Dynosoar, I totally agree that the system is being worked. People like WiseFawn can name off all of the programs, criteria, etc they want but the fact is loop holes are found and taken advantage of immediately. Like you said, there are always exceptions but I believe the majority function as you have seen. I have seen it within my own family. They don't want to admit that their choices have anything to do with the way their life is playing out. It is just "poor me" and "other people are just luckier". Then they brag about how they are working the system.

Lunaticus, well said!

Dynosoar- hmm, perhaps I have misjudged your blog. But it still takes the cake!

Anyone want to make the case of entitlement programs as "veiled reparations" ?

I would not begin to try, but it sure seems on the surface.................

"My average tennent is unmarried, 2 children"

Early parenthood and having children one cannot afford to support is the real problem, and the ultimate source of most poverty. Yet schools cannot teach sex education and provide condoms because the teenagers should "just say no" to having sex. I don't disagree with postponing sexual intimacy until one is mature enough to handle it emotionally and responsibly, but the fact is, teens have sex! They always have and they always will. What we really need is truly reversable sterilization. All girls are given "the shot" or whatever it is, when they are 12 and the shots continue until they are 21. Does anyone REALLY need to become a parent before 21?

Since this isn't even possible until we find a way to semi-permanently sterilize, pay the girls to get the birth control shot that works for 3 months. That's right - PAY THEM - and give them condoms, test them for STD's and remind them that the shot only prevents pregnancy. For the mothers that are already on welfare, pay they to get their tubes tied. It will save money in the long run and with fewer children, they will have a better chance at pulling themselves up out of poverty. You cannot tell me that paying young women to use birth control would cost more than the billions that are spent on AFDC, SSI, etc. I have no problem with paying welfare fathers to have vasectomies either. Fewer children growing up in poverty means fewer adults perpetuating the cycle.

Paula,
That's just it, if your suggestions were followed IT WOULD be an end to the cycle.

What Social worker in their right mind would suggest a program that would put her organization out of business?

NOBODY wants the cycle to end.

At least not me, and everyone at the Department of Social Services, the Dept of Health and Human Services,the
Dept of Education, Dept of Housing and Urban Dev., or ( fill in the blank of your favorite governmental offices )

It's all about the money, not the lack of it...............;-)

PoetPhilosopher:

"It may be more accurate to say "The rich get richer and the poor get richer very, very slowly"."

It depends on the amount of work and sacrifice they put into it. The secret to wealth is labor and retention of money. I should be sitting on a massively fat bankroll right now, except for the fact that even as I was taking home princely sums of money (despite my involuntary contributions to the Federal beast) I was blowing it in an utterly irresponsible fashion. If I'd started out young, put together a solid plan and put in the same amount of labor, I'd probably be well on the way to a million by now, if not already there and looking at the next few. If I'd been a bit more fiscally sensible, I'd be like a fellow I worked for back in the day, a millionaire who lives with his wife in a forty-foot vacation trailer.

People want the wealth without both the work and the sacrifice. They want the trinkets, not the achievement.


"Case in point. Unfortunately - politicians spout off about tax cuts and the extra $600 you get, all the while shifting the burden from the super-rich to the middle class. And for some inexplicable reason, "middle america" doesn't see through this. Possibly because they've been bamboozled into thinking it's an issue of entitlements for the poor, when in reality it's about the progressivity of the tax brackets. Well... economics is complex."
It's all about the downward / upward spiral, right ?"

I don't believe in the so-called progressive tax system. Because a person makes more money than I do in no way entitles me to a share of that income, nor does it put upon them the onus of having to have a larger portion of their income confiscated. It's not my money, it's not your money, it's their money, and they're welcome to it. Let the rich buy all the damn yachts they want, and if they're on a big yacht-buying tear, I'll get shares in a yach-building company and make a tidy profit.

Oh, and one other point about the 'super rich.' With that delivery job of mine, we had to stagger out how we turned in our payroll accounts, because if we weren't careful about crediting too much work in a single week, we'd get kicked up to the next tax bracket, putting us firmly in that level of Al Gore's "Very weaaaaaallllthiest Americans." Because of the static nature of the income brackets, more Americans by the year discover that huzzah, they're wealthy.

somebody who used to work 120 hour work weeks only to have forty hours of that work week get siphoned straight away into federal coffers to support these parasites

Okay, let's keep the problem in perspective. Whether or not the "system" is being widely abused (and I don't know enough to take a stand on that--the anecdotal evidence presented here notwithstanding), this type of program is really a very tiny portion of the federal budget. Aid to Families with Dependent Children, SSI, food stamps and so on only take up a couple percent of government spending--this is well-documented. (The exact figure depends on exactly what programs you choose to include.) Your forty hours are getting siphoned away to pay mainly for Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, national defense, and interest on the national debt. You might be working for the welfare cheats for twenty minutes or so out of your 120 hour week--which is bad, but not really a huge problem in the big scheme of things.

