Your drawing conclusions from one example and saying that it applies to every working class American. That was a kind gesture of you to pay the co-pay for your neighbor. No one held a gun to your head to do it did they? That is what the government does when it takes money from you and redistributes that wealth. Don't believe me? Try not paying your taxes and real estate/property taxes.
My wife and I both worked for minimum wage when we started working @ $2.85 an hour. Had food, housing, a car, took vacations and put away money for a down payment on a house. It took 7 years to save enough money, but we did it.
Did we eat fillet mignon and stay at the Hilton? We sure didn't. Did we have cable TV and buy precooked meals? Nope.
How easy do we want to make life for the working poor? Don't we want them to become the working middle class?
I've always felt giving too much assistance is much like a mother refusing to let her baby learn how to walk. How compassionate is that?
That sentence there exemplifies where we part company. I don't think anyone should be working poor, and I don't believe that one should have to move up to the middle class in order to provide adequately for themselves. My welfare gripes have always concerned the non-producers. I think it's a shame when the producers are going begging as well.
So you were able to save money for the house, buy a car, take vacations on mimimum wage? Did you have children too? When was it?