Politically Impossible by W. H. Hutt

Author:W. H. Hutt [Hutt, W. H.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Ludwig von Mises Institute
Published: 2011-11-06T16:00:00+00:00

Such optimism might be judged today to have reflected wishful thinking. But Ricardo was a shrewd, hard-headed business man. He was emphasizing a truth which is today inert simply because it is not being put to the people, not because it has been submitted to them and rejected. The point could be effectively communicated to electorates if the mass media presented all sides of the argument. The indoctrination barrier is indeed stronger among the intellectuals — the opinion-formers — than it is among the masses (pp. 13–14). Unless observable or demonstrable circumstances are explicable by them, economic theories will fall on barren soil. But the harm wrought to the masses by current policies, which is obvious to the economist, must be capable of demonstration.

It is easy to understand the pessimism of those who feel it would be hopeless to expect electors accustomed to receiving what they regard as income without effort to vote for income from work instead. But although the numbers of persons receiving ‘relief (‘public assistance’, ‘supplementary benefits’) have grown enormously in Britain and the United States38 (as well as elsewhere), and although they often have the power of a ‘swing group’, the net short-term gainers must still form a minority. The pertinent problem is less how to communicate effectively with the recipients of ‘relief than how to do this with the majority who are standing on their own feet. As the politicians know, taxpayers’ acquiescence cannot be simply taken for granted. There are evidences of growing resentment at ‘squandermania’. If the independent economists made the consequences of current policies plain, the trend of policy might prove to be rapidly reversible.

The welfare system of the Western world has emerged not solely through the cynicism of vote-buying politicians. It has come into being largely because of the altruism and generosity of spirit on the part of many disinterested taxpayers who themselves make up a potential and formidable ‘swing vote’, including those key persons, the ‘independent opinion-makers’. Must this group be expected to react unfavourably to an effort to end the pauperization of a large segment of the less affluent? Why should it be ‘impossible’ for a convinced and inspired leader to make it clear that the recipients of ‘welfare’ are being wronged in so far as they are denied the inducement to work for a living? Suppose a British Prime Minister or an American President of the future announced a policy which replaced state aid by high-wage employment for all able-bodied men and women;39 and suppose he emphasized and demonstrated the human degradation which the system has been observed to cause throughout the whole history of industrial society since the 18th century. Let us imagine, for instance, a future Prime Minister or President saying something like the following:

‘The lessons of history show conclusively that continued dependence on relief induces a spiritual and moral disintegration fundamentally destructive to the national fibre. To dole out relief is to administer a narcotic, a subtle destroyer of the human spirit. The Government must quit this business of relief.

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