How Welfare should be according to Anti-Welfareists

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TheGoggles
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26 Feb 2014, 2:00 pm

Kraichgauer wrote:

luanqibazao wrote:

sonofghandi wrote:

I guess basically I am just saying that those numbers are pretty worthless. It is like saying that someone who lives in a state with a high state income tax gives much more to charity (government run programs) than someone from Florida (no state income tax), which also a worthless statement.

Conservatives at all income levels give more than their liberal counterparts. They are also more likely to give to secular charities. They also give more blood.

Quote:

However, conservatives gave about 30 percent more money per year to private charitable causes, even though his study found liberal families earned an average of 6 percent more per year in income than did conservative families. This greater generosity among conservative families proved to be true in Brooks’ research for every income group, “from poor to middle class to rich.”
This “giving gap” also extended beyond money to time donated to charitable causes, as well. Brooks also discovered that in 2002, conservative Americans were much more likely to donate blood each year than liberals and to do so more often within a year. Brooks found “if liberals and moderates gave blood at the same rate as conservatives, the blood supply in the United States would jump by about 45 percent.”

I personally am neither conservative nor religious, nor do I consider charity a moral duty or a major virtue. What I want to question is the claim that 'people opposed to government welfare programs are just evil Nazis who want poor people to die.' That kind of attitude is not conducive to intelligent discussion.

You don't consider charity "a moral duty or a major virtue?" Believers and unbelievers alike would be taken back by that statement.

Randroid.

Kraichgauer
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26 Feb 2014, 2:07 pm

adb wrote:

Kraichgauer wrote:

And yet I know of studies that show how poor people - who are more likely politically liberal - give not as much monetarily, but in fact give in greater numbers. And then there's Christ's parable of the poor widow who found a coin while sweeping, and so gave it as her offering at the temple. While all the rich were giving tons of wealth at the same time, she in fact had given more, because as Christ said, she had given everything she had.

A hundred dollars does more for a recipient than one dollar does. Suggesting that someone who has less and gives a lower amount is somehow "giving more" is ludicrous. It's making it about the the person providing the charity rather than the person receiving the charity.

Charity helps people based on the amount of money donated. How much wealth the people donating have is completely irrelevant, as is their attitude in giving. What matters is getting the money to those who need it.

That story is nothing more than a manipulation to get people who can't afford to give to the church do it anyway. It amazes me that such an obvious scam is accepted by so many people. I really don't understand why people throw out their critical thinking when it comes to Jesus.

I'm talking about personal sacrifice of each donor. In that sense, the poor donors still give more than their rich counterparts.

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adb
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26 Feb 2014, 2:18 pm

Kraichgauer wrote:

I'm talking about personal sacrifice of each donor. In that sense, the poor donors still give more than their rich counterparts.

Ok. I'll concede that in terms of personal sacrifice, those who give a higher percentage are doing "more".

That said, I find it distasteful to talk about personal sacrifice when it comes to charity since it takes focus away from the purpose of charity. Charity should be about helping those that need it, not about feeding the feelings of righteousness for the contributors.

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26 Feb 2014, 3:19 pm

adb wrote:

Kraichgauer wrote:

I'm talking about personal sacrifice of each donor. In that sense, the poor donors still give more than their rich counterparts.

Who says it's about feelings of self righteousness? I doubt that poor people who give have any such feelings. And while there is undoubtedly altruistic feelings behind the donations of the rich, it has to be remembered they can give vast amounts and probably aren't going to be any worse off financially for it. The poor who give out of the goodness of their hearts are much more likely to be honestly sacrificing something in order to help someone else.

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26 Feb 2014, 3:27 pm

The average conservative is okay with a social safety net, not a social safety hammock.

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Kraichgauer
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26 Feb 2014, 3:36 pm

Raptor wrote:

The average conservative is okay with a social safety net, not a social safety hammock.

But one charge against conservatives is that they complain about that "hammock" when people need extended help.

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adb
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26 Feb 2014, 7:40 pm

Kraichgauer wrote:

Raptor wrote:

The average conservative is okay with a social safety net, not a social safety hammock.

But one charge against conservatives is that they complain about that "hammock" when people need extended help.

I don't really know any conservatives who feel that people who really need extended help shouldn't get it. The conservative position that I see is that they feel there is an unacceptable amount of waste and fraud in the system. Liberals see the amount of waste and fraud as an acceptable loss for ensuring that those who need help receive it.

