Welfare/Redistribution is actually harmful for poor people

To better understand what is good and bad for low-incomes, we need first understand what makes people poor. These 2 evils are unemployment (for obvious reasons) and inflation, making it much more expensive to be poor, especially that inflation has been higher on things that low-income household spend a high proportion of their money on (rents, utilities …) . Therefore it seems logical that to better help low-income people, we need first address the issues that make them poorer«We should measure welfare's success by how many people leave welfare, not by how many are added» Ronald ReaganMinimum wage : The current federal minimum wage in the US is $7.25/hour. Minimum wage doesn’t help poor workers, or it helps only those whose productivity is just below the productivity that is necessary to earn these $7.25/hour on a free (aka a very small number). To understand why MW creates unemployment, we need to take a look on the only that matters : the supply and demand. If you impose a minimum wage, it has to be higher than the natural price of the market (otherwise it is useless because workers would be paid as much without it). And we see that when the higher the wage is, the less employment there is (what is logical because employers will prefer not hiring people if it costs them more than it brings them / or they need ) . In Seattle, the minimum wage has been risen to $15/hour, and the economic situation of the situation has worsened, especially for small businesses (stores, restaurants..) . Many of them has been forced to downsize the amount of their workforce, rise their prices and/or buy products of less quality. This policy makes it much harder for unemployed people to be hired, and put the job of many people at risk. Unemployment benefits : The idea here is pretty much the same than for the minimum wage. This compensation can discourage workers from taking jobs (since a rational person weights the pro and the con of every situation, if his/her wage is similar to the salary of the job offer, he hasn’t any interest in leaving his cough). People who would wait a long before searching another job, knowing that unemployment benefits assure them a living will have much more problem in finding another job, since they are not used to sell themselves on the job market anymore. Financing welfare : Since more growth is the best way to fight unemployment, these welfare policies cost a lot of money. Either the public authorities raise taxes or they go into even more debts. For obvious reasons, raising taxes hurt economic growth (furthermore that we know that the 1% wealthiest know how to use every loopholes to avoid paying taxes, so businesses and middle class will pay more). Tax money is simply money that is taken out of the economic system, either this money is not used for household consumption (so less money for companies, so less investment and employment), either this money is not used for investment (company tax) , and will make companies less profitable (and less likely to hire people or raise wages …) Second solution is for city/State/federal government to go into debts, what will increase the money supply, and therefore create inflation, making it harder to low income households to live properly.