UK Emergency Budget

[Frozzy]

None of the burden of this budget is on the very poorest. All of it is falling on people who are incredibly wealthy.

It's not a developed/developing world dichotomy. Especially when you consider that an intra-national budget has absolutely no impact on the welfare of poor individuals.

Consider this. The US/EU/Japan racks up eight times as much revenue from agricultural tariffs than it spends in foreign aid.

Then, consider than because western nations promise so much aid that then doesn't work because the delivery is so woefully ineffective due to its fragmentation and its lack of economies of scale, western countries lose all credibility when targets are not met and the actual impact of such aid is minimal compared with the dollar amount. Then, consider that aid doesn't translate into investment, but it certainly does translate with reduced competitiveness for developing countries.

So, the net result is that people on lower incomes who can't afford the heating bill when everyone else can are miserable, poor people in Africa have no jobs because there's no effective infrastructure development and are miserable, farmers in Africa are miserable because they are priced out by western tariffs, and governments across the developing world are cynical about western attempts to help them develop their industry or allocate mineral resource effectively, and pretty much every exporter in the developing world is hacked off because your aid inflows inflated their currency and destroyed their competitiveness more than punitive Western tariffs ever did.

This is all because good-willed people in the west hide behind dollar amounts and a paradoxical system.

So, as Laz says quite succinctly, why should the least wealthy in the developed world have to bear a greater burden of this daft arrangement?

[Kuciwalker]

Sophistry. Where do the western world's poor get their goats and subsistence farms to emulate the 3rd World peasant state you're currently sporting such a bulging erection for, Trust Fund Boy?

This is a such a bizarre strawman that I have no idea how to respond.

Are you trying to suggest that with the ~1.2% drop in net income for the bottom decile of UK citizens, they'll starve unless given the opportunity to work on farms?

Or are you trying to suggest that the quality of life for a bottom-decile Briton really is comparable to that of an average African or Indian?

You seem to be complaining that the temperature is a little too warm just as your neighbor's house burns down.

Now explain again why you think it's better that the burden of funding the world's poor falls disproportionately on the developed world's poor, compared to the developeed world's rich. Without resorting to more sophistry or I'll just start making fun of you.

This is also a strawman.

My desire is for Western governments to adopt policies that maximize present and future quality of life for all people, not just the ones born in certain places. Most plausible* candidates probably involve a substantial focus on Western economic and technological growth combined with free trade and open immigration - three proven recipes for improving third-world standards of living.

Taxation and spending structures designed to help the "poor" in the first world figure into these policies for two reasons:
1) Maintaining a certain degree of social stability, which helps maintain the political will to pursue the other policies.
2) Promoting economic growth both through (1) and through higher fiscal multipliers.
3) (Probably much less important in terms of net effect, at least at the margin) actually improving quality of life for these individuals. In particular, if we were free to spend the same money on the poor without jeopardizing (1) and (2), we'd probably get a MUCH better return on quality of life.

*sadly, massive transfer payments probably aren't politically plausible, and so anything of the sort should be disguised as much as possible so the public doesn't notice it

[Kuciwalker]

Consider this. The US/EU/Japan racks up eight times as much revenue from agricultural tariffs than it spends in foreign aid.

Then, consider than because western nations promise so much aid that then doesn't work because the delivery is so woefully ineffective due to its fragmentation and its lack of economies of scale, western countries lose all credibility when targets are not met and the actual impact of such aid is minimal compared with the dollar amount. Then, consider that aid doesn't translate into investment, but it certainly does translate with reduced competitiveness for developing countries.

What could possibly make you think I support any of those policies? I hate tariffs and can't see why anyone would want our foreign aid to be ineffective.

So, as Laz says quite succinctly, why should the least wealthy in the developed world have to bear a greater burden of this daft arrangement?

I never said they should. I just think the idea that they are entitled to things a majority of the world's population lacks, just because they happen to live on a particular island, is disgusting.

[Hauldren Collider]

Direct transfers may well be more effective.

False, improperly placed incentives with that results in it often ending up in the hands of warlords or perpetuating economic inefficiency, prolonging the hardship.

[Kuciwalker]

False, improperly placed incentives with that results in it often ending up in the hands of warlords or perpetuating economic inefficiency, prolonging the hardship.

You have absolutely no idea whether the incentive effect dominates the immediate gain in quality of life.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

I never said they should. I just think the idea that they are entitled to things a majority of the world's population lacks, just because they happen to live on a particular island, is disgusting.

Address the question. Do you think it's fair the least wealthy in the developed world have to bear a greater burden of the arrangement?

Don't try evading it again- it was your decision to bring international aid into this discussion on whether this budget is fair.

Feel free to express it in numbers- arrange the deciles of the UK population by income and place figures for percentage of income you feel each one should pay to fund your overseas aid package.

[Kuciwalker]

Address the question. Do you think it's fair the least wealthy in the developed world have to bear a greater burden of the arrangement?

I don't think fairness exists as a coherent concept.

[Kuciwalker]

And even if it did, it would have no input on what was the correct course of action.

[ricketyclik]

fairness

[Kuciwalker]

None of those definitions relate to morality without being defined circularly

[Kuciwalker]

In particular, "free from bias, dishonesty, or injustice" requires we figure out what is just - which is the same question.

[C0ckney]

didn't plato already figure out what is just, or rather, what justice is...

[Kuciwalker]

Also, if fairness were coherent then it would definitely be unfair that your government is spending anything on their welfare when people still die from famine and drought.

[Kuciwalker]

Really simple decision model that is largely correct: group A is starving and group B is not? Let's spend our resources on group A before we help group B.

[MikeH]

So famine and drought in other countries means that 'fairly' we should allow our old and disabled to starve to death on the streets homeless? Is that your argument really?