Thoughts on Welfare Spending

Hey!

Apologies for not posting in a while - exam periods with somewhat swapped focus.

Today I have two charts for you on the development of the British Government spending. Not actually government spending, but only spending that includes 'benefits' (i.e., transfers, child benefit, jobseeker's allowance, state pensions, sick/unemployed/disability benefits etc).

First, in real terms, how the 'Benefit Spending' has increased over the last 60 years in real terms (that is, cleared for inflation).



So, the UK government spends a whole lot more money on benefits than they've ever done - essentially a constant development seen as far back as this chart goes.

Well, that's a good thing, right? Nay, not necessarily - and from a libertarian perspective, probably not.
What we have to remember here is that every £ the government spends, is a £ taken from all of us through taxation. Arguably, every pound taken up in taxation reduces the private spending by another pound, other things equal.

But the GDP has grown, we're a lot more productive than 60 years ago, thus it makes sense we spend more money?

Sure, let's have a look on the next one.





This shows benefit spending as a percentage of GDP, that is including the economic growth seen since the late 1940s*. Of all the resources we produce, the government has never used such a large portion of those to spend on benefits across the board.

Bottom Line and Question of the Day!
Leftists and Statists always call for higher benefits/tax levels and more equal distribution of means and government expenditure. As these charts show, the levels of benefit spending has never been this high before.  And throughout this period, the left flank, the labour Unions, the socialdemocratic parties have all called for increased redistribution of funds.
Question: What is a decent level? Where is "good enough" for you?

My answer: 0. Remove. Reduce. Abolish.

Have a great Christmas, you all!


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* Sidenote: As GDP being the nominator here, a recession/economic downturn produces a spike in the chart, as seen in late 70s/early 80s, early 90s and recently from 2008 and onward. 2 reasons: GDP drops; and spending in the UK system increases.