Whenever you see a pie graph that is meant to represent all government spending. You will probably see a graph like the one at US Government Spending or the one at Wikipedia which shows that “Welfare” spending is 12% of the federal budget. The problem with that is that the government has no spending category called “Welfare”. Therefore, what somebody calls “Welfare” is somewhat subjective and undefinable.
The Office of Management and Budget(OMB) does have a spending category called “Income Security”. The two pie graphs I linked to in the introduction just take that entire category and divides it by total spending to get 12%. In 2009 accounts categorized as “income security” accounted for 533$ billion in spending. According to the government printing offices’ historical tables, table 3.2: Oulays by Function and Subfunction, that spending is broken down into 6 distinct subfunctions.
- General retirement and disability insurance
- Federal employee retirement and disability
- Unemployment compensation
- Housing assistance
- Food and nutrition assistance
- Other income security
But as I described in a previous post, 3 out of the 6 income security subfunctions go to pensions and unemployment – things that must be earned by working and paying into.
The 3 remaining subfunctions cost a combined 284$ billion dollars, but even that doesn’t tell the whole story. Over the last week I’ve taken a more detailed look at each of these subfunctions to get an idea of how that money is spent. What I found was that even in the remaining subfunctions, Food and Nutrition, Housing Assistance, and Other that not all of that spending was spent on the poor.
When I analyzed the “Other” income security subfunction, I graphed how that money was spent by categorizing that spending into 4 different categories:
- Not Directed at Poor\Earned: Welfare not targeted to poor. The poor may use these programs, but just being poor will not qualify you for these programs.
- Direct: Welfare that’s Direct money to the poor
- In-direct: Money paid to 3rd parties on behalf of the poor
- Poor & Middle Class: These are tax rebates that poor and most middle class people qualify for and use.
I would now like to extend that analysis to the entire 533$ billion that the U.S. government spent on “income security”. Here’s how the numbers break down.
(Click chart for Larger Image. See The Numbers for this Chart)
As you can see the vast majority of the money spent in the “Income Security” function of the government is spent on programs not directed at the poor or programs where the income must be earned. If you want to know how I categorized everything, here’s how I did it:
- Unemployment and Pensions are classified as not-directed at poor\Earned.
- For Food & Nutrition, WIC & SNAP(Food Stamps) are “Direct”, School lunches are “non-direct”, the rest are “not-directed at poor”
- For Housing Assistance, I categorized the temporary “new homeowner” credit as “Poor & Middle Class” and the rest as non-direct
- For the rest you can read my previous post on how I broke down “Other Income Security“
If you would like more details on why I categorized the programs as such, I suggest you read my previous posts: Income Security, Food and Nutrition, Housing Assistance, and Other Income Security.
If you total up the direct and non-direct spending categories which are all the programs that are meant to help the poor, you will see that the federal government only spent 191$ billion on “welfare” for the poor. That would be 5.5% of the unified budget. I counted off-budget programs since the pie graphs in the beginning counted social security and other “off-budget” accounts. If you only want to go with on-budget expenditures it’s 6.4%, still a far cry from the 12% that most internet graphs will show you. Just for fun I decided to graph those numbers. Feel free to copy these graphs to show anyone who thinks we actually spend 12% of the federal budget helping the poor.
(Click charts for Larger Images.)
Source for all numbers is the Public Budget Database
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Helping the poor and disadvantaged is now big business no matter which graph you look at. It’s amazing how many programs are out there designed to put people back to work or to feed and house them, but somehow only a percentage of this money flows down where it is most needed.
Yes, admin costs etc are expensive but why make it into a business and a whole new industry?
