Did any of you take economics in college?
All of these programs you complain about so much is less than 1/2 percent of the entire budget. Also, most of these programs have a return of investment back to the economy. So if these items are returning an investment back to the economy how is it costing any of us anything when there is a benefit to the economy. Where do you get these talking points from?Why do we allow people that are on food stamps, Link cards, ect to buy non-essential food items on the tax payers dime? You see them buying pop, candy, ice cream.
When you're only luxury of the day is ice cream and Pepsi you might see it in a different light .
Poor people eating ice cream isn't the problem from my perspective , people that can afford their own ice cream and candy taking advantage of entitlements are a problem .
Have you seen the price of fresh food? Oranges, bananas, lettuce, tomatoes and other fresh food? Or for that matter meat?
I need to find it again but there was a program that let you go grocery shopping with the average cost of the item and you had to buy enough food to reach the daily allowance with just a $200.00 a month allowance per person. I wish I could find it again very few could do it according to the program success and fail rates. Then maybe you would stop complaining. Besides why does it matter f they buy pepsi or ice cream it's not your food and if they run out of benefits by the end of the month isnt that their problem and not yours? I never understood why people are so concerned with what people buy for their food when their benefits are up they are up no more to be had.
This post says it all. It sure is my food, I paid for it through my taxes.
What ever happened to doing the right thing?
The left is all about eating and living healthy, except if you're on welfare, food stamps, link or other forms of assistance. Let them buy and eat whatever they want because they can and are entitled.
I need to find it again but there was a program that let you go grocery shopping with the average cost of the item and you had to buy enough food to reach the daily allowance with just a $200.00 a month allowance per person. I wish I could find it again very few could do it according to the program success and fail rates. Then maybe you would stop complaining. Besides why does it matter f they buy pepsi or ice cream it's not your food and if they run out of benefits by the end of the month isnt that their problem and not yours? I never understood why people are so concerned with what people buy for their food when their benefits are up they are up no more to be had.
Wait a second? Your food? I thought republicans where the party of mind your own fucking business... oh wait... until it comes to sex, that has to be regulated....
From reading your posts you seem to think, mho, that everyone has the same ability as you to get a job, work, and survive on their own. So with that mind set, why are you not a doctor, a lawyer, a ceo of a corporation... since everyone can do it.
Dont you believe that people should be able to take care of themselves for the most part? Public assistance isnt designed for 20% of the population to be on it. There are people recieving public assistance that could work or even make more than they do. I have a cousin who's been on MN care and food stamps for yrs and turned down a full time position with a decent raise because she'd no longer qualify for these programs. None of these programs are meant for lifetime assistance unless you are disabled. What happened to bettering yourself through education or work experience so you can provide for yourselves....
From reading your posts you seem to think, mho, that everyone has the same ability as you to get a job, work, and survive on their own. So with that mind set, why are you not a doctor, a lawyer, a ceo of a corporation... since everyone can do it.
You are failing to look at one assumption you are making. You are assuming everyone can get a job, everyone has the intellectual ability that you have. I can ask the same question to you only in a different form.
Once again why are you not a doctor, lawyer or ceo of a corporation given you can educate yourself.
I am not a doctor because I'm comfortable with my income. Not everyone need to be a doctor to be successful. You can do it on a HS diploma. If you are disabled, mentally retarded ect I understand being unable to work. But to assume that everyone on these programs is incapable of working or advancing themselves is a fallacy. There are many people in america unwilling to put forth any extra effort to advance themselves.
there are many ceo's that never finished college and only have a high school diploma and some that only have a ged and some drop outs.. Again.... why are you not a ceo of a corporation...income has nothing to do with this... we are talking your ability why are you not more successful yourself.
Once again you are making the assumption that the majority of these people on these programs can work, have the ability to work, have the skills to get a job, or have the knowledge of how to advance themselves.
