Comments on: Addressing hunger: Republicans say charity; Dems say government

By: Claimsmaking – Socprobsgroup1

Claimsmaking – Socprobsgroup1 — Wed, 31 Jan 2018 01:31:35 +0000

[…] (Starving small children) […]

By: Arthur Lieber

Arthur Lieber — Mon, 01 Feb 2016 22:27:00 +0000

In reply to Stacy Mergenthal. Stacy, thanks so much as always. It’s great to get responses, but yours are so thoughtful and well-reasoned, I truly appreciate it. And since your comments come early, it means that more people will read them because if we do a good job of Search Engine Optimization (SEO), it means the posts will have long lives. -- Arthur Arthur H. Lieber | Civitas Associates 10845 Olive Blvd., Suite #155 | St. Louis, MO 63141-7760 (map)

By: Stacy Mergenthal

Stacy Mergenthal — Mon, 01 Feb 2016 22:11:00 +0000

The best thing about these results, IMO, is that both Republicans and Democrats have a desire to help people in poverty. The rightwing rails against “entitlement programs” and favors austerity measures, so it is easy to see them as kind of callous and heartless. But government assistance is so much more efficient than charity, reaching the most number of people for the most impact, usually at the lowest cost. Though we don’t tend to think of the government as being efficient, so this is all a little counter-intuitive.

The other aspect of government assistance that I prefer: we see time and time again that when we invest in people in such ways, we get a big return on those investments. For example, every $1 in SNAP benefits spent generates nearly twice that in GDP. It doesn’t make sense to keep cutting these benefits when they so successfully stimulate the economy to everyone’s benefit.

I think government assistance should be the primary means by which we keep poverty and hunger at bay, with charity to supplement.