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4 the haters out there yes most people abuse the welfare system. our 1st 4 kids my husband had a career n good insurance. our family dr prescribd my husband antidepressants that destroyed him. destroyed our entire life!! we did end up with 1 more child the 1st on welfare. he is fixed now but we r trapped with his sickness. he is on new meds but he is nowhere the man he was. we get some assistance n we r humiliated. if we had a farm we would grow n raise our own food but thats not how our society is. my husband was able 2 whittle some homemade guns 4 the kids with his dads help 4 xmas. we dont want pitty anymore. we r numb 2 what has happen 2 us. my kids r not embarrassed gettn used clothes n toys thank god. n they dont care drivn an old van. my kids r who u will want as a neighbor. they r kind n considerate lil humans. we raise them 2 worship the golden rule!!!! how about yous? p.s. my husband is the 1st generation on his side of the family 2 b on welfare my mom was single n the 1st for my side. his n mine have been payn taxes here since the 1700′s so i think we deserve the help right now.
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oh n all 5 of my kids r from the same man
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Five children to too many. Anyone would have a burden with so many – food, clothes, school things, electricity, heat, gas for car to take them to school, etc.
Five may be your basic problem. What were you thinking?
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Who do you think you are Bill G!!!?? You are not GOD!! You are a mere human, depraved , immoral and full of sin like everyone else!! How dare you judge her and tell her what’s too many for her!! You are delirious!!!! Check yourself before you wreck your self!!
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I do not wish to make things harder for you and your family, and the idea of you being on welfare because you hit a hard spot in your lives is fine. The point everyone is trying to make is that there is a serious amount of abuse of the system, and if you and your husband are looking for work then the system is doing the job it is designed to do, but if you are just living on it and using your families history as an excuse to live off the backs of tax paying american families who have gone through much worse than that of your situation, you are in the wrong and you are just making excuses, and to be taken seriously use correct grammar. The usage of number two for the word to is distracting and undermines everything you say.
Further more i am glad that your the parents of all 5 children and that they are not from mixed homes, but it is irrelevant.
Final comment, you hated for your entire post as though you have a guilty conscience, and if the tables were turned you wouldn’t believe what you posted; because from the context clues I found you have not looked for a job, and you remain on the system because you both have given up and become numb; thus you are abusing the system. I could be wrong, but that is what i have gathered.
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Manis you are abusing the system… Who made you the judge? Or anyone else for that matter? If you all wanna talk about a messed up system that’s abused why not talk about the in humane things that goes on in the correction system by police officers who suppose to uphold the law? Why not talk about the crooked politicians who abuse the system, they retire and still get paid for the rest of their lives and get full medical coverage!! Why not talk about reperations? So on and so forth!!
You all are a bunch of hypocrites and self righteous arrogant people!!
Neilly all your hurt and pain and suffering will end one day. Keep your head up sister, you and your man! Continue to support and stand with him, we need more people like you in the world today!!
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It’s not that I am pissed that families in need are receiving help, it’s that so many undeserving people are getting these benefits. I work my tail off just to pay for my own college tuition and car payments and to think someone gets some of that money because “our family dr prescribd my husband antidepressants that destroyed him,” is not good enough reason for a family/person to feed off welfare. Also, you are a grown woman, SPELL THINGS CORRECTLY! It’s not cute when 13 year old girls do it so it definitely is not cute when you do it.
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Stay at home moms? Maybe a very long time ago. However women wanted to be equal as a man as many women liberals. I some women wanting more rights than a man.. You ask how so? well lets look at the facts. Women stayed at home yes, many years ago while the husband / father went to work. Now fast forward to the present time, roles have changed. Men now clean the house, take care of the kids and make dinner. Ummm did women learn the role of a man. I think not. Do women go and work outside like a man, nope, women usually tend to get those inside aircondition jobs. While men have more on their plate than women do, men just take it. Umm need more info? Sure, how about the laws in divorce. Divorce now a days is corrupted because it supports and favors the women side. Do the kids go to the better parent? Absolutely not, kids go to the mother even if the mother cant even afford to feed herself. What do men get, the bills and child support payments. Child support is another government fail law because as we all know, most child support money isnt spent on the kids. Yes , yes most will complain it cost money to keep the roof over his head. But then again, why does a parent who recieves child support charge their own child for bills?
