucracy and overhead is ridiculous. They talk forever and get nothing done.

This is an idea close to my heart. I firmly believe that a pound spent by government is, often, a £0.95 wasted. But why is it only the first and second wealthiest men in the world that get to be philanthropists? What about the rest of us?

I think the problem for us is that we find so much of our wealth swallowed by taxes that are used to fund unpopular wars, ineffective programs, and to support chums of the ruling party. I think a lot of us see the foreign aid budget and, looking at our pocket books, think "I gave." And we did.

When charities come a calling what you choose to give on top of what the government liberates from you might hurt.

As an aside I think it is bluntly wrong of charities to use psychological tactics like gift-giving to pressure people into donating. No matter what your cause, unethical behaviour like manipulating people, cannot, in my book, be right. I also don't appreciate the aggressive doorstep tactics that many charity workers seem to have adopted.

I think the answer is to reduce taxation and allow people to decide how they want to be philanthropists. Government should not be about charity and giving away our money to the problem de jour in order to win favourable headlines for the ruling party is not ethical behaviour.

I'd rather give to the Gates Foundation.

Aid

Mon, 03 Jul 2006 12:39:46 +0100

A week ago, writing about philanthropy, I stated that I was unhappy with the present situation where the government steals money from me (i.e. taxation) and then makes itself look good giving it away to foreign powers as aid.

Today I read a piece by Walter Williams about the aid situation that just reinforces this point for me:

...

Zimbabwe provides an excellent example of why foreign aid, as a way out of poverty, is a fool's errand. "Few countries have failed as spectacularly, or as tragically, as Zimbabwe has over the past half decade. Zimbabwe has transformed from one of Africa's rare success stories into one of its worst economic and humanitarian disasters."

...

Botswana shares a heritage with Zimbabwe, for it, too, was a British colony. What it doesn't share with Zimbabwe is what explains its success: the rule of law, minimal corruption and, most of all, respect for private property rights.

...

No amount of Western foreign aid can bring about the political and socioeconomic climate necessary for economic growth. Instead, foreign aid allows vicious dictators to remain in power. It enables them to buy the allegiance of cronies and the military equipment to oppress their own people, not to mention being able to set up "retirement" accounts in Swiss banks. The best thing Westerners can do for Africa is to keep their money and their economic development "experts."

Allowing government to get into the aid business is tantamount to making it foreign policy and, as such, I'm against it. I'd much rather give the same amount of money, voluntarily, to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and see it do some good.