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Absolutely. The ideal system would combine high worker mobility (at will employment, no non-compete agreements, etc) with a generous safety net to minimize the
by gamble 17y ago
Absolutely. The ideal system would combine high worker mobility (at will employment, no non-compete agreements, etc) with a generous safety net to minimize the cost of losing one's job.
It seems like the issue here is the way unemployment is funded.
- jamesbritt 17y agoAre there not also cultural issues? Some people see a safety net as just that, and use it as a stop-gap while planning on future employment. Others may see it as sweet free ride to milk as long and as much as possible.
- gaius 17y agoThat is the problem we have in the UK. There is a whole welfare based subculture, often referred to as "chavs". Personally I would like to see entitlement to the dole based on education... The taxpayer has paid to educate everyone up to the age of 18. If someone throws away that opportunity and leaves school without qualifications they're unemployable, why should the taxpayer support them in that case?
- Robin_Message 17y agoWell, just maybe because when they are under 18 they are deemed a "child" and the thing about "children" is they don't always act in their long term best interests. They may have been raised badly. They may have done badly at primary school and been left behind by the education system. Yes, some people are feckless scroungers. But punishing them for that is leaving things too late. We need, as a society, to find ways to help people become productive members of our society, wherever they start from.
- gaius 17y agoTo each according to his needs, from each according to his ability. Two sides of the same coin, Comrade.
- dagw 17y agoGive them an opportunity to catch up. If they don't have a high school diploma, make them get one as a condition for getting benefits. Be flexible and offer night classes for people who work part time. I agree that punishing people whom either made bad choices or found themselves in a bad situation as kids is not productive, but it is equally unproductive to leave them in the situation they are.
- gaius 17y agoThe alternative is punishing those who made good choices, by taxing them to pay for the others. And it's not like those choices are even hard to make: ask any 10-year-old if he thinks he might need his education to get a job. People know this. But they know they get a free ride too. That's got to change.
- dagw 17y agoIf I had to chose between my tax money going towards letting people sit at home and watch day time TV or letting them get an education, I'll happily choose the latter every time. Secondly, we're talking about 16 year old kids here. If there is one thing that is pretty much universally true about teenagers it's that they're not very smart. Ask your avg. 16-18 year old high school dropout about the connection between education and jobs and they'll no doubt give you a long list of people who did perfectly fine without a high school diploma. They turn on their TVs and see people making millions without any education at all. Those are their role models. Then they look out their window and see college educated people just as unemployed as they are. Many kids don't see the connection between education as jobs. Telling people who later in life realized they might have made the wrong choice "hey you had a chance when you where a kid, too bad if you missed it", is not doing anyone any favours.
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- Tuna-Fish 17y agoThis also happens to some extent in Denmark. Generally, they think that the cost is worth the benefit of the system.
- billswift 17y agoThe "safety net" should NOT be generous or minimize the "cost of losing one's job"; it should do no more than assure that losing a job is not a catastrophe; it should not be made less than seriously uncomfortable.
- _delirium 17y agoIt depends on the reasons for the safety net--- one reason is a simple humanitarian one (don't want people homeless, etc.), for which the bare minimum suffices, but another reason is as an automatic business-cycle smoother, in which case you want reasonably generous unemployment benefits: http://www.nber.org/papers/w4750 http://www.nber.org/papers/w4750
- aaronblohowiak 17y agoThis was also covered in The Affluent Society, which you should read.
- aaronblohowiak 17y agoThis was also covered in The Affluent Society, which you should read.