I’ve written a piece for Fusion about a conservative approach to the welfare state. I looked at what three of the top influencers of American free-market conservative thought — Adam Smith, F. A. Hayek, and Milton Friedman — had to say about the government’s role in poverty alleviation. Based on what they wrote, I came up with these eight principles:

1. The best way to encourage the welfare of the people is a free economy with low taxes and a flexible labor market.

2. Government welfare programs are a legitimate function of the state.

3. Government welfare programs should be structured to discourage long-term dependence, providing a safety net for hard times, not a lifelong support structure.

4. Government welfare programs should be targeted broadly at helping the poor, not at specific subsets of people within the poor or at the nonpoor.

5. Government welfare programs are well intentioned, but they are subject to the same interest group pressures, bureaucratic tendencies, mission creep, and waste as other government programs are.

6. Government welfare programs are costly, not value-adding, to society as a whole.

7. Government welfare programs are not inherently socialist, but they can become socialist over time.

8. The current government welfare programs in the U.S. are fiscally unsustainable, and they are based on false premises about whom they benefit and how they are funded.

You can check my work by reading the whole thing here.