This is something that often thrown up at Libertarians that we are top hat donning ; monacle wearing scrounges . And that could not be further from the truth. The reality requires a little more thought what we are arguing for a society where as many of the responsibility for you, and your family are taken by yourselves. And the state is responsible for the absolute minimum.
So if you wanted to spend your spare money ,time and resources to look after orphans like philanthropists did in years gone by then you are free to do so. But what we have now is a situation where we are now taxed at 45-50% when you account for all of the taxes that we pay – you could also add a 3% inflation tax but let’s leave that for a another post
And then when you complain about all the tax you pay , they say you want orphans to starve ? If that was all our taxes were funding it would not be so bad.
But more importantly they forget that foundling hospitals were founded by Philanthropists of the time and not the state. But this history has been forgotten about and we now have the state providing most care and private charity and private welfare has been crowded out.
I find that history begins (for those who are of a very pro statist mind set) the moment the state gets involved. And prior efforts that were working as part of a wider civil society are quickly forgotten about.
Here’s the Wikipedia link to foundling Hospitals.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundling_Hospital