So why do you make the excuse you are comfortable with your income. I dont know anyone that doesnt want to make more money. Want to try explain once again why you are not college educated and more successful than you are? After all based on your assumption you would be lazy if you are not advancing yourself and are contempt.
When did I say I wasnt college educated? When did this become a personal conversation about what I do and why I'm not successful?
I have a BA in engineering from Syracuse, a masters in structural engineering from U of M, and have worked full time for many yrs. Not everyone needs or even wants more money. I have turned down jobs in chicago, new york and california for 30-50% more money because I dont need more and dont want to live somewhere else. I have worked hard to get where I am, including serving in the military to advance myself.
I never said that EVERYONE on these programs could work, had the ability to work, the education to work ect. I said there is no incentive for people on these programs to better themselves, there is no requirement that they try to better themselves. What is going to assist them to get off these programs with that being the status quo?
Now how about you? You escorted at one time, did you claim all your cash income as taxable so you could contribute your fair share to these programs? Dont defend the program s if you dont put your money where your mouth is. Sorry but you made this conversation personal...
Ahhhh here is where I assumed you were not college educated based on this statement. Looks like hit a nerve.
I am not a doctor because I'm comfortable with my income. Not everyone need to be a doctor to be successful. You can do it on a HS diploma.
your quotes "we are talking your ability why are you not more successful yourself"
also "So why do you make the excuse you are comfortable with your income. I dont know anyone that doesnt want to make more money. Want to try explain once again why you are not college educated and more successful than you are?"
No nerves, although I did notice you didnt answer any of my questions...
Now how about you? You escorted at one time, did you claim all your cash income as taxable so you could contribute your fair share to these programs? Dont defend the program's if you dont put your money where your mouth is.
The problem with our current policy is there is no incentive to get off welfare, no plan to help people get off from welfare, no requirement do anything to try to get a better education or get a job. Even the idea of making them volunteer for 5 hrs a week is taboo and asking to much. If we allow these programs to be taken advantage of it hurts them getting public support and more funding. When did the government become responsible for providing housing, food, medical care to people simpily because they are in need? There are plenty of needy people who dont qualify for these programs or dont get more help because people are allowed on these programs forever.
Once his "laziness" as you like to call it causes him to be a dreg on society than it becomes our business. Until then his ambition or lack there of is his own business. and he is right, formal educ
Everybody can do something, and this lack of work ethic in this country is what is going to turn us into another Europe, or are you one of those people that think that we should emulate Europe?
There are some who are not either physically or mentally capable of fending for themselves, this isn't about them. This is about able bodied men and women too lazy to take care of themselves because it's EASIER to let someone else take care of them.
This country is still full of opportunity, why do you think people are still risking their lives to get into this country and almost no one is trying to leave, except maybe for those who already have their pockets full and want to live a life of luxury in a country with a lower tax rate and cost of living.
Working at a job, even if it was menial labor, like working in the CCC, was preferable than not working. Now, politicians and bureaucrats are concerned that such jobs reduce a person's self-esteem. I think we need to re-institute something like the CCC again for all able body adult citizens who can't find work.
Completely agree, if they are able bodied there should be a bare minimum expected. Our grandparents would have done anything they could to avoid being on some of these programs people stand in line for.
sell out at my local grocery store on the days monies are put on the EBT cards. I don't understand it with the rising food costs. You would think they would want to get the most filling and nutrious foods available if they are truly hungry.
I spend more each week feeding my employees. Than a single person on food stamps, gets for the whole month. I would rather continue to be the helper as long as I can. I don't envy them at all
and it damn sure wasn't King Crab legs.
I remember buying a few packs of ramen noodles, ten pounds of potatoes, three or four lbs of pasta, and tomato sauce to put on them, and that was it for the week, and broke as I was, i never took a dime of public assistance.
I don't mind feeding the truly hungry, and it's no crime to fall on hard times and need a hand, but some people go generations on the public dole, and they need to be taken off the government teat, bigger and wider government safety nets are not the answer, quite frankly they are the problem.
