How can we help the poor?

Mayor Bloomberg wants to try something new

from JoeUser Forums

This article from Fox about a pilot program in New York City caught my eye. It sounds like an excellent idea to me (the only good idea Mayor Bloomberg has had IMHO, but hey).

It descibes a pilot program to pay poor people for actions taken to lift themselves out of poverty - read the article for details. Payments for going to doctors for routine checkups, for kids getting good (95%-level) grades, etc

 But the thing that caught my eye was this quote from an opponent of the plan:

"But some critics have raised questions about cash reward programs, saying they promote the misguided idea that poor people could be successful if they just made better choices.

"It just reinforces the impression that if everybody would just work hard enough and change their personal behavior we could solve poverty in this country, and that's not reflected in the facts," said Margy Waller, co-founder of Inclusion, a research and policy group in Washington.

Waller, who served as a domestic policy adviser in the Clinton administration, said it would be more effective to focus on labor issues, such as making sure wage laws are enforced and improving benefits for working people."

I was gobsmacked by this; and I rather suspect our host will get his blood pressure raised. Everyone I know who was poor (and are no longer), and everything I've read on the subject says, in effect, that poor people can in fact be successful if they make better choices. Lord knows if I had made better choices I would be in a much better position than I am now - in fact, if I hadn't had more "cushion" in my life and finances I would be poor now - I'm just now learning how to really manage my finances.

So what are you going to do, Margy, when the program shows that it's working?
13,635 views 39 replies
Reply #1 from JoeUser Forums Top
A really stupid policy in my opinion.  Wanting to pay people to make choices in their life that they should be making anyway is quite ridiculous.  
Reply #2 from JoeUser Forums Top
A really stupid policy in my opinion. Wanting to pay people to make choices in their life that they should be making anyway is quite ridiculous.


Somehow, though, we need to communicate that better choices DO result in financial success. While most people in America aren't poor because they choose to be, many ARE poor because of choices they make. Any solution to poverty, then, should center around teaching them to make better choices, however we want to do that.

But yeah, it's dumb policy. It invites people to play the system.
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Reply #3 from JoeUser Forums Top

The best part - it is being paid for with private money.

So it is worth a shot.

Reply #4 from JoeUser Forums Top
The experiment is being paid with private money.  This is something that just screams for government money eventually.

Reply #5 from JoeUser Forums Top
But yeah, it's dumb policy. It invites people to play the system.


people are playing the system now. but on the other hand the system is playing the people. why do you think that lady is so much against people making better choices.
becouse if they do she might be out of a job.
Reply #6 from JoeUser Forums Top
people are playing the system now. but on the other hand the system is playing the people. why do you think that lady is so much against people making better choices.
becouse if they do she might be out of a job.


Ok, this is why people tend not to like you, danielost. You had a valid point but you lost it with your condescending manner.

You're right, poverty is big business. But since I've been beating that drum on here for three years now, you're not telling me anything I don't know. But I also know the mindset of many of the poor. They'll play the game, get their checks, and still won't end up any better because, as the saying goes, you can lead a horse to water...

Programs like this won't work any better than the handout welfare system we currently have. At the end of the day all we'll have is another breastbeating politician touting his accomplishments when in reality he did little of substance.
Reply #7 from JoeUser Forums Top
Eliminate welfare for able-bodied, able-minded people and you'll see a lot fewer poor people.
Reply #8 from JoeUser Forums Top
Eliminate welfare for able-bodied, able-minded people


you can't do away with welfare it KEEPS the poor poor
Reply #9 from JoeUser Forums Top
Kinda funny how all the solutions the Gov't can come up with always seems to be centered around putting free money in the hands of those who could not manage it before. Education, that is the key. Send them to school, educate them and if they learn great, if they don't their loss.
Reply #10 from JoeUser Forums Top
Kinda funny how all the solutions the Gov't can come up with always seems to be centered around putting free money in the hands of those who could not manage it before.


Exactly, and this is just another example of it.  I mean seriously.......paying someone monthly if they hold a full-time job?  How ridiculous is that?


Reply #11 from JoeUser Forums Top
paying someone monthly if they hold a full-time job?


I know what you mean, but your statement struck me as funny. After all, isn't that why we hold down full time jobs? To get paid?
Reply #12 from JoeUser Forums Top
Exactly, and this is just another example of it. I mean seriously.......paying someone monthly if they hold a full-time job? How ridiculous is that?


