The welfare we provide the rich through the Federal Reserve system in just one year is many time greater than all of welfare we have provided the poor in all of our history. To that we have to add the benefits the very rich receive by using congress to guarantee their incomes and rig the markets they operate in.
The notion that the poor are the primary engine for never ending dependence on government has whiskers on it to say the least. Once an idea gains acceptance and catches on it develops a life of its own. When the time comes that it is no longer true, it is treated as fact regardless. Hardly a soul even wonders otherwise.
The poor do get some benefits, but the days when “helping the poor” seriously drove up the cost of government are long behind us. The true angst behind the current change in government is the fear by the rich of being cut off from their government benefits. That fear is probably not well founded. Trump’s tax and spending plans are tailored towards rewarding the politically powerful, just like those of the last two presidents.
Welfare for the rich is far more hazardous than welfare for the poor. The rich have the political power to see to it that their benefits continue growing. Can you visualize a thousand sided figure? No you can’t. It is just as hard to fathom the amount of money the rich have extracted out of the general population over the last forty six years by using the government as a tool. The process is ongoing.