Read enough on how fair it is, well lets get back on topic. Our government supports welfare dead beat parents to not work. Just a few months ago, i saw on the news that their were 5 generations from grandma down the line who never worked their entire life. And as we know now a days women are having kids from different guys. Lets say 1 women 3 different kids from different dads. thats 20% from each guy while she lives free and preg from next boy friend. wow this is so amazing i thought prositution was illegal. But some how the working class is paying for it. Lets support the women who like having money but frown on responsibility. I have a friend who is a social worker. She told me of a girl with 20 kids most from different dads and wants another baby.
Now from what i see not only are women abusing the welfare system, but my other friend went to the social security office to retire. Guess what he saw. A bunch of welfare dead beat moms trying to get disability for themselves and their kids. This is just amazing. What else can they get free. I know one thing. I have worked since i was 15 years old and I still work.
Doubt me in anything I say… easy way to prove my evidence. Go past any project in your city and see how many women with different kids are walking around.
Then count how many tatoos and rings / jewelry they have on.
Then go look at the vehical they are driving with those huge 26″ chrome rims.
I never knew welfare was a carreer.
I dont care if you believe me, if you dont. Open your eyes wider. And yes its true, our government doesnt want to help the elder class. My grandmother asked for help, she was only given 20 dollars for food stamps. The only time in her life she asked for help. She was laughed at.
…
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Wow, you really sound like a misogynistic asshole. And you’re completely wrong too about how bad the abuse of the system is. Most people who receive benefits do not have forty tats or chrome rims. I have a hard time feeling sorry for your granny when you descended from her.
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ok people, get a clue. I’m not saying that any one person is wrong or right but the way most people see it is that in certain areas, there are lazy “whoa is me” people all over the place. I work fire and ems as well as being enlisted in the military.I cant even count the number of lazy welfare moms that I have picked up and brought to the hospital for stupid reasons. one even told me that she wanted to go to the ER because she had a headache and her welfare wouldn’t pay for a cab ride but it would for an ambulance ride. the abuse is crazy and something needs to be done.
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Had you gotten a education you wouldn’t be in this mess. And improve your spelling. It’s sad that people have access to a computer, but don’t have access to a brain.
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I agree with BlueDot. Judging by the first post, the only sympathy I could muster was for the education system that obviously failed. As a person that grew up in a house of six, I would be ashamed to read a post by either of my parents containing that many blatant grammatical errors. I would also be ashamed that my family was seeking help from the clearly very biased, very abused welfare system. I can remember being in grade school having to wait until late at night to see my father. Why? Because he was earning the things that we had.
I too have struggled with the grasp of anti-depressants. The smartest thing I did was to man up and get off of them. It was destroying my life for a short time, but I had to learn that there we ways to deal with life’s problems that didn’t involve synthetics.
People like the person in the first post are exactly what is wrong with this country. “Paying taxes since the 1700′s” is no right at all to earn anything for free. Nothing in life is free. What may seem like an easy ride to some, is earned for you by someone else. From a very young age I worked for the things that I wanted and needed. And until the day that I die, I will bend over backwards before I fall victim to the system that my ancestors have been paying into forever. I understand that there are people who genuinely need help, and that’s fine. So go out and get it. Lord knows the resources are available. If you don’t have a job, find one. There are resources for that too, sometimes you just have to get off of your lazy ass and stop expecting something for nothing.
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There are 4.5 people looking for work for every 1 job opening. So maybe “get a job” isn’t as easy as it sounds these days.
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Sorry but your families have not been paying taxes since the 1700′s.
1862 – President Lincoln signed into law a revenue-raising measure to help pay for Civil War expenses. The measure created a Commissioner of Internal Revenue and the nation’s first income tax. It levied a 3 percent tax on incomes between $600 and $10,000 and a 5 percent tax on incomes of more than $10,000. (Quoted from IRS.gov)
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Because not doing so helps that other current big business increasingly dependent on an ever-renewable supply of the poor and despondent–Big Prisons. And these privatized prisons cost even more than lifting people up! As do emergency rooms, etc. etc. It’s about being cost-effective and getting some return for your investment. When you warehouse the poor in prisons, you harm your own economy. When you do not invest in the poor through education, etc., you wind up with what we actually do have right now in this country–too few educated, skilled laborers. The result is a general implosion of the economy, such as you see currently. The country that does not invest in itself harms only itself ultimately. We’ll just become the less competitive place, less desirable place to do global business, while other nations invest in their workers and rise, rise, rise.
