Ok, so I thought about this a little more while doing some mindless repetitive work, lol. I think I can state my ideas a little better, in a more general sense.

I think my idea relies on the assumption that "wealth" (be that material or non-material socio-cultural "wealth") is what makes society "better". And by "socio-cultural wealth" I mean doing labor without any material gain which still benefits society, like putting in the effort to raise one's children well, which improves society when those children reach majority and become well-adjusted good-intentioned adults.

The second assumption is that there is no fixed amount of "wealth" that just moves around between people, but that "wealth" is dynamically created and destroyed as a process of the functioning of society. That our labors create "wealth", while our consumption destroys it.

Thus, when a person or group's labors outweigh their consumption, their "wealth" increases. But when their consumption outweighs their labor, then their "wealth" decreases.

But since "wealth" is not a fixed quantity, taking it away from the net-producers and redistributing it to the net-consumers does nothing more than destroy wealth, to the detriment of the society as a whole. Not to mention that this is an oppression against the net-producer. This is the crux of my problem with a society having an "addiction" to the welfare state.

Nay, the real solution (in my opinion) is to work to change the socio-cultural values of the net-consumers so that they instead become net-producers (or at least zero-sum) themselves. Then everyone is better off, and everyone's "wealth" grows, and nobody is oppressed in the process.

That may require a little (just barely enough) kick-start from the welfare state, but as long as it is just enough to be a "hand-up", it doesn't cause the dependence that leads to the unsustainable net-consumer mindset and the oppression of the net-producer, but instead acts in everyone's best interest.

Unfortunately this also requires that we refuse to support able-bodied and/or -minded individuals who refuse to become net-producers. Which makes me feel like kind of an arse. But I can't see how else a society can continue to function in the long-term. Otherwise we undermine the net-producer foundation of said society and it eventually ceases to be a society that preserves individual freedom (due to the necessity of needing to oppress the net-producer to support the net-consumer). And being able to live within a society that supports individual freedom is the whole point (in my opinion).