Posted on 02/13/2012 6:45:02 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Skyrocketing food-stamp enrollments over the last few years have played a notable role in this year’s presidential race, but it’s not just food stamps that have exploded — it’s entitlements, generally: housing subsidies, Medicaid rolls, college loans and much, much more.
And the trend is threatening to chip away at the very pillars that keep America’s civil society functioning.
Today, one in five Americans — 67 million of us, all told — rely on federal aid in obtaining housing, food, income, health care or education.
The dependent population has been growing for years, of course. But the “Index of Dependence on Government,” published annually by The Heritage Foundation, shows remarkably sharp spikes in dependence in the years since President Obama entered the Oval Office.
Over the two-year period 2009-2010, the number of people receiving aid from the feds grew 7.5 percent. And the payments got much more generous, too. In 2010, the average recipient of federal assistance collected benefits worth $32,750. That’s more than the average per-capita disposable income in America.
Dependency-related programs now cost $2.5 trillion annually. That’s roughly 70 percent of the federal budget.
And, no, the growing dependence on government isn’t simply a reflection of hard economic times. From 1980 to 2000 — a period of good times and bad — dependence, as measured by the Index, rose 79 percent. It rose 36 percent from 2000 through 2008, and 23 percent during the recessionary four-year period thereafter.
Overall, we estimate that only about a fifth of the Index’s increase reflects responses to economic downturns. Another fifth can be attributed to population changes. The rest is due to policy decisions. Yes, Washington has actually decided to make government bigger and more people dependent on it.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
The more people dependent on government, the more who will vote for the party that promotes bigger government. This is leading to a tyrannical state.
Alexis de Tocqueville’s suppositions are being proven correct.
Gimme gimme gimme. Benefits for those who earn up to 200% of the poverty level and in some states, to people who earn as much as $60 to $70K per year. Pure insanity. There is no justification for this as helping the poor. Its creeping Communism, pure and simple.
The way to defeat this isn’t by going after the food stamps first. It is defeated by forcing a choice. High speed rail or welfare. Bake paths and rain gardens or food stamps. Force the people to make a choice.
Granted, the entitlements have got to go but they’re only a symptom of the greater problem and the democrats want us to go after the entitlements because that pushes people to side with them.
Force the democrats to justify massive amounts of money subsidizing dozens of regulatory agencies, green energy, and other pet projects right down the line. Tell the people that their food stamps are being cut as the EPA continues to grow.
Seems undercounted to me ... one in 5 is un/under-employed so there’s your fifth right there. Now add in the spouse and kids and the number is much larger.
We need to re design our national flag. It should be a blank white flag with an upturned palm (handout) !!
If anyone thinks America is becoming even MORE Conservative, simply look at Greece, and what is happening there at the moment.
Greece and Occupy Wall Street, are a fore runner of what will happen if Welfare, Food Stamps/Instant Government Cash Credit Cards, and unlimited Unemployment benefits are taken away.
And considering that almost 50% of the Population are employed by, or dependent on the Government for a job; Don’t believe for a second, that this is going to easily go away once a so called Conservative is elected into office.
As my wise father (RIP) use to say:
A liberal is someone who wants to give your tax money to the poor and get credit for doing it.
Here in Pennsylvania, Gov. Corbett is trying to reimpose an assets means test on food stamp recipients (see the Michigan Lotto winner who is now a millionaire but still qualifies because that’s not considered “income”).
The Democrats and the MSM is reacting as if he’s personally driving around and raiding the refrigerators of the “Working Poor”.
I do charity work with the poor and homeless in Philadelphia. You’d be amazed at how many young people in their late teens and 20s — black, white, no difference when it comes to race — are focused on getting a government check. Their goal is to keep adding to the number of government checks they can get. None even try to work, or if they do, its part time and they run with their friends at night. And do drugs and drink. There are a lot of people who need to be forced into working for a living. It will clear up a lot of problems.
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