One small correction to your post, when you are really hungry and are broke, you aren't really that concerned about filling and nutritious, filling is really all you care about.
that the system is too broken for the government to handle. It should be handled by family members, churches and civic organizations. Now my democrat grandfather that survived the Great Depression would say different. Because their was no help then. But the thing they did have going for them, is that they knew how to farm and work together so nobody starved. I don't see families doing that today. People have lawyers in the back pocket, and are just damn right greedy, even with their own blood
Much population is unwilling to work hard to advance themselves, its gotten worse in the past 15 yrs. The bigger the safety net and the easier it is to sit on it for 20+ yrs the worse it is for the people actually recieving assistance. We require nothing from the people recieving assistance, ie furthering their education, volunteering, advancing their work skills through internhips or meantoring programs. Maybe we should.
People have it so easy today, and the easier they have it, the more entitled they get. People think that certain things that most of us have struggled to achieve are "rights" I am sorry but you don't have a "right" to buy shit on my fucking dime, get off your ass, get a job and buy your own shit.
I disagree with MO on a lot of things, well OK, i disagree with her about most things, but the one thing I agree with her on is helping people who put out an effort. Some one with a low paying job that works his/her ass off is going to generate a lot more good will out of me than some one sitting on their lazy ass waiting for their HRS check to be hand delivered to them.
People that are able to work, and are on assistance for lack of work. They should be required to work for min wage, in exchange for the food stamps. Even if it's volunteer work at the soup kitchen for the homeless. So they can see what truly needy is and how to serve someone else that is worse off
so they work for minimum wage and then they have to give up their unemployment insurance checks and take away time from them searching for a job? Searching for a job, interviewing, sending out resumes, networking, job seminars? that takes no time right? You think these people who are out of work dont know what needy is? You think they dont have kids? no mortgages? How do you know that just the basic snap benefit is helping them to stay out of foreclosure?
How do you determine your analysis of "worse off"? What are the criteria for determining who is needy and who is not?
so I think I have a right to an opinion. The benefit is paid by me (employers), not the receiver.. But I would say let them keep the unemployment until it runs out, but still work 5-10 hrs a week helping earn some of the food stamp benefits.
What do you do for helping the needy? To be honest, when I was an escort. I got so far out of the loop of the real world, that I never saw suffering.
Worse off for me is tent city in my town. I think my locals on assistance should find time to visit the churches and help serve them breakfast and lunch. Why shouldn't someone that is taking, be giving to the less fortunate than them? They don't because they are self-absorbed and entitled.
Do you realize how many military families are on SNAP? Does this mean that they should quit the military cuz it dont pay and cuz they are lazy?
I know our military are under paid, and I will buy their food when I see them in uniform.
I spent 4 yrs in the military in Iraq. With war time hostile service pay its nearly $1500 a month and thats at e-2 in 2002. Enlisted pay runs up to $2900 a month for less than 2 yrs service. When you consider housing and food are provided its decent pay. Its actually more than anyone making $10 an hr working 40hrs a week takes home and they have to buy food and pay for their housing. Its not enough to support a family and a wife that doesnt work, but the compensation after 4 yrs of service is pretty decent if you advance at all. You wont get rich but I served with more than a few guys who want back in after being home for a yr or 2.
http://usmilitarypaychart.com/2013-military-pay-chart/
Unemployment Insurance is exactly that, insurance. For one to receive unemployment benefits one must have paid into the system and quite frankly they are only getting their own money back. I would much rather see those people putting their energies into getting back into the work force. That said unemployment benefits were never meant to last forever, and some people consider it a paid vacation to be milked for as long as possible, so at some point the gravy train has to end.
Welfare is quite a different story, there are families that have been on welfare for generations and that cycle needs to be broken. I fully support your suggestion for people who have been on long term welfare.
Employees DO NOT pay in to the system. Employers do!