Although, it would make sense for an EMPLOYER interested in helping the poor to offer bonuses for attendance and longevity. Still, the people who need it most probably wouldn't get it.
Reply #13 from JoeUser Forums Top
this money will end up going into some politicians pocket
Reply #14 from JoeUser Forums Top
I know what you mean, but your statement struck me as funny. After all, isn't that why we hold down full time jobs? To get paid?


LOL. I saw that as well. LOL

Although, it would make sense for an EMPLOYER interested in helping the poor to offer bonuses for attendance and longevity. Still, the people who need it most probably wouldn't get it.


My wife gets bonuses for good attendance and my job give incentives every 3 months based on how good my Dept does. I just so happen to belong to the Accounting dept even though I work in the mailroom. Kinda nice.
Reply #15 from JoeUser Forums Top
My wife gets bonuses for good attendance and my job give incentives every 3 months based on how good my Dept does. I just so happen to belong to the Accounting dept even though I work in the mailroom. Kinda nice.



And good employers do that because they realize the value of rewarding employees. One of the best jobs I ever had had an hourly production incentive coupled with quarterly and yearly bonuses. To get the hourly incentive all you needed to do was produce over quota...if you produced an extra hours' worth of product, you got an extra hours' worth of pay. I was averaging $11-12 an hour for unskilled labor at this factory back in 97...not counting bonuses (my Christmas bonus one year was about $800).
Reply #16 from JoeUser Forums Top
And good employers do that because they realize the value of rewarding employees. One of the best jobs I ever had had an hourly production incentive coupled with quarterly and yearly bonuses. To get the hourly incentive all you needed to do was produce over quota...if you produced an extra hours' worth of product, you got an extra hours' worth of pay. I was averaging $11-12 an hour for unskilled labor at this factory back in 97...not counting bonuses (my Christmas bonus one year was about $800).


Sounds great. We have what they call Rinker points in my Dept. Not all Depts have it. If you do great customer service so you can get a sticker from either your boss, an fellow employee or the customer can recomend points to your boss. Accumulate 9 stickers and you get 9000 points which equals about $25. Collect enough and you can get girt certificates or buy products from the company catalog that has a lot of not-so-expensive things such as electronics, funiture, house decorations and more. In my case we recently got them to add the mailroom personel to participate in this but not everyone knows and we don't really deal with outside customers so our flow of stickers depends on fellow employees so it takes 3 times as long to accumulate 9 stickers for us down here. It's still nice though.

But we don't know how much longer it will last since the company is in the process of being taken over, I don't even know if I will be here for long.
Reply #17 from JoeUser Forums Top
this money will end up going into some politicians pocket


I would think drugs, alcohol and corner stores would probably benefit more from this.
Reply #18 from JoeUser Forums Top
I would think drugs, alcohol and corner stores would probably benefit more from this.


if it gets to the people it is supposed to get to. i am saying it won't


what i mean is that they will throw 10 million or what ever and only 1 million will get to the people it is supposed to go to
Reply #19 from JoeUser Forums Top
if it gets to the people it is supposed to get to. i am saying it won't


what i mean is that they will throw 10 million or what ever and only 1 million will get to the people it is supposed to go to


Well I guess then drugs, alcohol, corner stores AND politicians will benefit.   
Reply #20 from JoeUser Forums Top
Well I guess then drugs, alcohol, corner stores AND politicians will benefit.


i don't see anything wrong with the corner stores benefiting.

i don't think drugs alcohol and politicians need to benefit and since it is three to one i disagree with this program.
Reply #21 from JoeUser Forums Top
I think we should have a stipend given to all stay at home Moms, based on number of kids(with diminishing returns for each). I think professional mothers (thanks JD Robb) should be paid as such, and by the government, because it's a service to society.

The hard part is putting a number on that service, and enforcing it properly. I can see abuse in the future, but I don't know how to stop it. But, they're already abusing the welfare programs, so what's the difference? Instead of being unemployed, you now have professional mother. And, if you have no kids and aren't working, go get a job, or go to a soup kitchen. No handout for you. Maybe some kind of educational benefit - after all, this person has plenty of time on their hands. And Dad should be working, or no handout to the Mom (unless they're separated - different situation).

I think that would keep the poor from being so poor. It takes a lot to raise your 20 kids you had to get more welfare. You should be able to stay at home and still afford to live. We're getting to the point where only two-income families can survive, and our kids are missing out on their parents.
Reply #22 from JoeUser Forums Top
I think we should have a stipend given to all stay at home Moms, based on number of kids(with diminishing returns for each). I think professional mothers (thanks JD Robb) should be paid as such, and by the government, because it's a service to society.


we had this it was called welfare
Reply #23 from JoeUser Forums Top
I think we should have a stipend given to all stay at home Moms, based on number of kids(with diminishing returns for each). I think professional mothers (thanks JD Robb) should be paid as such, and by the government, because it's a service to society.

