Its a question of how effectively the taxpayer's dollars are spent. By your logic we should just hand the needy cash money.
By my logic, we wouldn't be using government to do this at all, at least not to the extent we are currently. But as long as government
is doing it, we must understand that it is not the same as private charity. With private charity, those doing the giving can put whatever constraints on the gift that they like. But government must play by different rules.
Equal protection under the law is an incredibly important concept. We don't, or at least shouldn't, tolerate a government that treats some people as "more equal" than others. The nature of state services is that they are paid for from general revenues (taxes) that everyone is subject to, and provided to all more or less equally. Most importantly, we don't want to allow the eligibility for any state service to be based on extenuating 'demands'. We wouldn't tolerate cops who only patrolled neighborhoods that regularly supplied them with coffee and donuts, for example.
As I mentioned earlier, the concern I have is with any policy whereby enlisting the services of government reduces your rights as a citizen. In particular, I don't want to see the services we pay for via taxes, used as indirect means of control. The means by which government can exert power over us are supposed to be constrained by constitutional limits, and I see this as just another way around those limits. In short, if I've paid taxes for various safety net programs, or any other government service for that matter, I shouldn't be required to sign away my basic rights to utilize them.
I'm curious how you see the point I was making earlier about nationalizing health care. If health care is turned into a government entitlement, will you be ok with the state setting up similar restrictions and demands in order to use it? This seems like a dangerous development to me, and will open up our personal lives to micromanagement by the state.
I understand the impulse to not want to see 'handouts' misused. But as long as the 'handouts' are provided as a government services, they must (in my opinion) be offered up as equally as possible. I don't want to see them used as yet another tool for social manipulation. We should resist the urge to tell the poor that the must buy the 'right' kind of food, or go to re-education camps, or church, or whatever other thing that well-meaning people might feel is good for them. Those sorts of conditions are fine as "quid-pro-quo" for private charities, but it's improper use of state power.
One way I think that might be both good for businesses, the taxpayer, and those in need is just to find a way to encourage the grocers themselves to restrict the items that can be bought with food stamps. Perhaps a grocer who does not allow junk food to be bought with food stamps could receive some tax credits in exchange. This way we don't have to monitor ever single recipients spending patterns and the problem is taken care of by the market in exchange for financial benefit. We could use the already existing IRS to enforce the rules - busting grocers who sell junk food on food stamps but claim the credit for fraud.
This seems like a horrible idea to me, and a perfect example of the kind of indirect control I'm opposed to. The IRS is there to collect taxes to finance government. Not to push us around.
