One In Six Americans Now Receives Government Aid

Business Insider ^ | 08/30/2010 | Vincent Fernando, CFA

[SeekAndFind]

The number of Americans receiving financial aid from the government has soared since the financial crisis, and this fact is frequently used as evidence of American failure.

The Drudge Report highlights today that 'one in six' Americans are now receiving government aid, which is truly a shocking statistic. Programs such as Medicaid are already overwhelmed, and new health laws haven't even taken effect yet:

USA Today:

"Virtually every Medicaid director in the country would say that their current enrollment is the highest on record," says Vernon Smith of Health Management Associates, which surveys states for Kaiser Family Foundation.

The program has grown even before the new health care law adds about 16 million people, beginning in 2014. That has strained doctors. "Private physicians are already indicating that they're at their limit," says Dan Hawkins of the National Association of Community Health Centers.

Yet when reading headlines about benefits, one needs to make the distinction between 'Americans in need' and 'Americans receiving benefits' when passing judgement. This is because the surge in benefits recipients is a combination of both economic weakness and the expansion of benefits eligibility in order to support Americans during the crisis.

[AngelesCrestHighway]

What should anyone expect when you throw personnal responsibiltiy out the window?.....

[SeekAndFind]

More telling statistics :

* More than 40 million people get food stamps

* Close to 10 million receive unemployment insurance, nearly four times the number from 2007

[SeekAndFind]

More telling statistics :

* More than 40 million people get food stamps

* Close to 10 million receive unemployment insurance, nearly four times the number from 2007

[Molon Labbie]

I expect in the future 90 percent of survivors will be receiving government issued MRE’s.

What is going on cannot be maintained.

[outpostinmass2]

Don’t forget all those government “workers” too.

[Secret Agent Man]

No, it can’t be maintained much less allowed to keep growing.

[algernonpj]

What should anyone expect when you throw personnal responsibiltiy out the window?.....

This is way past lack of personal responsibility.

See stats in post # 3.

We are truly in 'interesting' and unprecedented economic times.

Charts showing what gvt stats would be if calculated as they were in Reagan's time:

[AngelesCrestHighway]

It’s a house of cards.....

[JerseyHighlander]

By this time next year, the US government will be spending $2.20 on outlays for every $1 net revenues.

Currently, 54 to 57% of all Federal expenditures are being financed with short term debt.

Within 2 years, the rest of the human beings on this world are going to collectively stop buying US debt, leaving Washington DC only a few options. Once the yield curve starts moving upward... everything we think we know regarding every facet of North American society is going to be turned upside down in a cannibalistic orgy as net economic activity collapses in the face of the collapse in trust in US Federal Reserve Notes.

North American residents, citizens, legal aliens and illegal aliens alike, are going to be facing a civil breakdown in proportions never before seen since the Europeans first discovered the New World. From Canada down through Panama and the Caribbean, through every country in the world that has a hard peg to the US Dollar., etc.

There will either be a military industrial complex in North America, or a finaincial-political oligarchy, there will not be enough liquid marketable wealth available for both.

[WOBBLY BOB]

[Signalman]

and this fact is frequently used as evidence of American failure.

Not if you're a "progressive".

[RicocheT]

Posts 1-11 above are all right on, our nation is in free fall and the landing will be very hard. Even tossing a lot of incumbent Democrats and incumbent RINOs in 11/2010 and 11/2012 will not be enough to stop the slide, unless Americans, individually, decide to get back to work to support themselves and their families. Even the ones on the government tit, employees and entitlement recipients, have to get to work.

[wac3rd]

Cloward & Piven Strategy going full-speed. Why pay for anything or do anything when it’s cheaper and easier to lay about and have the Government pay?

The only way to push a free, capitalistic, self-sustaining society to Communism, kill it with “Social Services” and eternal government employees outearning their private sector counterparts, for life.

This is/has been planned.

