‘Welfare to Work’ - the new poverty trap? A Liberal response

In short, welfare to work policies do not of themselves, resolve the "poverty trap" issue and thus increase an individual’s personal autonomy. And they do not necessarily meet the unique needs of each individual through case management.

The Work for the Dole programs of which the Howard government is so enamoured are another illustration of this point. Designed to give people a thirst for work, they can have the opposite effect. The work component in them is often boring and does not give people long-term skills to help them in a sophisticated 21st century economy.

The Keating government’s "Working Nation" programs were a much better model of training and work orientation tailored to the individual.

Of course the proponents of these policies will argue that they are built on the entirely reasonable concept of mutual obligation. That is, that there is a contract between the society and the individual that means that the latter must agree to perform certain tasks because there is the consideration of taxpayer’s dollars.

Such an idea is wholly illiberal. For the classical liberal this contract is based on exploitation - i.e. withdrawal of benefits if the recipient fails to perform a task such as an appointment for an interview - and thus is not a genuine social contract as envisaged by John Locke, David Hume and others.

For a liberal a genuine welfare reform package would include substantial job skilling, educational opportunities, childcare, and early psychological intervention to deal with potential mental illness issues. If all these were available then the expectation that an individual should seek employment when in receipt of welfare would be more just.

As former US Presidential Candidate Bob Dole’s Press Secretary, Douglas MacKinnon, put it in the New York Times recently, we "will all be better off if the poorest families in our communities believe that they, too, have a better chance. They deserve nothing less."

But to achieve Mr MacKinnon’s noble aim we need to devise a welfare system that enhances genuine individual autonomy. This should be the basis of a program of welfare reform, not the politically advantageous rhetoric of "mutual obligation".

The "individual autonomy" policy approach to welfare is exemplified in an excellent recently released paper by Karen Christopher of New York’s Syracuse University. Ms Christopher argues that the way to increase the economic capacity of single mothers is not by encouraging marriage for marriage sake as some conservatives would have us believe is the panacea, but through policy packages that include subsidised child-care, paid-leave policies (why not, for example, allow single mother two weeks extra leave a year during school holidays?), and training programs that continually upgrade the skills of single-mothers.

Welfare to work policies on their own are little more than a political stunt to appease those in the community who envy welfare recipients. Without addressing underlying issues such as mental health, education and parenting capacity, we will still be stuck with the same old poverty trap that has always existed. A liberal approach to the issue, one that emphasises the individual’s autonomy, is the only way forward.