The Future Scope for Self-Reliance and Private Insurance

Many years have past since a number of young liberal economists, including myself, raised the question—not then on anyone’s political agenda—as to whether the welfare state was a passing phenomenon (see Watson [ed.], 1957). It seemed only possible then to give rather tentative replies, and my own was contained in a pamphlet (Peacock, 1961), which achieved a certain temporary notoriety:

There is not much point in talking of individual freedom and responsibility to those who live in fear of want. But if poverty is abolished, if income and wealth can be equitably distributed, if economic fluctuations can be mitigated, then individuals are in a situation where, potentially at least, they can plan their own and their children’s future, and where it is less necessary for them to rely upon the State.… The true object of the Welfare State, for the Liberal, is to teach people how to do without it.