The epidemic of welfare.
Today I was walking through my home area (that being, Seattle suburbia) and decided to pop into my local Starbucks (one of 5 Sbux within 4 miles of my home). Outside the Sbux a table was set up with pamphlets and brochures comparing Obama to Hitler. The small Asian girl at the stand said something to me (as I was holding my baby nephew) about how his future was in jeopardy and asked if I wanted a brochure. My response? “Who, exactly, would you rather have in office? And, what makes you think it would be any different?” She, then, started spouting off a whole bunch of statistics and manufactured responses about social security and health care and how things aren’t changing and he’s spending money we don’t have, etc, etc. All I got from it was-she had no answer to my questions. They never do.
Before I rolled my eyes and walked away, I said “Maybe we should give him a chance to trim up the Bush that’s been 8 years in the making before assuming he’s the next Hitler.” Seriously, that’s a harsh comparison. Hitler killed millions but we’re just working with a bunch of money here, right? Someone just today said to me ‘it’s only money, right?’ Right!
I’m a little strayed from what I actually want to write about but I needed to get that out of my head before I bitch about something that’s annoyed me for many many years. Something that the government truly fails at. Something that SHOULD be one of the biggest priorities on their plates. Something relatively EASY to fix, in my opinion. The welfare system.
I’ll start with my vent-what the fuck gives women the right to have babies they can’t afford to feed/clothe/raise? I grew up in Montana and, by far, it probably has one of the worst welfare epidemics in the country. I knew of so many people who had 2 and 3 kids and didn’t work but received their checks every week from the state. The explanation being that childcare was more expensive than what they would have made making 9.50 and hour cleaning rooms at the local Fairfield Inn. I knew one girl who had 5 kids, all with different dads. Part of me wanted to befriend her, introduce her to Planned Parenthood, then beat the shit out of her for taking all my fucking money!
Here’s why I have a problem with this: I’ve never ever been on welfare yet I pay for childcare, food, medical, etc for all these lazy mothers who like to spread their legs but not ever step up to the consequences of having children. And you can’t chalk that much up to religion-people are just genuinely lazy if it’s easy enough to get away with being such. And the government makes it fairly easy-just put out.
Given the opportunity, MOST people would sit on their asses and watch TV that I pay for instead of actually working and teaching their children that you can’t get everything for nothing. Hard work pays off-trust me, if I can do it, so can you! And, what do I have to show for it? A nice car. A great job. Nice furniture. And…the ability to be a great influence to the children in my life.
I’m not saying welfare is unnecessary. I’m saying, it’s been too long being taken advantage of. It’s understandable that people in actual need use it. For example, families where the main breadwinner has lost a job and is using it as a means of living while in the process of finding a new one. Families where there is a member who is sick and the hospital bills massively attack their mailbox each month. Women leaving abusive type situations and need it in the interim of being ‘back on their feet’.
The main thing that pisses me off? The fact that some people can actually ‘choose’ to be on welfare even though they had a good job. Women that can ‘get by’ living off of my paycheck when I would have rather gave that money to a woman as help to leave a domestically violent situation.
I also know that unless you have more than 1 child-you’re totally screwed when it comes to welfare. Get this: single mother, very little child support, good job, going to school, taking birth control, apparently a woman who was trying to get things together to be resourceful, someone who doesn’t necessarily want to be on welfare but, could have used it as a means of ‘getting ahead’ so that success would be inevitable in her situation with no second parent (for whatever reason). Do you think she qualifies? Of course not-that would make sense.
But the single mother who’s complete means of support has been-living with her mother while she goes out on the weekends and smokes pot while her own single mom watches the kid(s), has random sex with multiple men (unsafely, of course), sells her food stamps for cash to buy weed and booze, then yells at her mom the next morning because the kid(s) (her kids) are too loud and she’s hung over. Do you think she qualifies? Yep…and I used to know her.
I truly think that kids get screwed in this whole situation. Truthfully, kids can’t choose. They are born into whatever they get. If it happens to be a mom who’s addicted to crack-who suffers? If it’s a father who’s physically or sexually abusive-who suffers? If it’s a parent that is too selfish to think of their needs/wants first-who suffers? It’s extremely sad. I’d say-let’s give the money to the kids-they’d probably make better choices. Seriously, think about it-when given choices like that-a healthy child will make good choices (because kids are generally good at heart – except the heathen that lives a few doors down from me) so I say-let’s try it…maybe we’ll be surprised.
