No worries, I understand you're views, they're basically center-left. My only criticism is this: 1) If the state is paying for your welfare, and mandating a high standard, companies will face high costs and therefore put fewer jobs in the market for ordinary-folk. So some of the poor get poorer, but in return they get amenities for nothing.

2) The state sounds ideal but there are errors in practice (as there are with companies, only the state is harder to control). For example, let's say there's a big recession, and all academics/intellectuals SUDDENLY agree 20% of nurses and teachers need to be sacked or else we get into a never ending debt cycle (this never happens in real life, but imagine all the intellectuals agreed)... Do you think the government would fire 20% of nurses, doctors, and teachers, because it needed to, just like that? Or would it pussy-foot because it didn't want to piss off non-intellectual voters.

My view is it would pussy-foot for a while before making the correct decision.

A business, however, would not pussy-foot if it was about to get into debt. A business would immediately fire 20% of the nurses, doctors, and teachers it was hiring.

Insofar as the above is true (and it is, watch governments institute "temporary" taxes around the world to pay for wars, and then NEVER repeal the taxes because they want the money), then I cannot support government intervention.

However; in some areas, like maintaining basic access to resources, government does a commendable job, just not in private enterprise. (And yes, nursing, medicine and teaching, if the rewards are to match the costs without waste, should be private enterprise, tightly regulated by govt.)