Living here in Eastern NC, I have to say Dynosoar hit the nail on the head.....

I've seen what he is talking about the majority of my life.

Hey stumpman,
Thanks for the validation, I'm sure others ( as noted in more than a few comments ) see the same in
their neck of the woods.
As for those that are presently blind to the situation, perhaps they may take a closer look around, next time
they ride thru "that part of town".

As much as I dislike AFDC and other welfare programs, vincible is correct. They are a miniscule amount of the budget.

But we do know that roughly $40 billion per year are spent just on food stamps by the federal government.  And a large amount by the states as well.

I pay 33% in federal taxes and 6% state. That's about 40% right there. We then have a 6% sales tax so using that money puts us up to almost 50% of our income effectively taxed before we even get to property taxes, gas taxes, and various "fees".

As someone who considers himself pretty good about spending money (my wife and I invest as much as we can) my biggest problem with paying such high taxes is that so much of it is just plain wasted.

That is why I prefer private industry to the government to solve problems when possible. Generally speaking, private companies have an incentive to be efficient. The government, by contrast, has no incentive to be efficient and thus is not.

What Social worker in their right mind would suggest a program that would put her organization out of business?

Most doctors I know would happily go out of business if it meant the end of disease.

cheers

My only problem in the entire equasion, Dynosoar...is when someone points the finger at me and says I'm not doing another to help out the poor and to take care of my fellow man.
When I become resentful of that treatment, I get told I'm not sympathetic to the plight that is of the poor. That the poor are people who desperately need me to bail them out and shame on me for turning a blind eye to it all. As you said, they seem very content to be the way they are. They seem content to live and interact as they do..but God strike me down for not contributing to their happiness. For once I'd appreciate if there was a "middle class fund"..in which everyone from a certain finacial bracket got money they never earned simply because they are middle class. "Hey, you make between X and X amount of dollars! Here's 25,000 for the year of 2005. You won't be taxed for it, have a nice day!" I'm just saying it would be nice. ;o) Please..won't you donate to my cause? *tears well up in the eyes* I'm human, too.

that first another should be Enough. Bleh lol

LM,
It is the beauracrats job to perpetuate the system, be it by guilt, or rationalization, the "poor" are nothing more
than a means to their end.

Jeb,
Certainly you are right concerning most MD's, but then they would turn to a cosmetic practice. But you know, iradicating all
disease is a more attainable target than eliminating "poverty".

Brad,
I mirror your tax and investment obligations ( at least in general percentages and practice ) but I believe ( or rationalize )
that I get my fair share of those tax dollars back by serving my chosen market niche....

Perhaps if you designed a software program with Governmental applications, you too could reap back your "investment"
of taxation?
Of course as a provider to Government your application would have to be way over priced and obsolete before
instalation, otherwise it wouldn't meet Federal standards.......( hehehe)

I actually doubt that most MDs would turn to cosmetic practice, but that's something else entirely.

Cheers

jeblackstar:

Most doctor's may happily go out of business if all disease was eradicated, but most pharmaceutical companies would not. Drug companies would rather prolong the disease than cure it... or make a cure that you need to take daily to keep the disease away.

Absolutely, it's eroneous to compare poorly paid and over worked social workers to the Drug Companies however.

Cheers

Jeb,
Overworked ? Granted their mission is a noble one, but if their management focused on the problems instead of
perpetuating the Department.............
Oh yes, they are overworked, filing forms, learning new regulations, new qualifications.........

Nothing personal, but I've always considered a Social Worker a professional meddler.....:)

Ahh, yes, those damn social workers who break into people's homes and take their children from them, those children who have pesky bruises, broken bones, burn scars, concussions, organ damage, mental psychoses, etc.

Yes, those troubling meddlers, we ought to stop them so those parent's can go back to their god given right to beat and abuse their children.

Jeers to Dyno.

Some of the people I graduated from Law School with, went into Family law.

These judges deal with approximately 60 cases a day, that's one case every 8 minutes. Now, these people deal with divorces, but most often they have cases refered to them from these meddling social workers. And many of the cases of abuse I've seen, and they've dealed with would make your blood run cold, this is not a overzealous parent, this is thrashing a kid within an inch of their life. Pushing their faces into the electric stove, locking them for days and weeks in a closet without allowing them to eat or use the bathroom.

