Replace Welfare with the Negative Income Tax

A well constructed argument by my opponent. The NIT would theoretically reduce overhead costs dollar used by system over dollar delivered to recipient, and it provides a bit more incentive to those who can work than our current systems due to the smooth transition between subsidized income and taxable income, but there are serious problems with using the government as a charity:Conflict of interest: Government as charitable organization.The biggest problem with government doing the job of long-term charity to it's citizens, especially in a system with elected officials, is that it becomes a conflict of interest. Our representatives seek to get themselves reelected. If increasing the amount of taxpayer funds going to people increases the number of votes from the beneficiaries in that district, that could be a huge temptation to an official. The simple and well constructed NIT would quickly be corrupted, just as many other programs have been mutated into payouts for special interests and vote buying. The changes over the years to the Tax Reform Act of 1986 and US Farm Bills are prime examples.http://taxfoundation.org...https://en.wikipedia.org...https://en.wikipedia.org...These laws end up going far beyond thier original scope.Equity to the providers:Funds for the NIT would come almost exclusively from people who do not partake of the system, and it's not voluntary. Say we have a single working man of 20, with no children, who has plans to increase his income through hard work and self-improvement, then buy a house and eventually marry and have children. He's currently making $30,000/yr, and pulls no negative income tax for himself. He's thinking of his future family, and saving for them. It's reasonable to pay for fire and police protection, public services like national defense, reasonable public servant's wages, public roads, and maybe even some other programs he does benefit from. But paying to raise another man's family? That's not equitable, when this young man is taking nothing, and trying to provide for his own future family. It's far more equitable for each person to pay for themselves and thier own family. The same situation goes for a single or family making $80k, or $8M. They worked for it, they earned it, they deserve the wages from thier labor.And thier responsibility is above all else, to provide for thier own families and not burden other families.But we do have the destitute, the poor, and the handicapped. Some people are greedy, but many are generous, and do give to charity. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that, especially when it's voluntary. A voluntary giver is more incentivized to check to see if the fruits of thier own labor is actually being put to good use, than an official in a position easily tempted to give other people's money, forcibly taken, to others for the purpose of support in November. One has actual generocity with his own honest money for the purpose of helping the poor. The other has outward appearance of generocity with someone else's money to gain popularity to keep a job.Now we're back to conflict of interest. We even have an example of the welfare systems being expanded at the same time private charity is attacked by the government. Why would that be? The less private charity is available, the more people will be on government assistance. The more people on government assistance, the more votes can be extracted by telling people on government assistance your opponent will remove it. As the article below points out, people give for far more than tax reasons, but the government with it's current handout system will try to hem in voluntary generocity.http://www.forbes.com...My opponent asserts that charity was not enough during the Great Depression (no source), but I would argue that's not all bad. Should children go hungry? No! But should adults who don't work or make stupid mistakes that cause them to loose thier jobs or not advance be given incentive to not make those mistakes? Yes. It's called learning through trial and error, and it's one of the best and most memorable learning tools. Being hungry incentivizes the worker. Charity is great, and I encourage it, but the recipient knowing the charity is not a never ending gravy train is critical. You must try to not be a burden to others, and you have a responsibility to take care of your own kin. It's not a standard I don't apply to myself, and if someone wants to learn to fish, I'll give him a few free ones, but the rest he must catch on his own. If someone absolutely cannot take care of themselves through no fault of their own, and have no family, that is the time for true compassion and generocity by the willing, not bueraucratic handouts pulled by force of law from the working class.This sideways Robin Hooding (Powerful taking from the sufficient and wealthy to give to non-workers, rather than a renegade taking from the over-taxing government to give back to the exploited) needs to be stopped by removing the official capacity of government as a charity. NIT is better than our current system, but history and human nature strongly indicates it will be corrupted quickly.a