Individualism vs Collectivisim

Question 1

What should be the introduction to Individualism vs Collectivism

Answer 1

• This essay will argue that the government should be involved and responsible for tackling social inequalities.
• It will discuss both collectivist and individualistic views.

Question 2

What is the first collectivist argument?

Answer 2

• The government are best suited to tackling and reducing social inequalities.

Question 3

Why should the government tackle these inequalities?

Answer 3

• The causes of these inequalities are quite often very complex meaning that it would be too much for one organisation such as a charity to handle on its own.
• This means only the government has the resources needed to fix this problem.

Question 4

What is poverty caused by, and what is the subfactors?

Answer 4

• Poverty is very often caused by factors beyond someone’s control e.g. being made redundant from foreign competition, periods of recession in the country or the decline of manufacturing.

Question 5

What is the example for this first collectivist argument?

Answer 5

• For example, in February 2020 Lloyds Banking Group announced the closure of 56 branches in Scotland, which made 780 redundancies.

Question 5

What is the analysis point for the first collectivist argument?

Answer 5

• Collectivists would argue that the government should be responsible for providing unemployment benefits to keep people stable.
• This would prevent homelessness for the unemployed, + for these people to look for another job in the meantime, so they do not fall into the poverty cycle.

Question 6

What is the second explain point for collectivism?

Answer 6

• The government are the only people who have the resources needed, and the influence and knowledge to be able to address and fix these complex factors.

Question 7

What is the second example point for collectivism?

Answer 7

• In March 2020, the UK Government introduced the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, which was estimated to cost around £14 billion per month, and it prevented 9 million people from losing their jobs during the coronavirus pandemic.

Question 8

What is the additional explanation to the second example point? (covid)

Answer 8

• It enabled companies to put workers on furlough instead of making them redundant if the company could no longer pay the worker.
• The Government would pay 80% of their wage and the company would pay 20%, helping both the company and the worker in question.

Question 9

What is the analysis for the second collecitivst point?

Answer 9

• This shows that the Government has previously used resources to help people from becoming unemployed.
• Proving the previously made point that only the government has the resources to be able to reduce social inequalities
• and is beyond the capabilities of the private and charitable sectors.

Question 10

What is the overall conclusion for both collectivist points?

Answer 10

• Overall, the government are the only people who can make changes to social inequalities.
• There are complicated factors as to why people in poverty, not that poverty was your own fault which individualists argue.
• Therefore, the government should make up the difference.
• They have been able to do this in the past with the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, they should be able to do it now for people who are living on the breadline.

Question 11

What is the final collectivist argument?

Answer 11

• Social inequalities have deepened when governments put in place individualistic policies.

Question 12

What is individualism for the collectivist argment?

Answer 12

• Individualism is an ideology which assumes that most of the disadvantages that someone has in their life such as unemployment or being in poverty are their own fault.
• They believe if someone does not have the means to support themselves in life, then that is because they did not work hard enough to get the skills, they needed to benefit them later in their lives.

Question 13

Do Governments follow individualistic policies and what will they do?

Answer 13

• A lot of Governments that do follow this ideology believe in personal achievement, and will put up fewer benefits, or even remove them together

Question 14

What is the example for the final collectivist point?

Answer 14

• For example, the Conservative Government 2012 introduced widespread reforms to the benefits system
• This was officially called the Welfare Reform Act of 2012.
• It replaced existing benefits with a new system called “Universal Credit” and introduced caps on the total of benefits which could be potentially claimed.

Question 15

What do collectivists argue about how the Welfare Reform Act of 2012 can do to social inequalities?

Answer 15

• However, collectivists argue that such action has the potential to increase social inequalities.

Question 16

Has foodbank use increased recently?

Answer 16

• Since the changes to the benefits system, foodbank use has increased significantly.

Question 17

What is the second example for the final collectivist point?

Answer 17

• The Trussell Trust reports that they gave out 1.6 million three-day food packages to people who needed them throughout 2018/19,
• compared to the previous number of 300,000 in 2012/13, an increase of 73% in just six years!

Question 18

What is the additional point for the second example of the final collectivist point?

Answer 18

• The Trust claims that 40% of these people seeking support from the food bank have been doing so due to the benefits system reworks

Question 19

What is the final analysis point for the final collectivist argument?

Answer 19

• This evidence suggests that rather than curing this societal problem, individualistic policies are harming it.

Question 20

What is the final overall conclusion for collectivists?

Answer 20

• Overall, individualism harms social inequalities.
• This is because of the changes to the benefit system by the Welfare Reform Act of 2012 which put restrictions on benefits.
• This would increase the amount of people in poverty and people who need foodbanks.
• When the previous benefit system was helping the people, as there were 1.3m less people in foodbanks before in 2012/13.

Question 21

What is individualism in general?

Answer 21

• Individualists believe that the government should have less involvement in tackling and reducing social inequalities

Question 22

What is the first explain point for individualism?

Answer 22

• Individualistic views can lift people out of poverty.

