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To think that the social welfare state is a natural outgrowth of churches setting up schools and hospitals is completely ridiculous. The two things couldn't be

by benzim 17y ago

To think that the social welfare state is a natural outgrowth of churches setting up schools and hospitals is completely ridiculous. The two things couldn't be more opposite. Social welfare emerges as a result of the collapse of Christianity in a society. The Dutch will talk about how they don't think anyone should be without health care, but if they saw someone in need they wouldn't help them. I don't know which comes first, but people who believe in social welfare seem to believe they have no personal responsibility to help those in need. Look at the average giving of the Dutch or someone like Joe Biden who while talking constantly about compassion gave an average of $369 per year for the last decade. Social welfare leads to an almost complete lack of the personal compassion that is at the heart of Christianity.

turkishrevenge 17y ago
"but if they saw someone in need they wouldn't help them" -- this applies to Christians and non-Christians alike. Similarly, a Christian or non-Christian could easily help such a person as well. Given the overall message of Christianity (read: Christ) then, by your definition, there should be no want or suffering in the world, but yet there is. You are free to believe what you want about the Dutch, but at the very least, you have to admit that they have created a society that attempt to provide some basic standard of health and social well-being to its citizens. Not the same can always be said for other "compassionate" Christian societies.
- benzim 17y ago
  But it doesn't apply to Christians and non-Christians alike. Conservatives and especially Christians give far more time and money to help those less fortunate. "Finally, the single biggest predictor of whether someone will be charitable is their religious participation. Religious people are more likely to give to charity, and when they give, they give more money: four times as much. And Arthur Brooks told me that giving goes beyond their own religious organization: "Actually, the truth is that they're giving to more than their churches," he says. "The religious Americans are more likely to give to every kind of cause and charity, including explicitly non-religious charities."" http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=2682730 http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=2682730 You're misunderstanding Christianity. Jesus said: "For you always have the poor with you" Matthew 26:11. Christians don't believe that its possible to eradicate poverty. In fact we believe that society will continue to grow worse until the end. The point is not to build a utopia, it is to personally help those you see in need.
  - undees 17y ago
    "And Arthur Brooks told me that giving goes beyond their own religious organization" I'm curious as to the percentage that goes outside givers' own churches. "when they give, they give more money" I'd also be curious to find out whether or not the less religious give more time, and how much money that time is worth.
    - randallsquared 17y ago
      I'd also be curious to find out whether or not the less religious give more time, and how much money that time is worth. Depends on how you count worth. The lawyer who volunteers at a soup kitchen, to use a lesswrong.com example, is giving up X dollars per hour of income to provide far less than X dollars per hour of charity, and since this is true for people who give to charity in general (without reference, but I'd be very surprised if it were controversial), it seems clear that people who primarily give time are donating for reputation rather than effect. I've no clue about the relative proportions of time and money the religious and non-religious give, though.
      - undees 17y ago
        "The lawyer who volunteers at a soup kitchen... is giving up X dollars per hour of income to provide far less than X dollars per hour of charity." What about the lawyer who does pro bono legal work for the same soup kitchen? Or (closer to the HN crowd) the coder who puts up a website for a charity? "it seems clear that people who primarily give time are donating for reputation" Reputation is one possible motive, but I could imagine others: warm-fuzzy feelings, a desire to connect to one's community, a lack of funds to donate (if a second job is out of the question), and so on. One might also choose volunteering as an alternative to other non-working activities. The soup kitchen lawyer guy wasn't exactly going to be pulling down $100/hr watching SportsCenter that Saturday.
mtinkerhess 17y ago
To believe in social welfare is to acknowledge that everyone has a responsibility to help those in need, and that the state should enforce that responsibility.
- anamax 17y ago
  That's true only if you believe that what the state does is necessarily and only helpful. (There are other requirements as well, but I'm limiting myself to two of the more obvious problems.) Govt help programs, at least in the US, are aimed more at benefitting middle class providers than the poor who are supposedly the beneficiaries.
  - robak 17y ago
    True. Another fact: in Netherlands you get the money from gov and you decide how and where to spend it. And you spend it for privately held child care, private doctors or private schools. So it is a very good mix of public funding and free market choice.
jules 17y ago
> The Dutch will talk about how they don't think anyone should be without health care, but if they saw someone in need they wouldn't help them. [citation needed]
- benzim 17y ago
  I was referring to this quote from the article. "If you tell a Dutch person you’re going to raise his taxes by 500 euros and that it will go to help the poor, he’ll say O.K., he said. But if you say he’s going to get a 500-euro tax cut, with the idea that he will give it to the poor, he won’t do it. The Dutch don’t do such things on their own. They believe they should be handled by the system. To an American, that’s a lack of individual initiative."
  - timr 17y ago
    The same thing happens in America -- we talk a good game about charity being driven by individual donations, but we don't tend to donate very much. Last I heard, your average US charity has less than 30% of its budget met by donations.
    - benzim 17y ago
      That's simply not true. Compared to any other country people in the US give far more. "Gaudiani said Americans give twice as much as the next most charitable country, according to a November 2006 comparison done by the Charities Aid Foundation. In philanthropic giving as a percentage of gross domestic product, the U.S. ranked first at 1.7 percent. No. 2 Britain gave 0.73 percent, while France, with a 0.14 percent rate, trailed such countries as South Africa, Singapore, Turkey and Germany." http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19409188/ http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19409188/
      - deleted 17y ago
        [deleted]
tybris 17y ago
European countries have far more social structure than the US. People are part of groups (tribes) formed around religion, culture, nationality, language, political ideals, labour, and even football. It is the group, not the individual, that takes care of its members. Members of the group contribute and the leaders decide what happens with the contributions. This model doesn't fit individual compassion, because it would distantiate you from the group ("you (member) think we (the group) are not doing enough!?"). That being said, Christianity was in fact the binding element that provided Western-Europe with its strong social structure that still exists today. It was not so much the Bible or morale that bound them, for most it was in fact the fight against catholic oppression that led to Calvinism and other reformations. Without support or leadership from the Vatican, protestants formed scattered social groups, in which members had to protect and support each other. In doing so they found themselves reinventing the biblical message. To protect the family, social gatherings (sunday prayers), give to the poor (prevent them from stealing), take care of the weak. Again, not as individuals, but as a group. The US on the other hand, was formed through immigration of people who had little or no social relations with each other. The result was an individualistic society where everyone took care of themselves. However, such a system is not inately human. There is no one to take care of the inevitable unfortunate. The individual compassion that is enabled by the lack of social commitments cannot begin to pay the rent for a single mother, the health care bill of a retiree, or the school books of a poor man's daughter. As economic tides reveal the pain of individualism groups are formed. Gradually, America is shifting towards a stronger social structure. Middle-America finds refuge for its mediocre economic opportunities in evangelical Christianity, whereas the people along the coast-lines are bounded by progressive politics. The growing schism between these groups is exemplary of the social bonds getting stronger. This also reveals the dark side of social structure. Deep hatred between different groups. A hatred that far exceeds any individual conflict, a hatred that has led to all of history's atrocities we know so well. Yet, the social bonds are unavoidable. Man is meant to live in a tribe. That is how we evolved.