It's the libertarian-type people like me who are a more appropriate target for that charge, since we oppose government social services entirely.

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26 Feb 2014, 7:53 pm

Kraichgauer wrote:

Raptor wrote:

The average conservative is okay with a social safety net, not a social safety hammock.

But one charge against conservatives is that they complain about that "hammock" when people need extended help.

The key word there is need and this is where we have the arduous task of weeding out the slackers and malingerers from those actually in need.

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Jaden
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26 Feb 2014, 8:37 pm

Whenever I hear the "Welfare Argument" as I've come to call it, I laugh. "Why?" you may ask. I'll tell you why:
because people who argue that welfare is making people more dependent, lazy, etc. have never had to be put on welfare, they've never dealt with the problems that are associated with being on welfare, they've never understood that being on welfare is not a free ride, but rather a struggle to survive. Do they even realize that because of how welfare runs, it's an everyday struggle just to make ends meet on a basic level? Of course they don't, because they don't see the face of poverty, they just use the stigmas and hearsay that is associated with welfare as a means to their own political ends, and who suffers for it? We Do.

Let me tell you (the anti-welfare individuals) the reality of the situation:

With SSI, one person gets (depending on state, generally):

$700/mo - Since the average rent cost is about $500-$600 with any decent area (at least where I'm from), that leaves the recipient with only $100-$200, before bills. After bills, even with assistance in paying those bills (through programs), you're left with at or less than $100-$150. Now comes the required expenses for living which can easily take up at least that much. I'm talking about clothes, soaps, everything for taking physical care of yourself.
Want to drive? Not going to happen with this income. Why? Because you can't afford a car, nor the gas. So you're left with depending on others for a ride to where you need to go to get groceries and pay bills. No internet service, again, money is thin. If you have low income housing, you might be able to afford some things, but then you also have to think about how safe the neighborhood is, because frankly, low income housing is usually where shootings happen (at least, they do here).

If you're eligible for food assistance, right now, here, it's about $180/mo. I don't think I have to tell anyone who's living it right now what that means. But the for the sake of those who don't get it, let me spell it out for you:
Cheap meals = not generally healthy food = health risks that go with it.
Compound that with a year or more and you get even more problems that go with it.
Not to mention the fact that it's actually pretty hard to survive on only $180 for food. Keep in mind now, that the rest of the monthly income has already gone to non food items because that's needed just as much, and food assistance can only be used for food.

So, while people advocate to eliminate or cut welfare, sitting in their decent houses, in decent neighborhoods, with their cozy $20,000+/yr jobs, they don't even know what the hell people in the thick of it have to deal with every day. And with these numbers ever continuously changing, those of us that are in the thick of it have to wonder what we'll have to give up or settle for next month, or the month after that.

I also remind these anti-welfare individuals (I'm being nice), that most people are on welfare because they have no other means of supporting themselves or their families in the first place.
We are not just a number. We're people struggling to survive.

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Kraichgauer
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26 Feb 2014, 8:53 pm

Raptor wrote:

Kraichgauer wrote:

Raptor wrote:

The average conservative is okay with a social safety net, not a social safety hammock.

But one charge against conservatives is that they complain about that "hammock" when people need extended help.

The key word there is need and this is where we have the arduous task of weeding out the slackers and malingerers from those actually in need.

But how many of those so called "slackers and malingerers" are really just that, and how many are only deemed to be such by conservatives who see giving them aid a waste of money?

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26 Feb 2014, 8:55 pm

adb wrote:

Kraichgauer wrote:

Raptor wrote:

The average conservative is okay with a social safety net, not a social safety hammock.

But one charge against conservatives is that they complain about that "hammock" when people need extended help.

Okay, then libertarians shall draw my wrath as well - as if I haven't before.
Incidentally, I tend to lump libertarians in with conservatives.

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26 Feb 2014, 9:04 pm

polarity wrote:

Disabled people are just as capable of contributing towards society as anyone else, when given the chance.

Disability is not entirely caused by a medical condition. It is largely due to the rest of society's unwillingness to make adaptations to work around that condition.

Hmm even if given the chance I am not so sure I'd be just as capable of contributing as anyone else. I could probably then find employment but I'd probably still have problems keeping up with a work load.