[Buckeye McFrog]

you don’t have to look very hard to find evidence that they are working really hard to ACTIVELY RECRUIT new recipients to the Food Stamp program

[ridesthemiles]

I have been watching for some time all the companies that are popping up with advertisements telling us how many wonderful things we can get ‘delivered to our homes’ if we have Medicare or Medicaid.

Early ones were the Hoveraround power chair, along with The Scooter Store.

They would give me a chair for FREE—even if I didn’t qualify thru Medicare or Medicaid.....So who was going to PAY for such a bonanza to me? Such chairs are very expensive.....well into the thousands.

Then Liberty something or other got Wilfred Brimley to tell me how I could get all my Diabetes supplies & testing strips delivered to my home & would never have ANY PAPERWORK to process!!! What luck for me!!!! NO PAPERWORK! They would bill Medicare & Medicaid for me!!!!

Then here came the ads for those who have to use ‘catheters’ for the rest of their lives. I don’t know exactly what kind of catheters they are referring to, but I immediately think of an item needed to pass urine....I am probably wrong. Other than that, I have no clue what kind of catheter use a person would need for the rest of their lives. There is never any mention of what disease this is connected to. However, a new company I cannot remember the name of, is now saying they will provide up to 200 disposable catheters per month with NO PAPERWORK required by me & that these wonderful catheters will be delivered directly to my house in unmarked containers if I qualify thru Medicare & Medicaid !!! LUCKY ME AGAIN!!

The very latest one I have seen really has me puzzled.

I realize that incontinence is a problem for older people & I feel lucky that at my age of 70, it hasn’t hit me yet. However, I am deeply puzzled as to how this problem qualifies for anyone to have Medicare & Medicaid to pay for the products connected to such incontinence: DEPENDS!!
Again, the wonderful company pushing this advertisement tells me that I won’t have to fill out all that PAPERWORK! They will deliver such necessary products to my home and again, it will be in unmarked boxes so I won’t be embarrassed for my neighbors to see what I am getting. Their ‘experts’ at the end of their 800 phone number will work with me to get the correct item, as there are 8 or more to chose from, and to see that I ‘get the correct fit’ for my needs. LUCKY ME ONCE AGAIN.!!!!

SINCE WHEN does Medicare or Medicaid conver Depends???? Are they also gling to pay for tampax & Kotex?

Every one of these companies sounds like a scam to me. Once they have YOUR Social Security number, how much are they billing Medicare for? YOU NEVER SEE A BILL. You have no way to know what amounts or how often these ‘insurance companies’ are billing the government for.

There is something basically wrong when you are allowed to recieve your Depends thru an ‘insurance company’ & Medicare and other taxpayers are paying for your items.

This should be your responsibility.

[ilovesarah2012]

I heard on our local news last night that food bank assistance has doubled over the past year. Things are not getting better, in spite of the Recovery Summer.

[SeekAndFind]

Things are not getting better, in spite of the Recovery Summer.

The problem really is there is no incentive for businesses big or small, to hire.

Businesses DON'T LIKE UNCERTAINTY. They want to be able to calculate with a certain amount of confidence, how much they can make when they undertake a project, build a plant, hire someone, etc.

Instead, what does Congress do ? They add MORE uncertainty and cost to the equation with healthcare ( a bill no one really understands ), a pending tax increase with the sunsetting of the Bush tax cuts, cap and trade, more regulations, more IRS agents snooping around, etc.

Then you have more state/local taxes increasing to feed the state and municipal pension beast.

Who they heck is going to hire under such circumstances?

[traditional1]

"Don’t forget all those government “workers” too."

That money-laundering operation of the Progressives (the SEIU, AFSCME, NEA, etc.) where Unions are allowed to be installed in EVERY facet of society, then pour dues into the re-election/propoganda/vote-buying schemes needs to be ruled illegal (RICO comes to mind), but netiher Party wants the cash-cows to be limited in their money infusion to the Parties.

To me, the Tea Party is about removing the purchasing of favorable treatment by Big Business, Big Labor, and Big Lawyers.

[Lucky9teen]

That explains the ones who still vote for Democrats...