Maybe if we get this little problem under control-we’d A. have more money to spend on social security, health care, reform, etc. and B. finally have a generation of people who weren’t so fucking lazy that maybe our future Presidents, senators and representatives wouldn’t suck so badly.
So my questions are these: What do you think of the welfare system in the US? What would you do if you had the power to change it? Have you ever had to use welfare? Have you ever used it when you could have found other means or been more ambitious in finding a job?
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Great article, SF!
I never know what to do about Welfare. I think it’s a needed institution, but it’s obvious that it’s abused. A cookie-cutter answer would be to put more limits and restrictions on who and how people get it. But the problem with that is that someone who needs it and deserves it would probably get excluded.
At the end of the day, it probably just needs to be scrapped and re-imagined. But like Health Care, that’ll never happen. No one wants to kill their ‘political’ career.
If I had the power to change some things… I would first get drug testing going full speed on the people asking for welfare. Seriously. That will solve a few problems. I would also set things up so that only the basic necessities of life with welfare are met. How? Let’s say someone is on welfare. They can only buy stuff like, food, housing, basic clothes, basic cleaning. If they tried to take the money to pay for cable or internet, the companies behind such things can not accept it or else they would face massive fines and such.
Hell, at my house, we don’t have cable, we just use the new digital bunny ears that we are forced to use now (which has a very shitty signal here in Ohio). I’ve seen a family on welfare ACTUALLY have digital cable. I wanted to yank the box right out of their family room.
And as for the whole kids deal, I would love to see the government push for something to prevent such things. Call me dumb, but perhaps a reversable procedure? Come on, everyone would love to go raw if there was no worries of an STD (the partners can ask each other) and possibility that a baby would be on the way.
I think any system of government mandated “charity” is flawed from the start. Given the power to change it, I’d abolish it altogether. The thing is, it’s not just those who “abuse” the money that are the problem. The very act of the government TAKING the money from those who earned it constitutes abuse in and of itself.
Once I had that previously-stolen portion of my paycheck back, I probably would be able to afford to give some to worthwhile charities VOLUNTARILY, and I’d probably do just that. But even if I didn’t, that’s my right, and my choice to make. Why? Because I’m the one who went to work, and gave up those hours of my life in exchange for that paycheck.
This is of course a subject matter I know, because I have in the past received welfare, and currently my daughter gets heath benefits.
I’m a single mom, going to school at night, and living with family. If I were to get a job on top of that I would never see my daughter. And I’m sorry, but I wouldn’t change that for the world. Her father is worthless, and doesn’t want anything to do with my daughter. So I go to school, so I can get a job and give her the best I can. But now I’m going to answer the questions
.
What do you think of the welfare system in the US?
I think its utter crap! I think its bull shit that people who get food stamps can buy whatever they want. So they end up eating tons of junk food that some people who work hard can’t afford. Also, they have no problem handing out money at times, but its a bitch to get them to do anything about child support.
What would you do if you had the power to change it?
Regulate what kind of food people can buy. And make sure every child can have health insurance.
Have you ever had to use welfare?
I do, and I have.
Have you ever used it when you could have found other means or been more ambitious in finding a job?
I used it right after I had my daughter, and I was unable to work. Once I was working again, I only used heath insurance. Which, I’m sorry is not cheap and I needed help with. And if it comes down to it, my daughter deserves to have that, I think its shit we pay for insurance as is.
Also, now I get assistance, but as I said before I’m going to school. And as simple as it may sound to work, go to school, and see my daughter, its not. And I’m not having her grow up without me. Call it selfish, but she already is minus one parent, she doesn’t need to be minus two.
Thats my whole take on it. Great article though, fantastic topic!
Interesting topic. I think i have a different view on this than most people here, and since going into it will make a comment of massive length i think ill just put it in a new main page post. All of which makes me think this should have been the new happy hour topic Trudes!
Living in a country which has its own old and established health care policies makes this hard to really chime in on. Hope you Yanks don’t get yanked!
Welfare is a teeny tiny part of the national budget. Something like %1.5. So if you paid $1000 in taxes, only $15 goes to a welfare.
Compare that to the cost of going to war: the defense budget, the VA budget, etc., and you have something like 35%. So, out of your $1000, $350 went towards our boys going overseas and killing people. Now look at the fact that the “war on terror” is being funded by national debt. Think of that as another $200 that is being put on your credit card annually.
$15… versus $550. The $15 helps Americans, in spite of the waste and fraud. The $550 kills foreigners, mostly civilians. Adjust these numbers up or down for you personally depending upon your tax bracket.