The hard part is putting a number on that service, and enforcing it properly. I can see abuse in the future, but I don't know how to stop it. But, they're already abusing the welfare programs, so what's the difference? Instead of being unemployed, you now have professional mother. And, if you have no kids and aren't working, go get a job, or go to a soup kitchen. No handout for you. Maybe some kind of educational benefit - after all, this person has plenty of time on their hands. And Dad should be working, or no handout to the Mom (unless they're separated - different situation).

I think that would keep the poor from being so poor. It takes a lot to raise your 20 kids you had to get more welfare. You should be able to stay at home and still afford to live. We're getting to the point where only two-income families can survive, and our kids are missing out on their parents.


While the sentiment is noble I don't understand why anyone should be paid for doing what they are suppose to do. For centuries man has survived in this world with women usually taking care of the children cause that was how life worked and still does till this date. When ever a man needed to do it it was done as well. I don't see why becoming a mother automatically means you deserve a paycheck paid for by someone else. I don't really like these ideas of thowing money at everything just because it sounds nice. If the mother needs money she can get a job and put the kids in daycare otherwise the man of the house (if there is one) can work 2 jobs if necessary. Putting free money in peoples hands has done nothing but create a society that abuses the system, a society of lazy people who know they can always work the system and not have to work anymore. We need people that can make our communities better by becoming better people, applying their skills to better our lifestyles, to pull this country from the hole we keep sinking in. This is done by education, by teaching how to become better people, how build a better world, not by putting money in their hands and hoping they do the right thing. Just look at the credit system, how many people have decladed bankruptcy, how many cash in advance places pop up every day, how many financial problem solving businesses we see on TV. Putting free money in peoples hands has done nothing but create more problems.
Reply #24 from JoeUser Forums Top
Putting free money in peoples hands has done nothing but create more problems.


So has taking fathers out of the homes.

There are places where you need not two, but THREE jobs to get by. Everyone has a breaking point, and there are only so many hours in a week.

I don't mean to suggest this is a reasonable proposal, but I DO mean to suggest that we need to do SOMETHING to get our priorities back in order. Day cares aren't a way to raise a child (nor, in my opinion, are state run schools, but that's a topic for another blog). Our entire CULTURE is becoming impoverished by generations of children who don't know their parents.

The proposal to pay SAHM's is, in my opinion, not a GOOD proposal, but it is SOMETHING. And in the absence of nothing, something usually gets a vote. We need to discuss the issues to address this further.

As to the proposal being the same as welfare, it is not. Welfare is means tested. Jythier's proposal is not. Frankly, I'm more than a little appalled at the attitude that SAHM mothers are welfare bums. My wife is a SAHM, and I assure you that she works harder than most folks, she just does it in a different environment.
Reply #25 from JoeUser Forums Top
I don't mean to suggest this is a reasonable proposal, but I DO mean to suggest that we need to do SOMETHING to get our priorities back in order. Day cares aren't a way to raise a child (nor, in my opinion, are state run schools, but that's a topic for another blog). Our entire CULTURE is becoming impoverished by generations of children who don't know their parents.

The proposal to pay SAHM's is, in my opinion, not a GOOD proposal, but it is SOMETHING. And in the absence of nothing, something usually gets a vote. We need to discuss the issues to address this further.


While I agree with the top part I do not agree that just because there is nothing that we should just go for the first dumb idea that is thown at us. I can't believe we have reached a point where we should be happy with what we get, forget about actually trying to find a real, good solution.

As to the proposal being the same as welfare, it is not. Welfare is means tested. Jythier's proposal is not. Frankly, I'm more than a little appalled at the attitude that SAHM mothers are welfare bums. My wife is a SAHM, and I assure you that she works harder than most folks, she just does it in a different environment.


I never called SAHM bums, just in case. They work maybe even harder considering that their job does not end till they go to sleep and in many cases they wake up during that time to do some more. What I don't agree on is this idea of giving a paycheck from out of other peoples money (taxes) for something that has been done for centuries and is known as part of the responsability of being a wife, husband and/or mom and dad. If this is so then maybe daddy shoudl also get a check for cutting the lawn, fixing a leaky pipe, painting the house, fixing the cars, taking the kids when mom goes out, throwing out the garbage, cleaning the garage, additions to the house, grilling, making sure all the electrical equipment works properly, etc. A womans job as a SAHM never seems to have a clock out time but then never does that of a Work outside of the house then stay home after work dad.