However to received unemployment an individual needed to have worked for someone what was indeed reporting payroll. Benefits are paid if the individual meets certain criteria...and at this moment the benefits can extend up to two years.
Welfare is quite a different story, there are families that have been on welfare for generations and that cycle needs to be broken. I fully support your suggestion for people who have been on long term welfare.
and why are we moderated now on this unmoderated board?
It's probably due to a couple of board trolls that like to hang around here, nobody that is here today though.
Wouldn't it have been "smarter" to simply moderate those who are persistent trolls?
Now someone has to read all this drivel...right? LOL
the point remains that to receive unemployment benefits, you must have had a job, and except for the people who work for one quarter, put their employer in a position where they have to fire them, and then expect to take a 2 year paid vacation. Except for those people, I feel a lot differently about people on temporary unemployment than I do about people on lifetime welfare.
Who had their livelihoods, savings, and homes TAKEN from them thanks to the recent political/economic/technological upheaval?
NO large employer is hiring middle age or older unless they have suffixes and acronyms after their name. Hump’n & bump’n it 30+ hours a week in a job that is sure to give a middle-ager a heart attack (but no medical coverage) is egregiously counter productive; even to the most stalwart of Christian work ethos.
I grew up the same way. Farm work and school until I graduated, than college while working 30+hrs a week. 4 yrs in the military, college after for my masters while working full time. Not one grant, student loan or scholarship.
I can see the need for all of these programs, but there are people on them who dont put in the least bit of effort to better themselves or even raise their children. Its should be eye opening that generations of the same family never leave some of these programs. Many very well educated public policy professors actually say that the welfare system in america harms more than it helps minorities.
The Oxford Handbook of the Welfare State is a good look at todays welfare systems.
Did any of you take economics in college?
All of these programs you complain about so much is less than 1/2 percent of the entire budget. Also, most of these programs have a return of investment back to the economy. So if these items are returning an investment back to the economy how is it costing any of us anything when there is a benefit to the economy. Where do you get these talking points from?
It's not just what these people take OUT of the economy, it's what they don't put back in. For everyone who is a net moocher, everyone who is putting into the system has to put that much more. If everyone who was mooching off the system who had the ability to do something, would do just that "something" to carry their own weight we would be in far better shape than we are now.
gagambler,
I dont think you ever took economics or for that matter ever attended a university or college. If you dont understand the basic premise of roi, or even opportunity costs.
Tell me what drives an economy? Am I mistaken but I thought having money for more than just bare essentials is what actually drove the nation. Our most prosperous period 1950-1975 we had a strong middle class earning good money, buying cars and homes. Not 15+% on welfare programs and spending on food stamps and section 8 housing.
Why not explain to a country bumpkin such as myself how entitlement programs have anything whatsover to do with ROI...and even more hysterical, opportunity costs LOL
Can you explain in laymen's terms...I'm pretty slow!
I dont think you ever took economics or for that matter ever attended a university or college. If you dont understand the basic premise of roi, or even opportunity costs.
so I try to surround myself with others that are chopping the wood and carrying the water.
1/2% your numbers are wrong. It comes to about $235 billion, the bulk of which is SNAP (formerly food stamps)
2012 federal budget 3.86 trillion. Its 6.12% if you dont factor in the deficit spending. If you do it's closer to 11%. Because we are over spending by nearly 70% doesnt mean it isnt a fair portion of the budget. Also these numbers are from mother jones and probably are on the low end of whats actually happening.
The cost of policing what foods people buy could outweigh the benefits of such program. However, there seems to be some policing going on. I'm not certain what program the person was on, but a person in line in front of me was having a dickens of a time buying the fruit juice she wanted, while the store clerk kept checking to see if what she had met criterion. It took so much time, I ended up going to a different line. To much of that could cost the store some customers, and we all know the grocery chains have their lobbyists.
for a while for the first time in my life.
I wouldn't like to go back.
