Treat adults like children and they will forever remain children

Cuomo’s welfare stipends

Redistribution and lingering dependency — it’s not just an Obama thing.

Case in point: Gov. Cuomo is launching a program that’ll give $2 million in taxpayer cash to Medicaid recipients who take good care of themselves.

Like the adults they’re supposed to be.

Under Cuomo’s “experimental” plan, as reported by The Post’s Carl Campanile on Monday, folks on Medicaid could get up to $250 a year as an “incentive” to get checkups, monitor their weight, pick up medicine or other steps to protect their health.

Some might even get free lottery tickets.

Not a budget-buster, you say?

What’s the big deal?

Well, the road to budget hell is often paved with experimental programs. And in a state where roughly one-third of the population already is receiving welfare benefits of one sort or another, it really doesn’t make sense to go trolling for more.

Now, it comes as no surprise that the cash program is a component of the ObamaCare Medicaid Incentives program.

But it is a little startling that Cuomo — given his experience with the pathologies that subsidizedhousingcan generate — was so eager to sign on.

Guess maybe he really hasn’t learned anything from America’s long experience with welfare: It’s now beyond dispute that handouts, subsidies, cash bonuses and the like all just foster more dependency.

And, no, that’s not a good thing — for the recipientsorfor the nation.

Bill Clinton got it.

Remember the huge dips in welfare rolls after he signed off on rules thatlimitedpayments? Clinton’s reform — one of the most successful pieces of social legislation in US history — moved millions from the dole into lives of self-sufficiency.

Now, we’re not suggesting that there’s no proper role for subsidized health care.

But it does need to be recognized that cradle-to-grave, no-frills-left-behind programs like New York’s version of Medicaid are socially corrosive on three levels:

* They are so hugely expensive that they suck crippling sums from public education and infrastructure renewal, in the process diminishing states’ prospects for long-term economic health.

* They promote permanent dependence on government succor.

* They make fools out of those among the working poor who are struggling to maintain independence and self-respect. If all their friends have Medicaid cards, why not just go along?

Cash bonuses meant to boost participation just make matters worse.

In New York, some 5 million people — more than a quarter — are on Medicaid, at a cost of $54 billion a year.

No wonder the Tax Foundation tabs New York as the nation’s most heavily burdened state.

Please don’t make it worse, governor.

Progressives/Democrats can only do do things: raise taxes and give money away