...the Chinese axiom “Give a man a fish, and you have fed him once. Teach him how to fish and you have fed him for a lifetime.”
THIS IS A FIRST STEP.. I am not setting off fireworks quite yet.. Nor do I revel in the pain this work program will cause with some truly needy family members caught in the net, but with most solutions to any major problem, there needs to be a beginning that will need to be corrections to bring the desired results..
WHAT IS THE PROBLEM, and where and when did it start? The problem is, and always has been, POVERTY, and the poor folks that suffer from the consequences.. WHAT IS THE SOLUTION, and how can we solve it? “Ay, there’s the rub”
Let’s face it folks, there has always been “THE UNFORTUNATE FEW”, and there will always be a desire to help those who, are truly needy.. That was, and is the predicament..
Through the ages, families and friends, and entire communities, have taken it upon themselves to “share their lot, with those have not”.. However, with that help came a stigma of shame, because the sharers gave what themselves, didn’t have.. To help others, was the reward, in-and-of-itself.. CHARITY..
It was only when Government’s and so called leaders, in the face of overwhelming need, GREAT DEPRESSION, FAMINE, NATURAL DISASTERS, WAR, attempted to assume that mantel, to fulfill that role.. And that began what has become a slippery slope..
An early attempt at a government solution was the “Widows’ and Orphans’ Pensions Act, 1935”.. This was the program of public assistance, to alleviate the public conscience of the results of WWI, the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl, etc, to create a safety net to the most venerable, and gave birth the what is now the, SOCIAL SECURITY system.. WORTHY, and TRUE..
However, That was then, and This is now.. There have been 1700+, new programs enacted in our Congress, and TRILLIONS of Dollars of added aid to solve real and imaged new programs since then.. The exists in every community, as many as 5 generations of families that have never held a job, or were required to put any effort forward to receive money, from our taxpayers’ general fund.. They are neither, Widows or Orphans, or anything resembling such, and yet entitled to a lifetime of income, “ad infinitum”, a Latin phrase meaning “to infinity” or “forevermore”.. Well, maybe not, we shall see..
Imagine a child, or children, waking up in a home, where not a single person in that home has ever held any gainful employment, EVER.. What role model does that provide, to end this insidious cycle? Two, three, four, FIVE generations of family that have never worked for the money they receive from other hardworking families who wake each day to earn a meager existence that are forced to share what they haven’t got with those who have never even tried.. It’s a failed system, and a cruel trap, for everyone involved..
SHOULD WE TRY TO STOP THIS INJUSTICE, and give these folks on both sides of the table a chance to regain some dignity, and others to keep what is rightfully theirs? I SAY YES, what say you?