The article on Social Liberalism is:
Any comments welcome.
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Very interesting Fred.
I would have thought Social Liberals as you define them would favour a negative tax rather than labour market regulation as being the best way to look after the low paid while minimising labour market distortion.
As a libertarianish sort of guy I support a social safety net on pragmatic grounds but I think the moral case for redistribution is as good as the moral case for conscription. If you say that there is a moral case for redistribution then I think you face the line-drawing problem. If you say redistribution is purely pragmatic then it is easier to draw the line and you start with the advantage of saying that redistribution benefits are not “entitlements” with all the expectation that term creates.
Thanks Pedro. I prefer the option of relying more on labour market regulation and less on social security (or negative tax, to the extent this is possible) because you might otherwise over-load the social security system.
This avoids two complications. First, how sustainable would an increase in social security be? And if you seek to increase the tax burden, you then have to make some allowance for the welfare costs (offsetting some of the cost of market regulation).
One can offer negative income tax to low income earners, when a government is introducing moderate deregulation of labour market to correct a major imbalance – but you can only go so far. In any case Trade Unions still have a role to play in levelling the playing field.
There us inevitably some judgment involved.