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I just discovered this valuable information and wanted to commend you on all your hard work putting together these numbers. If only you could spread it around so others would see it too.
Thanks!
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If you use the facebook sharing button below the article, you can help spread it yourself!
[...] who doesn't toe the extremist right-wing philosophy of MINE, must be a moocher, a tic, a parasite. How much do we REALLY spend on Welfare? Quote: If you total up the direct and non-direct spending categories which are all the programs [...]
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Thank you for putting this issue into some real perspective. Even the 6.4% could easily be cut from the bloated Pentagon budget without sacrificing one iota of national security. What would really help the most is putting the middle class back to work in good paying jobs. This would mean bringing some of those jobs back from overseas. This would mean some politicians would have to regulate their Billionaire benefactors. The fact is that this was done in Brazil and big businessmen screamed and cried that it would kill them, but their economy has been robust throughout this global recession. Business there has done well … just not as well as it has done here because of CORPORATE WELFARE. It is time to take care of the working people of America, and the poor. What kind of country do you want to live in? If our wages and employment continue in their present trends, we will be a third world country sooner than later.
[...] 24.4%, Social Security (the Ponzi scheme) at 21%, Defense (you know, the war thing) at 20.6%, and Income Security (I had to look this up, but it’s a combo of federal employee benefits, unemployment, and [...]
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How do I post your graphs on other websites when I can’t link anyone to the url for your images?
[...] [...]
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Thank you so much. I was starting to work my way down this trail when I found your web site which saved me most of the trouble. Unfortunately you did 2009 and I was working on 2010. If nothing else I’ll work the sources you provided.
Thanks again.
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If you want to know how to scam the government, talk to a “stay at home mom”, welfare-4-life baby-factory, ghetto mom criminal breeder: they know all of the scams.
These women never have worked and they don’t EVER plan on working; all they want is to live for free for life.
They are 100% happy being on full assistance in their HUD apartment with their food stamps, cash assistance, SSI benefits and all the scams that they are running.
Student loan scams (they never plan on paying back one cent); Earned Income Credit scams ($5000+ per welfare whore); IRS tax refund scams (they let working friends & relatives claim their bastard kids on their tax returns; then they keep the money or split it with the friend); Thanksgiving scams (they bring several changes of clothes and disguises and get free turkeys etc.; then sell the extra ones at parking lots; apartment complexes etc.
They are grifters and truly disgusting people.
When you hear “stay at home mom” or “single mom”, instead of feeling sorry for them, ask them if they are on welfare or if they work; have they ever worked, etc.
Watch how ANGRY they get, because you have called them out.
They HATE to be caught in their scam. They want everyone to feel sorry for them and to give them free stuff–they don’t want you to question their “single mom” status.
Many of them live with the baby-daddy of their mutant kid(s)–that’s another part of the scam. The guy gets a free place to stay, as long as he doesn’t marry the fat cow.
It’s GENERATION W.
It’s a LIFESTYLE CHOICE for them; they are forced into it, they choose to live this way. Fat, ugly, lazy, criminal-breeders.
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A lot of hate in this comment.
A lot of nonsense too. I didn’t realize selling turkeys was such a money maker. One could make dozens of dollars – being that there’s such a huge market for “parking lot turkeys”.
