You mean welfare taxes and welfare payouts? All of this seems like gross oversimplification and it worries me that it is so common. Words have definitions and

You mean welfare taxes and welfare payouts? All of this seems like gross oversimplification and it worries me that it is so common. Words have definitions and meanings and when you conflate them you reduce your ability to understand and reason about the world. I see why people think not doing something is equivalent of its opposite but this is not the case. Not taxing someone is not the same things as subsidizing them for the same reason that not expressing hate is not the same thing as expressing love. Not attacking someone is not the same as healing them. Hospitals can't heal people by simply not attacking them. Police reduce violent crime but it would be inaccurate to say that police are the same as hospitals because they both reduce personal injury. Not doing harmful drugs and studying both make you smarter, but not doing drugs is not the same as studying.