Even politicians agree that this one-sided giving is unhealthy. Yet in practice, program after program turns into another dependency-causing subsidy. Nowhere is this pattern more dramatically illustrated than in programs to provide shelter for the unhoused.
Governments keep increasing their efforts, only to reap ever-growing numbers of homeless.
In New York, for example, to help street people the city has built 26,700 units of permanent housing, and has provided 23,000 temporary beds. At the root of the failure of the government programs is irresponsible giving. When a person gives away his own, hard-earned funds, he wants to get full value for his sacrifice. He wants to make sure he is really helping someone, and not just throwing his money down the proverbial rat hole. In government welfare programs, legislators and administrators are not spending their personal funds.