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there is truly a lot of hate in this post, I was a single mom–for 7 years, before that I was a stay at home mom for a while as well. Mostly though I worked. My stay at home stints were the result of discovering I needed my entire paycheck to pay summer time daycare for my 3 children. I NEVER got welfare, medicaid, wic, housing or foodstamps. My husband paid a minimum amount of child support (less than 300/mo for 3 kids) and I worked…usually 2 jobs, after becoming a single mom due to divorce. I remarried after 7 years and continued to work. I resent the implication that all stay at home moms or single moms are welfare bums, whores, have “bastard kids” and are “truly disgusting people” you threw a lot of stereotypical, judgmental and biased, not to mention some racist statements out there. Yes, there are some who work the system, but for every bad egg, there is one who is trying to get on their own two feet and there are others who are doing it. You probably look down on them too, after all we are the ones who drive beat up, broken down cars, shop in the goodwill or salvation army, wear out of style or raggy clothes, don’t have fancy cell phones, cable or laptops, we take our leftovers home when we eat out and we actually use them for another meal, we use coupons and probably hold you up at the grocery store too.
We attend EVERY SINGLE free event in town, because it is the only entertainment we can afford to take our kids to. My children attended more darned parades than you can imagine. They thought of the LIBRARY the way most kids see the mall–a cool place to hang out when you were bored. They grew up the envy of their classmates because they always had homemade cookies and treats and homecooked meals and homemade costumes and their mom played games with them instead of sitting them in front of the nintendo or play station, not by choice, their mom was tired—two jobs and 65 hours of work a week will do that to you— but their mom felt guilty because she could not do more for them and had to be gone so much. I could not buy treats and costumes, but we made them and they were better because they lasted and we did them together, I could not buy fancy game consoles, but we learned to play monopoly and life and scrabble and checkers and chess. Funny thing, a while back, my son, 25, beat me at a game of scrabble. You never saw a young man so happy…he posted it on facebook and said ” I FINALLY beat my mom for the first time at scrabble, I have been trying to do that since I was 8 !” My husband and I have money now, not a lot, but enough, my kids all work and are doing OK for themselves as well, but we still sit down and play games together, we still discuss books we have read, they expect HOMEMADE meals and treats when they come visit and they ask me to help their children with costumes or in one case they do it themselves…they can afford to buy them, but choose not to because while we did it because we were poor, it gave them a strong sense of being loved and good memories and they want their kids to have that too.
I am sorry you are such a hateful person, obviously you did not have a loving upbringing nor a christian one, or you would have more tolerance. That is too bad, because all that hate is festering inside of you and you will never find happiness until you can let it go. You will probably deny needing it, but I will say a prayer for you.
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Just a Mom… I accidently clicked dislike on your comment. Please forgive me I meant to click “the like”. I agree with you %100 percent. Your reply was very well written and does you and Mother’s like us, who are single and have been stay-at-home, justice.
Thank you
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wow im so impressed!!!!! i wanna cry right now cause i should b doing more with my kids. i will try harder when they awake. thank u!!!!!!
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While I may not agree with the post you were replying to in full, I believe his point was that there is a fair amount of abuse for the system. I personally know a number of individuals who milk the system. That’s what they plan on doing every single month to make it by. They laugh at the fact that they can blow interviews intentionally just so they DO NOT have to work and still receive their benefits. One individual in particular, her mother is foster care taker. She doesn’t do it out of the kindness of her heart, she does it for the check she receives every month for those children. She shows the kids a negligible amount of attention, despite the fact that her children are all “adults,” and “living” on their own (by which I mean one is in prison for a number of charges and another is living on state/federal assistance WHILE claiming a child she no longer has who now lives in another country with the father).
I understand the help is there to be used. But it needs to be used by those who are actively trying. Trust me, I understand the hardships of finding a job, I spent nearly a year and a half looking for work. Fortunately enough for me, I had parents who I could fall back on (I’m 23 and boy is that embarassing). I found work, got on my feet, and right before I was set to move back out, my father was let go from work. A 50 year old man, who paid taxes his ENTIRE life, from the age 16 onwards, was denied ANY form of state or federal assistance. I force myself to ask how this could conceivably be fair… In my new position, I made more money annually than my mother did (she was recently laid off). So, here I am, 23 years old, living in the restrictive environment of my parents house, paying their mortgage, their utilities, etc. I don’t mean to sound ungrateful, I just wish to point out the flaws in the system as it is set up.
