That makes sense and we're getting a bit closer to understanding but still not 100% there.
It boils down to having a good definition of being in a bad place, or legitimaly requiring governmental help, VS being able to help yourself; in the end we only want to help those who can't help themselves and those who could help themselves but choose not to are being unethical.
There are two ideas being confounded here.
1) I agree people who could help themselves but chose not to in order to receive help from others are being unethical.
2) I disagree that we, as a society, necessarily only want to help people who cannot help themselves. Or put more simply: depending on the context I am not necessarily opposed to public or private charity going to people who have behaved unethically in the past and may do so again in the future.
I think this may be the fundamental disconnect with some posters: saying "you made a bad or immoral decision" is not synonymous with "therefore I'm okay with letting you starve." (I don't think that's the point you and I are disconnected on, a little more on that later.)
The problem with posing this definition is that a "genuine bad place" depends on the standards of living of each individual, their tolerance for pain and general badassity. For example, person A "needs" to have their TV subscription, eat out, cannot work too much, etc. and as a result spends all their savings and ends up needing help. According to their intent (not trying to game the system), this is ethical. In contrast, person B has a high pain tolerance, is frugal and will work 12 hour days to earn a living on top of saving some money, preventing them to achieve their dreams in the process, or spend quality time with their kids, and in good faith they assume everyone including person A does the same. According to your standards, it would be unethical for person B to work less or retire, because their decrease in income would be intentional and they'd benefit as a result. This doesn't seem right.
I disagree with the bolded bit. A "genuinely bad place" is obviously subjective, but I think its definite is dependent on the standards of the folks who are handing out the private charity, or the populace that elects the politicians that set the rules for public charity, rather than each individual who applies for it.
As a result, I'd respectfully object to the underlined bit as that does not, in fact, reflect my own personal standards, beliefs, or ethics.
Let's try again. I posit that it's only unethical to decrease income to increase benefits if:
- The decrease in income is intentional, AND
- The ONLY reason (intent) for decreasing income is to increase benefits.
This means that if decreasing income also increases happiness, or is otherwise necessary for general well being, then the behavior is ethical. Seems like this definition would satisfy everyone so far?
Except this poses another problem. If your "friend" suggests you to decrease income and promises you more happiness as a result, your intent is now happiness, not leeching, which is ethical. But what if the reason you'll be happier is indirectly linked to the benefits you're getting? I.e. by blacklisting some taboo intents, it becomes advantageous to identify intents closely correlated to those taboo intents, then feeding those off clueless loved ones.
We can't even scientifically determine cause and effect relationships with certainty, so using intent in law is prone to all kinds of complications. No wonder the justice system is so fucked.
I'm sure you know the old joke about physicists and assuming a spherical cow in a frictionless vacuum? I feel like that's a good analogy for the crux of where you and I are disagreeing. We both agree that introducing the question of intent into ethics generally, or the ethics of seeking out public or private charity makes the questions more complex, and potentially more subject to gaming by bad actors. Where we differ really seems to be the question of whether considering intent is avoidable complexity, or necessary complexity.
In the specific case you laid out above, a conditional that includes "only" is going to be extremely subject to gaming, because it is quite easy to find some additional motivation to add in to the discussion. So I'd change the statement "The ONLY reason (intent) for decreasing income is to increase benefits." to "The person would reach the same decision to decrease income in the absence of any increase in benefits."
Now this requires reaching a conclusion about people's decision making in a counter-factual scenario, which is obviously hard to determine, but, as you point out, determining a person's set of motivations is difficult as well, and both are impossible with complete certainty, so I don't think I'm making this proposed ethical standard any harder to apply than it already was while at the same time making it somewhat more difficult, but clearly not impossible, to game.