by benzim 17y ago

turkishrevenge 17y ago

"but if they saw someone in need they wouldn't help them" -- this applies to Christians and non-Christians alike. Similarly, a Christian or non-Christian could easily help such a person as well. Given the overall message of Christianity (read: Christ) then, by your definition, there should be no want or suffering in the world, but yet there is. You are free to believe what you want about the Dutch, but at the very least, you have to admit that they have created a society that attempt to provide some basic standard of health and social well-being to its citizens. Not the same can always be said for other "compassionate" Christian societies.

benzim 17y ago
But it doesn't apply to Christians and non-Christians alike. Conservatives and especially Christians give far more time and money to help those less fortunate. "Finally, the single biggest predictor of whether someone will be charitable is their religious participation. Religious people are more likely to give to charity, and when they give, they give more money: four times as much. And Arthur Brooks told me that giving goes beyond their own religious organization: "Actually, the truth is that they're giving to more than their churches," he says. "The religious Americans are more likely to give to every kind of cause and charity, including explicitly non-religious charities."" http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=2682730 http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=2682730 You're misunderstanding Christianity. Jesus said: "For you always have the poor with you" Matthew 26:11. Christians don't believe that its possible to eradicate poverty. In fact we believe that society will continue to grow worse until the end. The point is not to build a utopia, it is to personally help those you see in need.
- undees 17y ago
  "And Arthur Brooks told me that giving goes beyond their own religious organization" I'm curious as to the percentage that goes outside givers' own churches. "when they give, they give more money" I'd also be curious to find out whether or not the less religious give more time, and how much money that time is worth.
  - randallsquared 17y ago
    I'd also be curious to find out whether or not the less religious give more time, and how much money that time is worth. Depends on how you count worth. The lawyer who volunteers at a soup kitchen, to use a lesswrong.com example, is giving up X dollars per hour of income to provide far less than X dollars per hour of charity, and since this is true for people who give to charity in general (without reference, but I'd be very surprised if it were controversial), it seems clear that people who primarily give time are donating for reputation rather than effect. I've no clue about the relative proportions of time and money the religious and non-religious give, though.
    - undees 17y ago
      "The lawyer who volunteers at a soup kitchen... is giving up X dollars per hour of income to provide far less than X dollars per hour of charity." What about the lawyer who does pro bono legal work for the same soup kitchen? Or (closer to the HN crowd) the coder who puts up a website for a charity? "it seems clear that people who primarily give time are donating for reputation" Reputation is one possible motive, but I could imagine others: warm-fuzzy feelings, a desire to connect to one's community, a lack of funds to donate (if a second job is out of the question), and so on. One might also choose volunteering as an alternative to other non-working activities. The soup kitchen lawyer guy wasn't exactly going to be pulling down $100/hr watching SportsCenter that Saturday.