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26 Feb 2014, 9:12 pm

zer0netgain wrote:

thinkinginpictures wrote:

Moreover, many of those Anti-Welfareists further claim that welfare should be cut or abolished altogether, simply because it makes people get dependent on it.

I have personal knowledge on this. I worked as a case manager, and I saw how messed up the system was.

I advocate the following.

1. Get government OUT of the welfare business.

Government can't "discriminate" on who gets help and who does not. It is so easy to fake your income/assets to qualify for benefits (if you don't mind lying). Lots of people who deserve help do not get it because they don't meet an arbitrary annual income level. Likewise, lots of people can loose their benefits once they make more than X but don't yet make Y which is what they need to be self-sufficient.

There is more than enough research out there showing that government-run welfare is designed to perpetuate a class of cheap and disposable labor...not to help people in need.

2. Make welfare something run by private charities.

Admittedly, how to fund these is more problematic than government-run which is funded by taxes, but (in the USA) if the government provides the money, their rules apply...making who runs it irrelevant. A private charity can scrutinize if someone gets benefits. It's no longer about meeting an arbitrary monetary level. More so, if the applicant appears to be wanting to get something for nothing, you can just turn them down. They have no right to benefits, so they can't claim they are being discriminated against.

The best part of a privately-run charity is that if the populace does not approve of how they run things, they don't donate. A charity has to be good stewards of their money or they find it very hard to get donors. Government welfare doesn't do squat. Your case worker might get a meager salary, but their supervisors, and their supervisor's supervisors, etc. are paid very well.

I know government has tried programs where if you don't do X, you don't get your benefits, but the political nature of government-run welfare is that such standards can be increased or decreased based on political agendas and not what works in denying benefits to lazy people and providing benefits to people who legitimately need help.

3. Require that as much as possible, the goal of welfare is to get people off of welfare for good.

Welfare should be helping people to be self-sufficient. The only people who should be life-long recipients are people who will never be able to get and keep a job through no fault of their own. We shouldn't cut people off until they are able to stand on their own feet. Decrease benefits as they earn more, yes. Cut them off before they are able to do without the help, no. Tolerate people hovering at a level that lets them get benefits but never enough to have to really hold a full-time job, absolutely not.

While the private chairty being responsible for welfare sounds ok in writing...I have to wonder what happens when private chairity doesn't provide enough welfare to cover the needs of people who need it. I think the government run option certainly does need improvement...with SSI you can't have more than 2,000 dollars in savings or in cash or you can get cut off. So yeah makes it complicated for people who potentially could become functional for work to actually try and find something though I hear you can work on SSI but it would likely have to be part time which wouldn't help advancing to more of a career.

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Jaden
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26 Feb 2014, 9:20 pm

Sweetleaf wrote:

zer0netgain wrote:

thinkinginpictures wrote:

Moreover, many of those Anti-Welfareists further claim that welfare should be cut or abolished altogether, simply because it makes people get dependent on it.

That's actually a lot from my perspective, the last I heard, I could only save up to $800 without it being taken back, though I've found this number actually lower (last time I had any surplus in the account, it was reviewed and the payment was lowered, this is when I had less than $200 in the account after the fact). The system here seems like it's worse off than most places.

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27 Feb 2014, 12:28 am

Kraichgauer wrote:

Raptor wrote:

Kraichgauer wrote:

Raptor wrote:

The average conservative is okay with a social safety net, not a social safety hammock.

But one charge against conservatives is that they complain about that "hammock" when people need extended help.

The key word there is need and this is where we have the arduous task of weeding out the slackers and malingerers from those actually in need.

But how many of those so called "slackers and malingerers" are really just that, and how many are only deemed to be such by conservatives who see giving them aid a waste of money?

Not that I have "proof", but I imagine if we went to a no questions asked welfare or disability system we'd have people at every enrollment office lined up out the door and clear back around the corner to get their free money.

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27 Feb 2014, 12:37 am

luanqibazao wrote:

I find that discussions are more interesting if I assume that nearly everybody has good intentions, until they prove otherwise. The Western political world is not divided between angels and demons, but composed of mostly decent people who subscribe to different ideologies. But I guess if you decide from the outset that everybody who disagrees with you is an evil monster, you needn't bother trying to understand any other points of view. Easier that way I suppose.

This belief on my own part is responsible for 90% or more of the arguments I get into here.

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