Contrary to "Entitlement Society" Rhetoric, Over Nine-Tenths of Entitlement Benefits Go to Elderly, Disabled, or Working (unemployment rate, minimum wage)
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And exactly why is one/tenth going to non-elderly, non disabled households? That's absurd -- but it means that welfare handouts could easily be cut 10%. Stop giving it to non-elderly and non-disabled.
And redefine disability to be only real disabilities. We have to get out the notion that working for a living is too cruel or too hard on people. People with ADHD should be able to do something with themselves. They have arms and legs, they have IQ's over 65. In fact work benefits them. Work benefits almost everyone.
I have yet to understand why laying around doing nothing with yourself is supposed to help depression, stress, ADHD and all the rest.
Social security for those who paid in for 50 or more years I can certainly understand. I definitely cannot understand how someone works for 10 years and then expects free checks from the government the rest of their lives. As for disability -- that's why you buy long term disability insurance. If you want to guarantee your future, you should do so, but stop expecting the world owes you a living.
Welfare to single mothers should not last any longer than maternity leave for working women. That would be 3 months and then it's back to work they go. Paying people to have babies is silly --- there is no good reason to hand women free cash money for 5 years because they decided to have a baby they couldn't afford and have no husband to help them support it. They can work, just like so many working mothers do.
Welfare to single mothers should not last any longer than maternity leave for working women. That would be 3 months and then it's back to work they go. Paying people to have babies is silly --- there is no good reason to hand women free cash money for 5 years because they decided to have a baby they couldn't afford and have no husband to help them support it. They can work, just like so many working mothers do.
I generally agree with you, but, devil's advocate here for a moment: we know for a fact that bad nutrition in the first few years of life can stunt IQ and that low IQ is highly correlated with likelihood to commit crime or chronically go on welfare, so you could argue that even if it isn't "fair," that it is possible (couldn't say for certain without studying the matter) that in the long term the benefits of better early-childhood nutrition might be quantitatively more significant than the dysgenic incentives of the policy, to such a degree that the eventual lower criminal justice and welfare spending would make the food stamps now flat out a good investment.
Not necessarily saying that is the case cause I don't really know, but it's possible and can't really be ruled out automatically; just throwing it out there because I think it's something that very much needs to be considered before you cut programs that help feed kids younger than school age. A little money for food now is a lot cheaper than remedial education, prisons, and more people on welfare later.
I generally agree with you, but, devil's advocate here for a moment: we know for a fact that bad nutrition in the first few years of life can stunt IQ and that low IQ is highly correlated with likelihood to commit crime or chronically go on welfare, so you could argue that even if it isn't "fair," that it is possible (couldn't say for certain without studying the matter) that in the long term the benefits of better early-childhood nutrition might be quantitatively more significant than the dysgenic incentives of the policy, to such a degree that the eventual lower criminal justice and welfare spending would make the food stamps now flat out a good investment.
Not necessarily saying that is the case cause I don't really know, but it's possible and can't really be ruled out automatically; just throwing it out there because I think it's something that very much needs to be considered before you cut programs that help feed kids younger than school age. A little money for food now is a lot cheaper than remedial education, prisons, and more people on welfare later.
Well here we have free meals at the schools year round because so many getting food stamps sell them and don't use them to feed their children.
Child neglect should be a crime. Parents should be required to provide food for their children.
A better way would be to do what is done here, keep the school cafeterias open year round for children 18 and under. That way the kids would get food, the parent can't sell food stamps for drug and alcohol money, the costs would go way down.
We're already allowing for double and triple dipping -- the kids win all kinds of food stamps for the parent but the parents still aren't using them to feed the kids, so they added in WIC and at least 2 free meals at the public schools -- year round.
The Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) was created to ensure that children in low-income areas could continue to receive nutritious meals during long school vacations, when they do not have access to school lunch or breakfast. It provides nutritious and free meals to children 18 and younger during the summer months. School districts and other eligible sponsors may serve as summer feeding program sites.
The Seamless Summer Option (SSO) was created by the federal government as a summer feeding alternative for schools that already participate in school meal programs and wish to continue meal service into the summer.
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Kind of shameful --- food stamps aren't being used for the purpose they were given so the taxpayers have to provide free meals another way.
I can see keeping this just for the children but stop handing the irresponsible parents food stamps. That invites fraud and abuse.
The american government spends $50,000 PER FAMILY. Are you telling me the money is spent wisely? Do you see $50K worth of services a year?
I believe that's up to an average of $62,000 a year per welfare household. Births to welfare households are outnumbering those to taxpaying families -- how long is that going to be sustainable?
And the sad thing is, all this lavish spending is not making a dent on poverty rates.
Well here we have free meals at the schools year round because so many getting food stamps sell them and don't use them to feed their children.
Child neglect should be a crime. Parents should be required to provide food for their children.
A better way would be to do what is done here, keep the school cafeterias open year round for children 18 and under. That way the kids would get food, the parent can't sell food stamps for drug and alcohol money, the costs would go way down.
We're already allowing for double and triple dipping -- the kids win all kinds of food stamps for the parent but the parents still aren't using them to feed the kids, so they added in WIC and at least 2 free meals at the public schools -- year round.
Extend that to kids younger than school age and you've pretty much hit the nail on the head on the best possible solution -- I'd never though of this before and always thought there was no good solution, but I like this, maybe complement it with letting kids whose parents may not have good car access take some home with them. It would be important to implement something like this nationwide either before or concurrently with ending the current SNAP program though.
Heck, expand it for adults too (although not located at schools of course) who need food. We can make sure no one in America starves without handing out what for all practical purposes is cash (edit: I know soup kitchens exist, just that we'd need to make sure there was sufficient coverage).
basically one has to look at the funding. Separate the entitlement that the person has paid skin into the game or his employer or both have. Certainly there are cheats on SS disability but then there is SSI and others that come directly out of general funding. That is why if the program has people with skin in the game its much hard to politically cut. When you then consider that the people getting them had no say to join ;the government often borrows the money at low rates and on basic s that would be illegal if not government it changes what things a lot. Would you want to be forced into a program on retirement then told they can produce what they promised. not anyone I know would. If they suddenly made it optional guess who would suffer; those who pay nothing because they would have a mass of people like them to compete against. When you look that only about 60% of working age people are working you see the problem. France has 40% .they supply 100% of GDP which is what I the end government taxes and depends on .I say that 40% in France has done a outstanding job working but its gotten to be too much of a burden to choose to continue support too many. Even then like US a small percentage contribute the most to GDP and they of course are richly reward which enables them to pay that huge percentage.
Extend that to kids younger than school age and you've pretty much hit the nail on the head on the best possible solution -- I'd never though of this before and always thought there was no good solution, but I like this, maybe complement it with letting kids whose parents may not have good car access take some home with them. It would be important to implement something like this nationwide either before or concurrently with ending the current SNAP program though.
It is for all kids 18 and under. For babies, I'd keep WIC but for the baby only. Adults should not profit by having children they cannot afford.
Food stamps are a very badly designed program because they don't ensure nutritious foods be purchased, nor do they ensure that the children who are supposed to be fed will benefit in any way from them. Only a school feeding program or something like it can get healthy enough foods to the children.
It's so bad here with parents not feeding the children in spite of getting all kinds of food stamps and WIC that they had to come up with the idea of feeding the kids at schools year round. I can agree with that, but the over-abused food stamps should go.
I even think for adults there could be another feeding program, but just very basic and cheap -- bologna sandwiches or beans and tortillas. The days of lobster and steak for those who don't want to work should end.
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