Now I would like a better job than the one I found. But there might be more of a chance of going back to unemployment than getting a better job. That goes for many people.
I don't have a problem with people buying whatever they can with food stamps. I have never seen it as "my" tax money. It's all of our tax money. My personal $XXX dollars didn't go to Joe Schmo. I grew up being taught the value of work - but in that experience, I was also shown the world of those who don't work and the world of those who don't make enough even at their best to have food on the table every night. I have a family member who teaches in a low income neighborhood. A lot of those parents are good, hard working people - they just come up a little short in the end. Do some take public assistance? Yes. Do some abuse it? Probably. But think about that - good people who work hard and still can't buy basic food. There's a problem with that. Not everyone can be a lawyer, a doctor or a business owner. We need to find better solutions then what we have now. And if you think food stamps are a luxury - try living off of $150/month in food. If you really want to make a dent in what the government spends - focus on healthcare and military spending. Those two account for nearly 50% of the budget. But it is so much easier to pick on the poor, isn't it?
it's not to be envied. Thank you for putting it into perspective. I have a terrible feeling we are all going to be very poor in the years to come. I won't be sitting down saying poor pitiful me. I will rise from the ashes and re-invent myself.
Did you know suicide took more lives than auto accidents with middle age people last year? Due to stressors of being caretakers, financial, job losses.
I dont see them as my personal dollars either. But there is a need to fix broken programs. When generation after generation of the same family are on these programs something needs to be addressed. If there is no incentive to get off these programs or requirements to try and make yourself more employable (if your able bodied) it becomes a never ending drain on the economy. Even if 10% could work and remove themselves from these programs shouldnt it be a goal to get them there?
Many of the medical expenses incured by the federal government are provided as welfare benefits. Military spending for the 2011 fiscal year, the president's base budget of the Department of spending on "overseas contingency operations" brings the sum to $664.84 billion.
The total amount spent on these 80-plus federal welfare programs amounts to roughly $1.03 trillion. Importantly, these figures solely refer to means-tested welfare benefits. They exclude entitlement programs to which people contribute.
http://www.budget.senate.gov/republican/public/index.cfm/files/serve/?File_id=34919307-6286-47ab-b114-2fd5bcedfeb5
"According to the 2010 US Census Bureau findings, there are 114.8 Million families in the US. With 34.2% of US families “on welfare” (see related article: An Expansion of the Welfare State), this means that approximately 39.3 Million homes receive monthly welfare benefits. The Federal government expects to spend $451.9 Billion in 2012 on welfare expenditures. This averages out to roughly $11,500 annually per family or $958 per family per month.
If the fraud rate is only 2%-3%, how much money could it really be costing us? Well…these low rates would mean that roughly 785,000 to 1.2 Million families are illegally receiving welfare benefits. At the average rate of $11,500 per year, this is costing the tax payers between $9.0 - $13.5 Billion dollars every year."
http://www.roanen.com/1/post/2012/04/how-much-is-welfare-fraud-costing-us.html
The Pentagon wastes 250 billion annually which amounts to 5 billion per week.
Doesn't that get you a snootful as well?
Why is it that when "waste" is talked about the Pentagon is never mentioned.
What never?
Well, hardly ever.
showing he paid less than 14% while hiding Hundreds of Millions off shore I've come to believe that NO welfare fraud by a person earning less than $50k/yr should be prosecuted.
Steal a loaf of bread and you go to jail. Steal the life savings of countless thousands of Americans and you go on a $20k per appearance lecture tour
Both situations are wrong, ethically, morally and in some cases legally. Congress members for the most part are rich, feel entitled and of course look out for themselves. Many are willing to mortgage the countries future for their success today/fortunes today. That doesnt absolve everyone else from having to pay taxes, not defraud welfare, social security and snap programs.
Our economy is so top heavy (the top 1%) that its hard to sustain a middle class, but thats an excuse for us not to contribute?