Quote:
Originally Posted by rubecube
Because it's largely a contradiction. Socially liberal, or progressivism, is generally in favour of equal rights as in equality in result, as opposed to formal equality. This is basically impossible to achieve without some sort of wealth redistribution.
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When people tell my fiscally conservative, socially liberal I usually think libertarian or classic liberal.
I think what most Canadians want is fiscally prudent, socially slightly liberal. This does involve some wealth redistribution, but I think think that's a good thing for both the wealthy, the middle class, and the poor.
Consider some examples of what prudent fiscal policy with some wealth redistribution does for everyone involved...
1. Provides everyone with a baseline level of opportunity to acquire the skills they need to compete and hopefully excel in life. This improves the productivity of the country as a whole, and for the rich, increases their property values and provides them with a larger pool of talented people to hire. Benefits the whole spectrum, including those who are taxed higher to provide the services.
2. Reduces the number of people that end up economically ruined due to health problems. The number one cause of bankruptcy in the US until recently at least was health bills. If the government doesn't redistribute the wealth, the higher prices companies have to charge due to high rates of bankruptcy does it instead, but the pain and suffering caused is much higher when bankruptcy is involved than when it is not.
3. Provides people who due to circumstance or poor decisions fall into economic ruin the opportunity to rebuild their lives quicker. Just one thing this does is it helps keep criminal activity low as everyone can hope for a better future. A safe country benefits everyone.
While none of these things are fiscally conservative, they don't need to be fiscally liberal either. There are a numbers of ways in which prudent fiscal policies can be implemented, the best of which take into account human qualities like laziness, greed, limited will power, etc.
For example, our country right now is missing a bridge out of welfare for those who want to work, but don't have the skills, or are constrained in other ways (think, for example, of young single mothers who have to take care of their child since they can't afford child care and find a way to make a living without any skills). A solution that was trialed in some poor areas of the country was to allow something like 10000/year in income before welfare payments reduced and then tapered the benefits off slowly as income increased beyond that. It was a resounding success as people used the extra income to get the formal education they needed to do higher paying work. I'd love to see something like this re-introduced in Canada.