Mitt gets booed at the NAACP convention.

[Griff]

Originally Posted by Spexxvet

There's this pervasive idea started by the "welfare queen" comment that people live lives of luxury when they are on the dole, anecdotes of people on welfare driving Cadillacs. That's not a case of poor people who can afford expensive things, it's a case of wealthy people criminally getting welfare payments. The way to fix it is to monitor the system more closely, but that would cost more money and increase the size of government, so we can't do that.

I've been in human services long enough to see the problem isn't people living large on the dole, although you see drug dealers making a nice living while on welfare. Its more a dissolution of the human spirit. People choosing to survive not thrive. Its caused by both too few and too many resources being used. Things like inordinately expensive health care preventing folks from risking taking that entry level job.

Then there's the issue of people getting help when they can afford it. I am offended that millionaires get social security payments and access to medicare. I am appalled that people who can afford multi-million dollar beachfront homes get their flood insurance subsidized.

...or the well off hiding assets so the public pays for their nursing home care.

If there's not a program to be dependent on, folks would be dependent on a company - a retirement fund instead of social security, a health insurance company instead of medicare/medicaid. The difference? There's no incentive for a government program to screw you to make a few extra dollars. If the folks choose not to use a company for those services, and there's no program, then our fellow citizens would suffer, or they would be helped by charity, or by family or other individuals. It WILL happen, and the cost WILL be expended. It doesn't make a big difference to my wallet if my money goes to a government program, a company, a charity, or I give it directly to a person in need. The cost is there, and it will be paid.


I don't think the cause of the downfall of the USSR is obvious or because it was too dependent.

I'd rather see the individual take an active interest in his own retirement but human nature being what it is...?

The USSR failed to harness human creativity largely because individuals were not rewarded for hard work and dedication.

I'm looking at programs through a lense, trying to discern whether a particular program has the outcome of making people more or less independent or capable. In the Head Start world, lots of struggling families are able to put another adult in the work force because the child is being cared for and educated. There are related programs like The Fatherhood Initiative which have great success building a culture of fatherhood in struggling communities. I've seen families pull together and succeed based on just a little help. Then there are folks that use the time away from their kid to smoke more dope and watch tv.