For me the amount of my taxes that goes to welfare is negligible compared to the amount I donate to charity anyways. But if someone were to offer to give me back all that money that goes to buy bombs, now there we are talking some serious ching.
I, like G, cannot really comment on the state of American Welfare, what with being a foreigner and not knowing enough of how you dudes do it down there. HOWEVER, in regards to the Asian lady with the Obama=Hitler pamphlets, if you ever see her again, try to give her a copy of my handy Nazism flowchart! http://tcrcomix.com/comics/episode159.html
Still, $1000 in taxes is a total lowball estimate. When you multiply that $15 up by how many thousands you REALLY pay in taxes, it’s quite a bigger number. Sure, the money you’re giving to the war multiplies by that same rate, but the fact that I’m having a large amount of money stolen from me for war in addition to the small amount being stolen from me for welfare is little consolation in terms of making me miss that smaller amount less.
As for the charity comparison, there’s a vast difference between the two, and that difference is rooted in principle. When you give to charity, you decide how much to give, when to give, and what charities to give it to. When your taxes go to welfare, you have no such control. And since you own your money, you have a right to that control.
Also, this goes for anyone who is poor and feels like they “need” welfare. I invite you to come to where I work, and do 1.5% of my job. At that point, I’ll gladly reimburse you with 1.5% of my paycheck.
hahah Thanks JCC-I couldn’t have said it better!
All the comments were great but I’d like to focus on the one that really mattered (to me, at least)…
@Laurie- So…what you’re saying is that you think because you had your kid and couldn’t afford to provide for her-that I should? I see that you think it’s because you want to spend time with her but that’s truly a selfish response. Kids are resilient-just ask mine. Even at 10, she’ll be able to tell you that even though she spent most of her infancy in daycare so I could work fulltime and go to school fulltime, she has 100% of me now and she can be thankful that I’m teaching her responsibility and that no one else is responsible for her actions but HER!
And also, you can thank her for my paying for your kids’ healthcare, thus taking away money that I could be spending on her. And thank you for proving to me, once again, why I could never respect you. You’re a gem-now go fuck yourself.
Gosh..
@Seattle Honey I’m sorry that you think you are so much better than everyone because you worked full time and went to school and blah blah blah, but I really don’t give a shit. You A. Don’t know my situation, and B. Are a royal fucking cunt. You never got any help? None!? Well la de da…. I’m have no apologize that I have to get help so that my daughter can go and see a doctor! I don’t, she is the most important person in my life and I would do anything for her.
And of course mine was the most important to you, because stepping on me makes you feel like some sort of women, when actually all in all, it makes you a total cunt! Learn that being nice isn’t a weakness, its called FUCKING TACT, so learn it.
@Laurie- I don’t care if you think I’m being nice. I care that you decided to have unprotected sex with a douchebag (your words…somewhat) so that I have to pay for you to take care of her when you (I’m assuming) are fully capable of doing so by yourself (given that you don’t have any disabilities-which, I’m assuming you’d have told us by now because you CAN’T SEEM TO SHUT THE FUCK UP).
But…so worth it. Enjoy!
That said, YOU’RE telling ME what tact is little miss-let’s have it out with my ex fuck buddy in the forums. That’s gold. Plus, you DID apologize in your comment above so I guess that should make it allright, right? Sure, sure.
And I don’t think I’m better than EVERYONE (come on…I’m no JCC)…I’m just better than you. But, you already knew that or you wouldn’t be so pissed off now would you?
PS-your response was the most important because I already knew what your response would be-I waited for it. I’m sick like that, I guess.
Can you ladies move this catfight to the forums so i can eat some popcorn in my underwear imagining you two pulling each others hair naked erotically, and do bad things to myself? Just that its easier to read there than here. Thank you for your consideration.
Well written article, and on principal I agree with your point, but I have to agree with Squidious here. Most of the people on welfare need it. Yet we are arguing over the few who take advantage of it. in the grand scheme of things, welfare in a small portion of the government budget. A portion of the governments budget that actually goes to the people of this country. Yet, we spend more on our military than any other country in the world.
On a side note: good thing we had Bill Clinton and the Welfare Reform Act in 1996. According to http://www.ontheissues.org “The welfare rolls dropped nearly 60%, more than 7 million people, by the time he left office” and as of 2000 “the percentage of Americans on welfare reached its lowest point in four decades” not sure what that number would be now due to the policies of president who was in office over the last 8 years.