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A Community-Based Alternative to the Welfare State (March 14, 2013) It is important to discuss alternatives before the Status Quo devolves and collapses, so we have an intellectual framework to guide healthier, more sustainable alternatives once the current system implodes. Two of the key characteristics of an empire in terminal decline are complacency and intellectual sclerosis, what I have termed a failure of imagination. (The others are military over-reach, chronic deficits, a parasitic Elite that is immune to what's left of the rule of law, weak leadership, mass dependence on the Central State and excessive consumption.) Michael Grant described these causes of decline in his excellent account The Fall of the Roman Empire:
There was no room at all, in these ways of thinking, for the novel, apocalyptic situation which had now arisen, a situation which needed solutions as radical as itself. (The Status Quo) attitude is a complacent acceptance of things as they are, without a single new idea. In other words, if our idea of intellectual rigor and honesty is Paul Krugman dancing around the Neo-Keynesian Cargo Cult campfire waving dead chickens and mumbling the same old nonsensical chants about aggregate demand, we are well and truly doomed. This same intellectual sclerosis and spiritual vacuum characterizes our acceptance of the current welfare state. That dependence on the State is destructive to the the well-being and productivity of the dependents and to the fiscal health of the State is self-evident. As management guru Peter Drucker observed in his 1993 book, Post-Capitalist Society:
Joseph Schumpeter warned in 1918 that the fiscal state would in the end undermine government's ability to govern. Fifteen years later, Keynes hailed the fiscal state as the great liberator; no longer limited by restraints on spending, government in the fiscal state could govern effectively, Keynes maintained. We now know Schumpeter was right. The Status Quo firmly embraces both sides of the welfare state coin: corporate welfare lavished on favored cartels (education, healthcare, defense, oil/gas, banking, etc.) and transfer payments to individuals, i.e. paying people to stay at home watching TV. Republicans and Democrats alike are crony-capitalists par excellence, and both ends of the political spectrum are delighted to warehouse the poor at home via welfare, where the steady drip of State dependence saps their motivation to make political demands on the State-corporate partnership. (Warehousing the poor in prison for drug-related activity is far more costly and troublesome than simply paying them to stay home and watch TV.) Politicos bleat the requisite lip-service to "creating jobs," but there is no discussion of policies that might give meaning and purpose to those without jobs while loosening the State's grip on the throat of society. Correspondent Jeff W. recently shared an alternative vision of dealing with chronic unemployment that is light years away from the centralized welfare state. The key feature of Jeff's system is that it is centered in the community-based economy, the largely forgotten sector of the economy that has been hollowed out by the Central State and corporate-market machine.
Here are some thoughts about replacing the welfare state with community groups: Thank you, Jeff, for articulating a community-based alternative to the centralized welfare state. One of the few commentators who understand the importance of membership is John Michael Greer of the The Archdruid Report. Membership entails privileges that are dependent on fulfilling duties, guidelines and responsibilities. Failure to comply with the guidelines or evasion of responsibilities leads to dismissal from the group. This is the core of membership: it can be revoked if the membership privileges or other members are abused. What is especially noteworthy in Jeff's alternative is the freedom of choice and competition. No one is forced to join a community group; they are free to not join a group and as a result of that choice not collect the benefits. Donors can choose which group to fund, so the community groups are competing for both donors and dependents. The second key feature of Jeff's alternative is that the goal is not to warehouse the unemployed in front of a TV set, it is to offer them meaningful work and purposeful roles in their community.
As Jeff observed, we as a nation are not yet ready to even discuss alternatives to
our corrupt, bankrupt corporate-state welfare system, but it is important to
discuss alternatives before the Status Quo devolves and collapses, so we have
an intellectual framework to guide healthier, more sustainable alternatives once
the current system implodes.
Things are falling apart--that is obvious. But why are they falling apart? The reasons are complex and global. Our economy and society have structural problems that cannot be solved by adding debt to debt. We are becoming poorer, not just from financial over-reach, but from fundamental forces that are not easy to identify or understand. We will cover the five core reasons why things are falling apart: 
1. Debt and financialization
2. Crony capitalism and the elimination of accountability 3. Diminishing returns 4. Centralization 5. Technological, financial and demographic changes in our economy Complex systems weakened by diminishing returns collapse under their own weight and are replaced by systems that are simpler, faster and affordable. If we cling to the old ways, our system will disintegrate. If we want sustainable prosperity rather than collapse, we must embrace a new model that is Decentralized, Adaptive, Transparent and Accountable (DATA).
We are not powerless. Not accepting responsibility and being powerless are two sides of
the same coin: once we accept responsibility, we become powerful.
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