138 Social Programs

<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">What do people think of when you say “social programs”? Welfare? Social Security & Medicare? Child Care? Maternity Leave? Caring for those that cannot care for themselves? These are services that private charities did in the past but we are an evolving, mutable society, and placing the burden for our well-being on other individuals violates their liberty as well as our own. The charities that provided clearly essential services were haphazardly funded, inadequately staffed & at the mercy of circumstance. In modern times, those functions need to come under the jurisdiction of government to provide consistency, management & longevity. Combining the State's duty to propagate itself with its duty to take care of you when you are ill, social programs assume some of the responsible for raising the next generation, as well as nursing the last.</p> <p>We can Depend on Market Forces to drive most of the economy: the competent top quarter of the population will keep the plates spinning & our smart-phones improving, but the majority of Americans need the benefits that society-sponsored social programs can provide, and these needs wax & wane while people are getting started, during their child-rearing years & post-retirement. Even the go-getter, make-things-happen part of your life is limited to perhaps three decades. Social programs are the foundation upon which everyone stands to provide a pyramid of shoulders so the ones at the top can reach for the stars.</p>