Professional meddlers? If so, thank God!

Cheers

Jeb,
I granted their job noble.
I know they do good work, save lives, et al...
My problem is with their management and the perpetuation of the Department...

I have always been led to believe that for every horror case that you describe, there is 10 cases that are unfounded, and border
on harrassment by the agency. ( my unfounded belief, based on unrecalled info )

Coming full circle in this post, could it be that the system created the original situation, rewarding childbirth, but ignoring the formation of a functioning family?
Some would conclude that the truly innocent children are nothing more to the parent than a qualifier for more income.

I accept your jeer for my rather sweeping stereotype of Social Workers ( there was a wink at the end of the comment ), but it is
my opinion of MOST of them. ( everybody can have opinions, just like.......)

Lots of satellite dishes,

I hate to say it, but this is why you shouldn't jump to conclusions.

My house has a satellite dish attached to it, but guess what? It isn't hooked up, and hasn't been hooked up since we've been here, let alone the many years the house sat vacant. Even if we DID have satellite dish, in our area you need an outside antenna at least 30 feet high (at our house, and we're at the TOP of the hill) to receive 3 to 4 part time channels. An outdoor antenna, for those who don't know, costs about $100 out of pocket, plus the costs of cable, etc...add to that the fact that not everyone has the skills to install one, and you could easily end up spending over $300 just to have TV reception (although TV isn't a necessity, it does help as far as news, etc., are concerned). In our case, the antenna was given to us, and I installed us, which still isn't finished as the antenna still has a tendency to turn, but I digress. The point is, given the choise of $300 out of pocket to put up an antenna in rural areas and $50 per month for satellite with clearer reception, most people choose the latter. We were considering it ourselves, even though we can ill afford it, as we found ourselves HORRIBLY behind on current events.

Moral to this story: a satellite dish is not necessarily a sign of indulgence.

WOW! A full year later and I,m still gettin' comments.

It's a very good article.

I grew up pretty poor.  My dad left my mom when I was 4 and we were on our own. And so we lived where my mom could afford on her minimum wage job. And we lived amongst the poor, being poor ourselves, for some  years.

And what I saw left a strong impression on me.  Most, though not all, Americans who are poor are poor because they're stupid, lazy, or both.

And while some like the champion the cause of the poor, most of the time when you start digging into the specifics of a typical poor luck story you find a series of idiotic decisions and poor judgment.

One of the nice things we're seeing with these new reality shows that have people going into to "Rescue" some of these losers is that champions of the poor (who are typically pampered middle class people) get to see first hand what many of us who have some real world experience dealing with the poor have.  They see the loser who can't be bothered to take out his own trash and so lets it fill up his apartment or trailer.  We see the stupid mother who has 4 out of wedlock children that she feeds whatever junkfood is more convenient for her to get.  We see the lamer who loses his job because his car tire goes flat and is too lazy to change it or ask someone to help him change it and so just misses work.

That's the real world. That's the real world of what most poor people in the United States are like.  And before some frothing at the mouth left winger comes on and starts condemning me, I will say that there are truly good, hard working, honest, intelligent people who get screwed over and end up poor. They certainly exist.  But they are so few, as a percentage, that it seems like we could custom tailer programs for those people and quit letting the stupid and lazy leech off the rest of society.

From my experience there are two kinds of poor. Those who have a low income and those who have a low income lifestyle.

Most "rich" people I know have been down in the dumps a time or two. For that matter, right now I'm not so financially set myself. However, what me and those "rich" folks I know have in common is, this will only last long enough for us to do what we need to to get out of it.

Hurricane Andrew held one of my favorite examples of the low income as a lifestyle.

I ask you (and anyone else reading); a couple of weeks after Hurricane Andrew went through your neighborhood, your household garbage was filling your yards. A recovery team shows up in your neighborhood, handing out all the plywood, plastic sheeting, candy corns and other necessities of life and recovery. After an evaluation of your future needs, a person from the recovery team announces that port-a-pots and dumpsters would be delivered in a few hours...

What would your reaction be:

A) "Thanks for the much needed supplies,port-a-pots and dumpsters."
"Just drop the stuff off and let us get on with our lives and you can get on with yours".
C) "I don't know who you expect to pick up all this garbage!"

Would it surprise anyone if I told you which response came from the neighborhoods most closely fitting what your article describes??

Glad this article was regenerated!!!!