"More than half of all Americans--53 percent--now
depend on government for their income. In 1950 the
figure was just 28 percent. While that number shot
upward, the proportion of workers in the private sector
fell. The economist Gary Shilling totaled up federal,
state, and local government workers, plus
private-sector workers who owe their jobs to
government,
plus recipients of Social Security, other transfer
payments, and benefits such as food stamps. He also
tacked on the dependents of these direct
beneficiaries. After adjusting his figures to avoid
double counting, Shilling found that for each person
earning his pay in the private sector and paying taxes,
there is at least one more person relying on a check
from the government.



"Historically, government dependence reached its
height in 1980, hitting 55 percent at the beginning of
the Reagan presidency. Shilling sees the country
returning to those days and then going further: He
predicts the number of government beneficiaries will
grow to 60 percent of the U.S. population by
2040."



Katherine Mangu-Ward, "Data: A Nation on the Dole,"
Reason Magazine, August/September 2007
Print Edition.


It seems to me that if your livelihood comes from the state, you would be more inclined to bow to it, if not to grovel before it; I've seen hippies become park employees, and then become cops; become teachers, and then become less liberal, if not Republican, and I wonder how much of the conservative element in our society depends upon the state for their income.