Posted on 01/28/2013 1:40:39 AM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
Those who work for a living might want to put away shoes, hammers, and other hard objects to keep from throwing them through the computer. A new study shows that on average the government spends $168 per household on various assistance programs, one-fifth more than the median income of $137.
As the Republican side of the Senate Budget Committee reported (after all, who else in government is going to do it?), welfare spending per hour per household in poverty is $30.60, which is higher than the $25.03 median income per hour.
The Weekly Standard points out that direct welfare payments are not taxed:
"After accounting for federal taxes, the median hourly wage drops to between $21.50 and $23.45, depending on a household’s deductions and filing status. State and local taxes further reduce the median household’s hourly earnings. By contrast, welfare benefits are not taxed.”
Welfare recipients never had it so good. This is not to say that poor people are rich, or that life is easy for everyone on food stamps or on some other form of government assistance. It’s just that conservatives would rather poor people be working, rather than paying their way through life on other people’s dime (which at this point, is their children’s dime). Work is not only more economically productive, but it offers more opportunity for people to improve their own lot — not to mention that working people are more likely to feel dignity and self-importance.
If welfare is inherently compassionate, then there is a Pavlovian ego-stroke for Congress passing even unsustainable spending programs. On the other hand, conservatives get demonized for suggesting there is so such thing as a budget, and that you can’t keep looting the private sector without negative consequences — like systemically high unemployment...
(Excerpt) Read more at ijreview.com ...
I haven’t seen Atlas Shrugged II yet, don’t tell me how it ends.
Just wow.
Yeah—I got it-—but I wish I hadn’t......I was much happier not knowing that.
Sorry ‘bout the multiple posts—’puters’s acting up this AM
12 may be a record!
Good luck getting anybody here to care about this!
Every time a debate starts here about ‘entitlements’ I post the link below. Follow it and download the .pdf report and you will become physically ill. It will quickly become apparent that the welfare problem makes Defense, Medicare, and Social Security look like parking tickets!
The good news is that I plan to get a new computer next week.
I’ve been on welfare twice in my life. Once, during the 1990-1994 recession, when I was on it for five months, and more recently, during this current economic Charlie Foxtrot, I was forced to go back on it for several months. I assure you that I don’t find being on the dole even REMOTELY pleasant, in fact it made me feel like some sort of criminal.
The only thing that bothers me more about the whole system is that in many ways it’s like a pitcher plant. It’s hard to get out of it, especially when all you can find is minimum wage jobs. There really has to be some sort of more effective methodology than “work or starve” on one extreme and the “nanny state” on the other, but the system really is broken.
I thought the 5 year limit was supposed to reduce dependence on welfare; it certainly brought down the urban black birthrate. If being on welfare long-term means living around people on welfare, I just don’t see it as a winning strategy; in fact, it would be depressing.
This is balderdash. I actually know someone on welfare. She can’t even buy hot food. If she gets toilet paper, she doesn’t have carfare. It is extreme, grueling poverty that nobody would choose.
Education is often touted as a solution, but most people think of traditional colleges and universities. That kind of education has devolved into a racket often handing out degrees worth their weight in toilet paper.
In fact, the potential for self-education abounds. Unfortunately, few are of this persuasion as we've a glut a sheep and a deficit of foxes.
The goal is not to have things handed to one. The goal is to become objectively good at something one is passionate about.
As an employer I want people who are inclined to learn and innovate, not sheep accustomed to being led nor the entitlement-minded who expect a job handed to them because they happen to bear some establishment-oriented imprimatur. I'll take experience and demonstrated self-discipline any day. Energy, enthusiasm, competence...
You must not be one of holder's people then. I used to work for subsidized housing in a small city. The dirty little secret is that certain "ethnicities" are rubber stamped through on these various programs due the fact that bureaucrats don't want any "trouble" from community organizers. Obama's sons and daughters usually have a MUCH more streamlined process.
I actually experienced this with my own two children; one happens to be bi-racial. His application was NEVER EVER audited for reduced price school lunch. At the time I had two jobs, no child support and was the divorced mom of two. (I was married to both of my children's fathers and both children came at least nine months after marriage).
My daughter, who is white, had her application CONSISTENTLY audited each semester. Same financial information on both apps. I asked the school why this was and they acted as though they had been caught red handed. I was even told that my son could get happily bussed to any one of the better city magnet schools, but my daughter had to walk 2 miles through the worst neighborhoods to the worst schools due to the "racial balance" (inbalance).
They even had a little map with symbols for the various races of children and where they could go. Needless to say I threatened to show this to the media and they backed down, allowing both of my children to ride the same bus to the magnet school.
they usually just convert to SSI or SSD for a host of questionable “disabilities.”
I can’t do much myself now, due to health, but I was a career counselor and recruiter for 25 years. Anyone here who wants me to find them (or a family member/friend/neighbor/co-religionist) a job or a better position, FReepmail me.
She must not be one of “holder’s people” I overheard a very novice black caseworker tell a white woman that she was being “too honest” and encouraged her to work the system (the way generations of welfare recipients have done)
Can I dare ask the question whether she buys lottery tickets, uses drugs or alcohol?
btt
Wish i worked for you. Nowadays, companies want cookie-cutters that can easily be replaced.
AMEN! I see the product of the local universities unable to write anything more than their name. . . but I'm sure they are proficient at community organizing. Today's bachelor's degree is equivalent to a 4th grade education in the sixties and seventies. The colleges have discovered the cash cow of non-acredited remedial education due to the failure of the public schools (and parents to actually parent).
I imagine most of that article is accurate, but can’t stomach the insane claim that SS and Medicare aren’t means tested.
“they usually just convert to SSI or SSD for a host of questionable “disabilities.”
