Relief of Poverty: Four Centuries of Futility

John C. Goodman / Townhall Columnist

More than 400 years ago, the British adopted the Poor Law system, under which local communities were made responsible for the relief of poverty. For the next four centuries the Poor Laws were amended again and again, as the following argument went to and fro: Was the system providing necessary relief or was it in various ways interfering with the natural workings of the labor market by subsidizing idleness and encouraging indolence.

At one point a royal commission recommended the following two tests:

• The less eligibility test: a pauper should have to enter a workhouse with conditions worse than that of the poorest free labourer outside of the workhouse.
• The workhouse test:  relief should only be available in a workhouse in which conditions were to be so uninviting that anyone capable of coping outside them would choose not to be in one.

The history of the British Poor Laws makes for interesting reading and even more interesting is their treatment in the novels of Charles Dickens and Frances Trollope and later Jack London.

But before continuing, let’s stop and ask a pertinent question. Do you see anything wrong with this historical approach to welfare?

Muslim bomber sucked out of plane may have hid explosives in laptop
By Robert Spencer / Jihad Watch

 

If this is confirmed, that will be the end of laptops on airplanes, as the TSA continues to play catch-up with jihad terrorists, protecting us from the last jihad mass murder attempt while the jihadis are already preparing for the next one. “Bomber sucked out of plane may have hid explosive in laptop,” by Yaron […]
 
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DHS Ordered Agent to DELETE RECORDS of HUNDREDS of MUSLIMS WITH TERROR TIES

Pamela Geller / Atlas Shrugs

Not only did the Obama administration scrub counter-terror programs of jihad and Islam, now we find out that his administration scrubbed the records of Muslim terrorists. If the enemedia was not aligned with the jihad force, this would be front page news across the nation.

Who gave the order to scrub the records of Muslims with ties to terror groups?

These new shocking revelations come fresh on the heels of whistle-blower testimony in the wake of the San Bernardino jihad slaughter who revealed Obama administration shut down investigations into jihadists in America (and quite possible the SB shooters) at the request of the Department of State and DHS’ own Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Division. “They claimed that since the...

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