When Welfare Goes Wrong...

[morethanpretty]

Originally Posted by Aliantha

As I said, my ideas on charity are different to yours and if you want it plainly, then yes, I do believe anyone who doesn't care to give to strangers or 'bums' as you so nicely put it, is less charitable than someone who chooses to show their charity closer to home.

Again, though, you're trying to make nice-nice, you're inserting and adding things into what I've said. Strangers are not the same as homeless (there like that word better), I am perfectly willing to help charities (that I trust) that help strangers, or people I don't know. I trust the the charity is helping those it KNOWS needs help, therefore by my association with them I am helping people I KNOW need help. Not necessarily people I know personally or have relations with. Right now I don't have the ability to help monetarily or physically as much as I want to, so I prioritize. Yes it is easier to help those I'm closer too, but that isn't my only goal. I still would not give money to homeless, I would give to a homeless shelter, soup kitchen, ect. Those charities that help the homeless a lot more in the long run than my pocket change would.

[Aliantha]

Just forget it mtp. You're wonderful. Very charitable. You should be very proud.

I'm terrible and simply shouldn't speak to people like you the way I do.

But just keep in mind for next time; if you're going to ask me to back up what I say, I will, and since you were the one that asked, you were the one I used as an example.

For the record once and for all, any charity is good. I just think it's better if you don't feel the need to put conditions on your charitable deeds. To me, it's takes away from the other things you do.

[morethanpretty]

Right I will: It is your business if you want to be financially irresponsible with your charitable donations and investments. I can and will feel good knowing that my charity fed a hungry person instead of buying heroin needles.

[Aliantha]

good for you.

[Yznhymr]

Failure is when law abiding tax payers support intentionally non-working citizens. These are typically minority groups looking for a hand outs instead of completing a simple high school deree and getting a job. Hence, they are liberals and vote for a person as President based on race and not experience. This is the same in my home town. How sad, depressing, and tragic.

[classicman]

While I agree with some of what you say Dana, I disagree with the last line "many are trapped." I call BS, at least for the most part here in the states. There are a zillion programs for those willing to get off their asses and work at looking/finding work. Currently the situation has changed obviously, but in the general sense, again at least here, there are many opportunities for those that wish to seek them out.

[Sundae]

Originally Posted by classicman

While I agree with some of what you say Dana, I disagree with the last line "many are trapped." I call BS, at least for the most part here in the states. There are a zillion programs for those willing to get off their asses and work at looking/finding work. Currently the situation has changed obviously, but in the general sense, again at least here, there are many opportunities for those that wish to seek them out.

Again, American vs UK citizens. It does seem that an awful lot of US citizens are genetically lazy. If they are not governed by a punitive system then they will take every opportunity not to work.

Luckily, there is only a minority of people in this country who live this way. Of course we have our own burden of the generally criminally minded, drug addicts of one sort of another etc. But I appreciate the American fear that if you had better welfare, just about every American would take advantage of it. We do have a welfare state and not every Brit takes advantage of it, lucky old us.

[smoothmoniker]

Originally Posted by Sundae Girl

If they are not governed by a punitive system then they will take every opportunity not to work.

you mean a punitive system like the free market?

[lookout123]

I know a gentleman who came from a very poor background to become a very very insanely wealthy man. About 15 years ago he was sitting around with a group of men thinking back to the days he would show up to school in ratty clothes and no school supplies. He was self conscious and a loner. One year a teacher spotted his embarrassment and gave him a new sweater, shoes, a backpack, a couple notebooks, and some pencils without drawing attention to the gift. He still draws on that day as one of the defining moments in his life.

He asked one of the other guys at the table how difficult it would be to identify all of the children in a school who might be in the same type of situation he was as a child. The other man who was a school superintendent let him know it wasn't hard. The gentleman announced that while he understood it wouldn't solve all the problems in life, he wanted every child within reach to start the school year with a two new sweaters, shoes, and a backpack filled with supplies. He stood up, told the school superintendent he wanted the number of children within 24 hours. Not just for his school, but for every school in the area. The men all laughed because they knew he was rich but to provide those items to the thousands and thousands of kids in the system would come out to a huge number. He nodded and left.

The next day the superintendent stopped at his office and gave him a list that was even larger than expected. He told the gentleman that while it was a worthy idea the cost was just too high to make it workable. Maybe just some shoes? Just school supplies? The gentleman laughed, told the school superintendent to sit down, and picked up his phone. He made five phone two minute phone calls. Every year since then the gentleman and five friends have made sure that every single child in that region starts school with two new sweaters, new shoes, and a backpack full of supplies. Does it solve all their problems? Hell no. But it does possibly lessen the embarrassment for one or two kids who might someday go on to help others.

Only a very small number of people know that story because he didn't set up a charity, run a news story, or accept any awards. It is a private act by private citizens. When I asked him about it he simply pointed out that not everyone with money is a greedy bastard. Most people just need to know a need exists and they'll do what they can to help.

