Charities doing the job of the state?

mikemac1

There is a charity for pretty much any cause and just about all deserving cases. There are a few I'd have issues with their aims and not something I'd get involved with

Ireland does have a welfare state and people can be on various schemes and benefits from cradle to grave.

Did you ever see people collecting or campaigning and wonder, why donate sure that's the governments job?
I'm not saying it's right or wrong but maybe this was your first reaction

Friends of "my local" hospital looking for money to buy some new equipment.
Money for day centers for blind and deaf people
Money for suicide and mental health support services like Pieta House
Lyons club want money for Christmas hampers.
Supports for the homeless

All fantastic services who do valuable work

But I've caught myself wondering, why am I donating, sure let the HSE or Minister Joan Burton look after that.
Sort of "I pay taxes to the State and the State will look after you"

Is it a valid thing to wonder?
If your local hospital is struggling and needs a new wing or equipment would you wonder why am I being asked to donate, my taxes have funded Minister James Reilly and let him deal with it.

Or maybe is it nonsense to expect the State to do everything and maybe we should look at the older times when charities were local and it was people in the area who looked after those who needed help in the community.

I'm not a cheapskate and I donate to local causes if I can. I'm certainly not rich.
But is this letting the government off the hook and allowing them to get away with waste?

They don't spend every tax euro realy carefully as charities will fill the gaps they are supposed to be covering. I know the State gives money to some charities but some get funding and many don't.

For example Irish citizens who are blind need guide dogs
The State won't pay for Irish guide dogs for the blind in Cork, they get off the hook as people donate and fund the charity instead

We receive over 85% of our income through voluntary donations and fundraising through a network of volunteers across the country. The remaining 15% is provided through statutory bodies and government agencies. It will cost just over €4 million to run our organisation this year.

The State should be paying for this

Manach

Given the history of charities in this country (dating from the first statutory act in the 1630s) it is the State doing the work of the charity. Charities in general are longer lasting that a state and where the state starts to run into difficulties and re-trenches - as is happening in Greece - charities have the organisation strength to keep servicing their benificaries.

The Corinthian

You actually raise two issues, not one. Firstly there is the question of the welfare state and whether it is the job of the State to look after its citizens, or more correctly to what degree.

Many would disagree with an overarching welfare state as the price that must be paid for it - principally freedom of choice and meritocracy - is too high. Indeed, from the libertarian perspective, your thread title would be framed as "The State doing the job of charities".

The second issue is one of the Hobsian contract, or more correctly whether this contract is being maintained. That is, in return for the taxes and loss of personal freedom (to the State) are we getting value for this. This is a separate issue because regardless of whether you opt for a socialist-style welfare state or a capitalist-style Laissez-faire one, you can get good, fair or even poor value for your contribution and sacrifice.

And if we are getting poor value, then either we the people, will change it for the better or (more likely, IMHO) leave it for a better social contract in another State - which is where 'brain drains' come from.

Peregrinus

If we accept for the purposes of the discussion that the community has a responsibility to care for its vulnerable members, it doesn’t follow that the state is the instrument through which this should be done. A state is just one institution which a community establishes, and whether a particular responsilbity should be discharged through the state, through other bodies, or through some combination of the state and other bodies seems to me to be a pragmatic question. I don’t see any “default” that these things are the responsility of the state, or the responsibility of private charities.