Question 23

What is the additional information needed for the first explain point for indvidualist?

Answer 23

• Even though inequality may increase when more individualistic policies are introduced, many people are better off than they ever have been.
• The lower taxes and fewer regulations in place for employers encourage businesses to take on more staff.
• Meanwhile lower taxes for individuals help keep more of the money for themselves, getting better savings and being able to be better off in life.

Question 24

What is the example of the first individualist view?

Answer 24

• For example, before the Coronavirus Pandemic, unemployment in the UK was at 3.9%, the second lowest in the past 40 years.

Question 25

What is the additional info needed for example of the first individualist view?

Answer 25

• This is partly due to the Conservative Government’s welfare reforms that were introduced in 2012 which were designed to “make work pay.”

Question 26

What is the analysis point for this first individualistic view?

Answer 26

• This demonstrates that benefits shouldn’t be used as a primary source of income +
• there is more encouragement for people to get jobs with individualist policies, instead of relying on food banks.

Question 27

What is the explanation of the final individualist view?

Answer 27

• The growing costs of the welfare state are unsustainable for the future.

Question 28

What is the additional info needed for the explanation of the final individualist view?

Answer 28

• If the policies of the collectivists were realised by all to be free and universal, then the taxes would need to be risen each year on businesses and the citizens in the country.
• When the population eventually grows, so too does the number of people needed to be covered by the welfare state.

Question 29

What is the first example point for the final individualist view?

(free prescriptions)

Answer 29

• For example, in 2018 it was revealed by the BBC that the cost of providing free prescriptions in Scotland has risen by 25% in 10 years, costing the country £1.3 billion pounds.

Question 30

What is the analysis first point here of the final individualistic view?

Answer 30

• This can make it very unsustainable as more money would need to be spent on the welfare state, the more taxes would need to rise.
• The more borrowing the country would need to make, the potentially putting the country in debt if it cannot be paid back

Question 31

What is the second example to support this final analysis point?

Answer 31

• For example, the Office for Budget Responsibility estimated that the UK Government spending plans for 2021/22 would cost around £1,143 billion,.
• But the tax that was coming in for that same time would only amount to £820 billion.
• The government’s debt stood at £2.223 billion according to the Office for National Statistics, this would cost taxpayers £45 billion per year in interest.

Question 32

What is the final analysis point for the final individualistic view?

Answer 32

• This evidence shows how much money is being spent on the welfare state and that it does require tax to increase to be able to pay for it,
• the Individualists argue that there must be a limit to what can be spent and what people pay in tax, otherwise, why should there be an incentive to work?

Question 33

What is the conclusion for Individualism vs Collectivism?

Answer 33

• In conclusion, the government should be involved and responsible for tackling social inequalities to a certain extent.
• Even though individualistic views can encourage people to work instead of living on benefits as a primary source of income and decreasing taxes so there is an incentive to work,
• collectivists’ views are better because they give the people the support they need when unemployed through the Coronavirus Reinventive Scheme.

Question 34

Is lower unemployment rates better for the population?

Answer 34

• However, although unemployment rates are low because of these individualistic policies, this isn’t helpful to the population.

Question 35

Are people on low wages, or on insecure jobs?

Answer 35

• Even though people may have jobs, they are on low wages, or in insecure jobs such as Uber Drivers, or Just Eat Collectors as extra jobs on the side to still afford food whilst keeping a home.

Question 36

Are individualistic policies good now?

Answer 36

• Alongside rising inflation and fuel bills, these individualistic policies may have been good 11 years ago, but not today, what we desperately need is collectivist policies to help the struggling working class.

Question 37

What is the example for the Uber Driver paragraph?

Answer 37

• For example, at least 3.7 million people in Britain are in insecure jobs, up from 3.6m in 2021, out of a total workforce of 34 million, according to analysis of government data by the TUC.

Question 38

Do we need Collectivist or Individualist policies today?

Answer 38

• This shows that Collectivist policies are what we need today, to help people who desperately need to go to foodbank, to live stable lives without thinking of going hungry again.

Question 39

Is government intervention good for the people?

Answer 39

• Nonetheless, even though the welfare state is unsustainable for the future, sometimes government intervention must be done for the benefit of its people.

Question 40

Why is government intervention needed?

Answer 40

• This is because extreme events could happen, which are unpredictable such as pandemics or the cost of living rising, which means people could be belted in poverty unfairly.

Question 41

What is the example for government intervention?

Answer 41

• For example, from the UK Parliament themselves stated that the unemployment rate rose from 4.0% in January-March 2020 to 5.2% in October-December 2021, but fell to a rate of 3.7% in January-March 2022.

Question 42

1974? (government intervention)

Answer 42

• This was the lowest the unemployment rate had been since 1974.

Question 43

What does the government intervention example show?

Answer 43

• This proves the previous point that we need the government to be able to help us with staying stable within the country, otherwise people will struggle in hard times, therefore staying in poverty.