This is the same guy who was disheartened to find out school scholarships were either ethnic or achievement oriented. He promptly started a new scholarship open to anyone involved in any community service of any sort. But that's another story.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by lookout123

Most people just need to know a need exists and they'll do what they can to help.

Once they realize the government doesn't provide for everyone's needs, and the poor aren't getting rich on welfare.

This is the same guy who was disheartened to find out school scholarships were either ethnic or achievement oriented. He promptly started a new scholarship open to anyone involved in any community service of any sort. But that's another story.

For the people that Shawnee is always worried about. Not the people with no means, but not enough means.

[Aliantha]

We're the same as the UK in a lot of ways. There are great safety nets provided by the government for those in need. Most of the time, most people do the right thing, but there are some scammers which they chase down.

Actually, a few years ago new legislation came in that once your kids were in school, you had to work part time or study in order to recieve any further benefits. I think this is a good idea. Of course, some people still get out of going to work, but most people take advantage of the fact that centrelink (social security) has all sorts of programs set up to help people with this task.

[Shawnee123]

There aren't really a zillion programs, and though it may seem that way to eeyore, I mean classic, everyone in the country isn't sucking off the government's teat, nor would everyone even if it were easier to cheat the system.

[DanaC]

Talking of programs, how many of the programs which are being run in the States, to help people improve their circumstances, are run by private organisations, and how many of them are badly run and/or badly conceived (usually in the wake of some knee-jerk political reaction to bad unemployment figures) ?

In the UK, there are some good programs to help people get back into work and some good routes back into the workforce, with help from trained advisors...

Then there are the rest of the programs, which are appalling. They rake in our tax money in contracts, and deliver badly conceived and badly run courses/sessions, with untrained/undertrained, badly paid and disillusioned staff. The attitude of many people working within the system towards their clients is, frankly, shocking.

Out of the dozen or so Basic Employability Training courses (literacy, numeracy, life-skills and job search skills) operating in this area, before the goal posts changed and drove everyone ot of business, the one I worked at was pretty chaotic. We operated on a shoe string, in classrooms held together with sticking plaster and good will. With bookcases we'd filled with books we'd all bought or borrowed and learning materials we'd designed and made (along with the standard curriculum stuff, which just repeats the kind of learning that put these people off school in the first place).

In order to buy ourselves time to tackle the mountain of paperwork, we'd end up letting them sit there working through their glossy DfES workbooks, ticking off the sections they'd *coughs* 'mastered'. We did this for maybe two afternoons a week. I always felt really shit about it. particularly for those who were at the lowest ability levels, because they couldn't even do the workbooks. Wordsearches and picture books.

We were known to be the best in the area. There was almost universal shock in the field locally, when our company wasn't successful in its bid under the new system. Other companies just left them doing word searches for weeks at a time. They taught them nothing, and treated them like children: authoritarian and humiliating.

In job search, we coached them in interviewing, letter writing, helped them with CVs, coached them in phone techniques, and sat with them (sometimes) when they made phone calls. We telecanvassed local employers to try and get them to take on our clients on a 'Job Trial' thereby protecting their benefits if the job went drastically wrong, I went to an interview with someone, to a local superstore that used to take on learning disabled workers on Job Trials and often employed them at the end. Those jobs did not go on our figures until they'd been employed there for at least 2 months.

Other companies, I know, were putting jobs on their books, when they'd got someone a day's work, or a week in one of the local packing plants. How does that help someone who has been unable to form regular patterns of work?

Just because a program claims to be helping doesn't mean it actually is.

[Clodfobble]

The only program here that I know of is the Texas Workforce Commission, and it's state-run. I was quite impressed with how well it was run the one time I was in there (you are required to show up for at least one orientation class in order to collect unemployment, which I did for a few weeks when Acclaim went belly-up.) Between their classes, free computer use, excellent job search website, and abundance of state positions that are exclusively filled by people in the unemployment system, I was only further convinced that the only people who can't get a job using their system are the ones who don't want one.

[DanaC]

A well-run course can usually help a lot of people. Despite ours being a bit shambolic, we tried hard, and a good percentage of our clients found stable employment (there for a year or more) and a fairly high percentage got their literacy and numeracy certificates, which are a requirement for a lot of jobs.

Of the ones who didn't get work, some were players, most were just fundamentally ill-equipped for life, or had huge gaps in their CV from years of not having help and were therefore not the most desirable prospect for employers, or had criminal records, or drug and alcohol problems. I ended up as a de facto social worker and shoulder to cry on for some of them. I'd listen to their stories, which for them seemed very matter of fact, but left me thinking if I was them I'd have thrown myself off a roof by now.

See, most people on in the system get picked up and funnelled through various channes into work or training. Over a period of about five years the unemployment figures fell sharply. The ones who came to us, were the ones who had proved unreachable.