by Tom DeWeese, American Policy Center, ©2021
(Jun. 21, 2021) — You are a poor minority living in a government housing project called “Affordable.” It’s all paid for by the tax dollars of mostly middle-income Americans. Included in still more government programs are monthly checks and coupons to supply food, free healthcare, free education, and let’s also throw in free cell phone.
Does that not make us a generous nation? Are not the poor well cared for and satisfied? Aren’t the taxpayers proud of their contribution to the common good?
The answer to every one of these questions is NO!
First, consider these facts about that stipend income from the welfare check. Originally, it was called “assistance” and the purpose was to help out when the paycheck wasn’t quite covering needs. Then that system was changed and the welfare check means you can’t hold a job as you are collecting that monthly check. If a recipient even tries to put some away in savings, just an attempt to get ahead, it is confiscated and possibly the welfare check stops. It’s no longer “assistance” during hard times. Now it’s control.
Then there is that public housing situation. Here’s what it’s like to actually live in those government projects. In many cities these neighborhoods are drastically rundown in disrepair as lights, air conditioning, and appliances fail to work. The roof leaks, windows are broken, and the plumbing backs up. Trash around the grounds is in ever-growing piles, is rarely, if ever cleaned and hauled away. Don’t even think about any kind of yard work to create a place for the children to play. Worse, the residents live in fear of gang elements like MS-13 that have taken over the neighborhoods to rule as their territory. Pimps, pedophiles, and drug dealers prey on the children. And no matter how many times residents may ask for repairs, it never happens.
Why are the conditions so bad in this government-controlled housing? Government is a monopoly that has no incentive to be efficient. The taxpayers are forced to pay and the money rolls in so the politicians can puff out their chests over how generous THEY are in helping the less fortunate. Meanwhile, the management of these properties is by government bureaucrats with no personal stake in the projects. Their paychecks keep rolling in, no matter what happens to the properties they manage. Only private owners care about the condition of their property.
In such an atmosphere, the inherent hopelessness leaves little room for making future goals for their lives. There is no way out once the system has a hold on you. By herding African-Americans, other minorities, and low-income families like cattle, the government is committing them to a future worse than poverty. They have lost their rights, their choices, and their ability to excel through self-determination and personal growth.
Yet, proponents of government’s fair housing want you to think that those favoring the programs are the compassionate ones, helping minorities to survive in an oppressive capitalist world of the rich. Essentially, fear is the common tactic used to keep minorities in their programs. Anyone who opposes their system of control and, instead, argues sound economics and a system of equal opportunity, is accused of heartlessness and racism, determined to pull the plug on their lifeline.
To promote the fear and division, politicians, the news media, and the public education system continually drive home the message that our nation’s founders created an oppressive society in which Whites got all the goodies and minorities are deliberately oppressed. In addition, goes their propaganda, the free enterprise system is designed to take the money from the poor and put it in the rich man’s pocket. The result is strife, jealousy, and hatred between the races.
Read the rest here.
Tom DeWeese is one of the nation’s leading advocates of individual liberty, free enterprise, private property rights, personal privacy, back-to-basics education and American sovereignty and independence.