Yes, the welfare industry has changed a lot since the steps taken to eliminate the multi-generational welfare lifestyle in 1996.
“There really has to be some sort of more effective methodology than ‘work or starve’ on one extreme and the ‘nanny state’ on the other”
Gee, if only humanity had invented social institutions between the individual and the state. We could call them “families,” “churches,” or “fraternal organizations.” Naw, that’s crazy talk./s
By the way, Lenin’s replacement for “he who does not work shall not eat” was “he who does not obey shall not eat.” Which I bring up because your “work or starve” reminded me of it. That’s the gubmint’s (and Tim Allen’s) perennial solution: more power. Only it didn’t work with Lenin, even, who had almost total power, as lots of people who obeyed starved to death, too.
I wonder how much of that “spending per” money actually makes it to the recipients, and how much goes to run the bureacracy? My guess is most is going to the SEIU purpleshits and their ilk.
> She can’t even buy hot food.
Then the money is probably being spent for “Administrative Costs”.
I remember reading somewhere that the welfare recipient only gets a small fraction of every dollar spent on the program.
A lot of welfare program spending never filters down to the poor. Social services bureaucraies take a large cut; the overhead percentage will vary greatly from place to place, but I imagine that on average it is very high. Then there is the gaming of the system, with large amounts being fraudulently siphoned off in improper payments to legally ineligble recipients. This leads to the always interesting question of how many $40,000 a year clerks, $80,000 a year investigators, and $120,000 a year supervisors you want to hire to chase people who are cheating SNAP for an extra $30 a month.
On top of that, you have to factor in the often massive incompetence and featherbedding of welfare services rendered in-kind rather than cash. I'm sure the situation varies greatly from place to place around the country, but here in DC, social services have notoriously been used as a jobs and political patronage program. I recall an expose of DC public housing years ago, back in Marion Barry days -- ancient history now -- that showed that it would have been significantly cheaper simply to shut the entire sytem dowm, and buy each public housing tenant a brand new townhome out in the suburbs. DC back then was probably an extreme case, and city administration has improved greatly since the Barry era (not that we're anywhere close to where we should be ...), but this is still a major factor. The system is short-stopping a lot of money that is intended for the poor.
A recent example from a different sector: DC as of 2010 was spending nearly $30,000 per year per student in DC Public Schools (DCPS), by far the highest figure in the country. That's almost Sidwell Friends tuition. While a handful of DC public schools have turned the corner and are noteworthy success stories, the DCPS system as a whole remains a disaster area, although one with a very large, very well paid staff and nearly as many non-teaching as teaching personnel. Welfare tends to work the same way.
If this thread is still alive tonight, I'll be glad to discuss solutions. Gotta get to work so I can pay my taxes. I have a whole lot of social workers and welfare administrators to support.
Every person on welfare should be flown to Haiti or some other 3rd world hell hole to live with a real poor person for two weeks. Only afterward would they be eligible for welfare benefits.
Our poor are only relatively poor. They’re the 1% when compared globally. The Marxist argument that wealth creates poverty is utter nonsense.
Thanks to government schooling a majority were weaned on it and now believe it as if it were a sunrise.
bookmark
Why is she poor? Is physically disabled, severely retarded. etc.?
BTTT
The country is already socialist. It just doesn’t have the name yet.
Good post.
Just got one.
Windows 8 is a pain in the butt compared to XP.
Of course peoplewl would choose it. It’s a universally observer fact that people on the margins are induced to choose to go on the dole rather than earn a living. You can’t imagine anyone choosing welfare probably because you are far enough above the line to make the proposition absurd. But try someone making only a little bit more than your friend, and the choice turns attractive.
“The dirty little secret is that certain “ethnicities” are rubber stamped through on these various programs due the fact that bureaucrats don’t want any “trouble” from community organizers.”
No lie: a friend of mine decided to test that hypothesis in CT. He told his wife not to pay the electric bill for three months. Then, just as they were about to shut off the electricity, he went online and applied for aid. The first time, he used his name and actual race (white). He was denied. The second time, he used his wife’s name and marked her “african american.” She was approved for assistance.
They went down to the office to pick up a check (or complete the process - I can’t remember which), and the case worker balked at giving them payment.
She said, “Your form says your black. You’re not black.”
He said, “No, I’m sorry. We must have made a mistake filling out the online form. Should it matter?”
She left them for a loooong time, during which they saw her talking to multiple supervisors. She finally came back and gave them payment.
That is a TRUE STORY. This guy is a close friend who just visited my house less than a week ago, not some distant acquaintance.
Each time I go shopping, I try to observe how folks pay. I can usually guess if they buy name brands and grab a soda and/or candy bar... usually EBT shoppers using TAX money. Go to Lowes or Home Depot, and those workers who shop sometimes grab something but you can tell they are in work clothes and need the energy fix, but can they really afford it based on this article - here in Fayetteville NC the average wage is service industry being near to a military base, and construction workers are lucky to top $15 an hour. My guess is that in this area that welfare buck can afford a lot of Tide and soda pop at the checkout, but in NYC it might only cover the rent and drugs/alcohol....
She can’t buy hot food?
Who gives a damn.
Tell her to do what the rest of us do that have to pay for our own food.
Learn to cook and cook it herself.
Bag of beans and a bag of rice will go a long way.
Throw in a few cans of greens, some corn meal, a little flour, a few eggs, a dab of coking oil, and she’s set for the month.
I and a lot of other people have lived that way before at our own expense.
If we did it, she can too.
I will be getting the new IMAC. I’m excited to be replacing my old Mac that has been a wonderful machine for all these years-—the latest one has a bunch of new features that I think I will use and enjoy.
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