this post was submitted on 10 Feb 2025
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In France, where I live, good unemployement (keeping arround 80% of your previous revenues during a year or two) and health benefits (100% coverage if you have a, relatively cheap, additional individual insurance). Which has the added benefit of keeping medecine prices pretty low (ie insulin is free for diabetics here and doesn't cost much if you pay for it yourself).
It should, and could, be even better if they trusted beneficiaries a bit more, and were not constantly harrasing them into accepting shity jobs.
When you earn unemployement benefits, you still pay taxes and the rest of the money you spend keeps the national economy running (which, in turn, also turn in taxes) so financing it isn't necessarely an issue and hasn't been for decades (even without taxing the 10% wealthiest who manage to mostly avoid it and thus, don't contribute. While their wealth doubled in the last 20 years, taking inflation into account).
The constant political fight arround those spendings is mostly about the morality of "assisting" unemployed and poor families not an economical balance matter.
That I know, I live in Belgium.
I wonder what successful capitalisation of that would look like?
One way would be to higher EU members' financial contribution to it's budget in proportion to their lack of wellfairness. I also frequently dream of tariffs on extra-EU imports on the same criteria, thus also preventing so called "social dumping", modern slavery and exploitation. Which in turn would make our own production more competitive and enable better salaries overall.
Of course, a lot of goods would get more expensive, but we would finaly pay a fair price (rewarding those who until now payed with their health/liberty/life for those low prices). Unfortunately, I think it will keep beeing a dream for quite a while (if not ever)...
That's the topic of this post: due to it's central steering EU became technologically (and in a few decades economically) irrelevant. It doesn't know how to make 21st century things. Tarrifs don't help with that problem, au contraire. Nor does a national social security system. The latter does make sure that everyone's quality of life degrades about equally fast.