[SeekAndFind]

RE: That explains the ones who still vote for Democrats...

---

That’s a TROUBLING growing number though. If you take away from Peter to give to Paul, you can always count on the support of Paul. What worries me is the increasing number of Paul’s in our society.

[Lucky9teen]

Regardless, as Becks (and Sharptons)rallies clearly pointed out this weekend...we surround them.

Now we just need to get every out to VOTE and get the right people to represent US!!

[EternalVigilance]

What we need are more Pauls like this one:

Warning Against Idleness

6 But we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you withdraw from every brother who walks disorderly and not according to the tradition which he[a] received from us. 7 For you yourselves know how you ought to follow us, for we were not disorderly among you; 8 nor did we eat anyone’s bread free of charge, but worked with labor and toil night and day, that we might not be a burden to any of you, 9 not because we do not have authority, but to make ourselves an example of how you should follow us. 10 For even when we were with you, we commanded you this: If anyone will not work, neither shall he eat. 11 For we hear that there are some who walk among you in a disorderly manner, not working at all, but are busybodies. 12 Now those who are such we command and exhort through our Lord Jesus Christ that they work in quietness and eat their own bread. 13 But as for you, brethren, do not grow weary in doing good. 14 And if anyone does not obey our word in this epistle, note that person and do not keep company with him, that he may be ashamed. 15 Yet do not count him as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother.

== The Apostle Paul, II Thessalonians Chapter 3

[Gapplega]

It’s going to collapse.

[Gapplega]

It’s going to collapse.

[SeekAndFind]

It’s going to collapse.

It does not have to be inevitable though. But we DO HAVE TO MUSTER THE COLLECTIVE WILL to change things.

See for instance --- Paul Ryan's FINANCIAL and FISCAL ROADMAP TO RECOVERY as explained simply: Here

Will most of America take it seriously ? THAT is the big question.

[Gapplega]

I really hope so, but I don’t think the “average American” gets it. They don’t understand how serious this is and what it means to them. They don’t understand that other countries are not going to accept our paper dollars in exchange for their goods in the very near future. Don’t get me started about who’s to blame, but the endgame is near.

[Gapplega]

I really hope so, but I don’t think the “average American” gets it. They don’t understand how serious this is and what it means to them. They don’t understand that other countries are not going to accept our paper dollars in exchange for their goods in the very near future. Don’t get me started about who’s to blame, but the endgame is near.

[azkathy]

I think you are correct, “the average American” doesn’t get it.
I was laid off from my job last August. I worked temporarily at a couple of different jobs. (One company went out of business, one company that didn’t pay their bills-including me, etc.)

Now I am working at a Convenience Store and although this is not my “dream job” I took it because there isn’t much work out there, and this store is one of the busiest in the state. The job will probably be secure even though it doesn’t pay very well. That being said, it has been very enlightening.

On a daily basis I see people buy JUNK with their Food Stamp Credit Card. Candy, energy drinks, things that are completely unnecesary and have no food value. They have no qualms about it either. They use their cash for the important things like lottery tickets, beer, cigerettes, etc. It is quite frustrating to witness when I am working my tail off for $8.oo an hour and I used to make over $20.00 an hour.

This is happening around our country. I also agree with the previous posts about the “free products” people are being taught to take advantage of. How will America survive with all the freebies being handed out?

[DrC]

This article should have made clear that the 1 in 6 figure excludes the 47 million people on Social Security and/or Medicare. Some of these qualify for Medicaid, Food Stamps etc.—programs included in the 1 in 6 count—but most do not, so an unduplicated combined total like would double the 1 in 6 figure.

I’m not taking a position on whether SS and Medicare should be included since one could reasonably argue that programs people “paid for” through mandatory payroll taxes throughout their working lives are a different animal than Food Stamps, which may be provided to individuals who elect not to work. But if you exclude those 2 programs, then unemployment insurance likewise probably should be left out since that too is a benefit for which we all contribute mandatory payroll taxes.