Skivers and strivers: this 200–year–old myth won’t die | George Monbiot

Vilification of the unemployed, by the government and the media, has a long and shameful heritage - expect the fallacy that welfare creates poverty to persist

Kindness is cruelty; cruelty is kindness: this is the core belief of compassionate conservatism. If the state makes excessive provision for the poor, it traps them in a culture of dependency, destroying their self-respect, locking them into unemployment. Cuts and coercion are a moral duty, to be pursued with the holy fervour of inquisitors overseeing an auto da fi(C).

This belief persists despite reams of countervailing evidence, showing that severity does nothing to cure the structural causes of unemployment. In Britain it is used to justify a 12bn reduction of a social security system already so harsh that it drives some recipients to suicide. The belief arises from a deep and dearly held fallacy that has persisted for more than 200 years.

Related: Osborne to proceed with 12bn welfare cuts despite anti-austerity protests

Macroeconomic policy mistakes were blamed on the victims. Does that sound familiar?

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