mtinkerhess 17y ago

To believe in social welfare is to acknowledge that everyone has a responsibility to help those in need, and that the state should enforce that responsibility.

anamax 17y ago
That's true only if you believe that what the state does is necessarily and only helpful. (There are other requirements as well, but I'm limiting myself to two of the more obvious problems.) Govt help programs, at least in the US, are aimed more at benefitting middle class providers than the poor who are supposedly the beneficiaries.
- robak 17y ago
  True. Another fact: in Netherlands you get the money from gov and you decide how and where to spend it. And you spend it for privately held child care, private doctors or private schools. So it is a very good mix of public funding and free market choice.

jules 17y ago

> The Dutch will talk about how they don't think anyone should be without health care, but if they saw someone in need they wouldn't help them. [citation needed]

benzim 17y ago
I was referring to this quote from the article. "If you tell a Dutch person you’re going to raise his taxes by 500 euros and that it will go to help the poor, he’ll say O.K., he said. But if you say he’s going to get a 500-euro tax cut, with the idea that he will give it to the poor, he won’t do it. The Dutch don’t do such things on their own. They believe they should be handled by the system. To an American, that’s a lack of individual initiative."
- timr 17y ago
  The same thing happens in America -- we talk a good game about charity being driven by individual donations, but we don't tend to donate very much. Last I heard, your average US charity has less than 30% of its budget met by donations.
  - benzim 17y ago
    That's simply not true. Compared to any other country people in the US give far more. "Gaudiani said Americans give twice as much as the next most charitable country, according to a November 2006 comparison done by the Charities Aid Foundation. In philanthropic giving as a percentage of gross domestic product, the U.S. ranked first at 1.7 percent. No. 2 Britain gave 0.73 percent, while France, with a 0.14 percent rate, trailed such countries as South Africa, Singapore, Turkey and Germany." http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19409188/ http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19409188/
    - deleted 17y ago
      [deleted]

tybris 17y ago

European countries have far more social structure than the US. People are part of groups (tribes) formed around religion, culture, nationality, language, political ideals, labour, and even football. It is the group, not the individual, that takes care of its members. Members of the group contribute and the leaders decide what happens with the contributions. This model doesn't fit individual compassion, because it would distantiate you from the group ("you (member) think we (the group) are not doing enough!?"). That being said, Christianity was in fact the binding element that provided Western-Europe with its strong social structure that still exists today. It was not so much the Bible or morale that bound them, for most it was in fact the fight against catholic oppression that led to Calvinism and other reformations. Without support or leadership from the Vatican, protestants formed scattered social groups, in which members had to protect and support each other. In doing so they found themselves reinventing the biblical message. To protect the family, social gatherings (sunday prayers), give to the poor (prevent them from stealing), take care of the weak. Again, not as individuals, but as a group. The US on the other hand, was formed through immigration of people who had little or no social relations with each other. The result was an individualistic society where everyone took care of themselves. However, such a system is not inately human. There is no one to take care of the inevitable unfortunate. The individual compassion that is enabled by the lack of social commitments cannot begin to pay the rent for a single mother, the health care bill of a retiree, or the school books of a poor man's daughter. As economic tides reveal the pain of individualism groups are formed. Gradually, America is shifting towards a stronger social structure. Middle-America finds refuge for its mediocre economic opportunities in evangelical Christianity, whereas the people along the coast-lines are bounded by progressive politics. The growing schism between these groups is exemplary of the social bonds getting stronger. This also reveals the dark side of social structure. Deep hatred between different groups. A hatred that far exceeds any individual conflict, a hatred that has led to all of history's atrocities we know so well. Yet, the social bonds are unavoidable. Man is meant to live in a tribe. That is how we evolved.