It angers me to no small extent that people I personally know are abusing the system, while my parents who looked for jobs every day of the week, went to multiple interviews a week, were denied assistance while these uneducated morons are given assistance as if it is their right. They chose to not even graduate highschool, they were not forced out. They enjoy doing drugs and drinking far too much to even consider finishing their education or attempting to get a job. While people may say that they have been misguided and it is not their fault, trust me, it is. I am a recovering drug addict myself, barely passed high school (it took an extra year), but I work my ass off because it is what needs to be done. Those same people I know look at me and tell me they want to be like me, they tell me they look up to, but I can’t help but feel no respect for some one who isn’t even willing to try. When you need a job, flipping burgers is beneath nobody.
Instead of my parents being given a helping hand, the man and woman who raised me being given the help that they have paid into for over 30 years, they are denied any help by our government. It absolutely infuriates me that I am paying 30% of my total salary to a government that has done nothing to help my family. Sure, you can argue that they have upheld this country, but that means little to me. My first paycheck after going on salary, I did the math. I worked for under $6/hour. I have never factored it out again. Meanwhile, I work approaching 100 hours a week, every week. Much of this is spent on the phone, a fair amount of it is spent replying to emails, and a large amount of it is spent driving. Whereas, people I personally know get to sit on their ass all day, smoke some weed, maybe drink a 40 of their shitty beer, and receive food stamps, EBT, whatever the hell they call assistance/welfare these days, for doing not a damned thing. But, you know what? When all is said and done, I am worth more than those people. I am stronger than they are and will prove myself to be a better person, while they are a parasite on the ass of this country. Please, spare me your out-dated Christian prattle. I understand, at face value a person is worth no more than another, but I am worth more to society than those people.
While all my friends are out partying, acting as most young adults my age tend to act, I stay at home. I worry about my credit score and the debt that is piling up to keep my parents afloat. I will most likely never own a home, maybe never even be allowed to rent an appartment myself due to credit score and delinquent payments.
I apologise for seeming to ramble, I just listed my thoughts as they came to me, since I don’t have time (need to get back to work!) to properly organise this rant. To sum it up, I am going to find myself a nice Australian woman and move myself down to Australia once my parents get on their feet. A country who ONLY HELPS THOSE WHO ARE TRYING TO HELP THEMSELVES. What a novel concept, huh? I once believed the United States could do no wrong, but following 11 years under Bush and Obama, oh boy were my childhood delusions shattered! I refuse to take part in promoting laziness and what is seemingly turning into a socialist revolving-dictatorship as our civil rights are encroached upon at the will of the people we vote into office.
If you don’t agree with me, I don’t give a fuck. More than likely, I will make more of myself than you ever will. I’ve been as low as you can be and by virtue of my own work ethic and (slight) intelligence, I have risen up and taken life by the horns to make something of myself. I have never asked for help from anyone, because, frankly, most people will not help others selflessly.
Well, back to work.
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I give you credit for doing the right thing and identifying the problem areas. The right way is the hard way but it pays off in the end. Some people think I have the best luck with my wife, family, and my job. My luck is based on my hard work and the fact that I do the right thing every day. Keep the faith and keep doing what you’re doing. It will pay off in the end. Some will think you got lucky but we will both know the truth.
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Why are ppl labeled haters just because they don’t want a socialized welfare state? I’m not ashamed to say people should provide for themselves or suffer the consequences. If family or friends can help, great. Society shouldn’t have to carry people that aren’t productive or burden the state.
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Women look for lazy men and they don’t marry them, but only use them to have babies that we will apy to raise all their life, and the men they look for fat women, so they can have them home all the time, while they have protected sex with skinny no brain women.
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Obese women have to take whatever comes along and these men only want food, a place to sleep, and also make sure these women work; so they can invite the skinny neighbor for some fun.
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wow. what venemous racist woman hating tripe. my friend you need to seek therapy.
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Oh my, someone has a BIG opinion on their hands. An opinion that has some fictio-I mean “facts” that need to be checked. I’ll have you know that my mom was a stay at home mom for 12 years. My stay-at-home mom taught me manners, played with me, helped me, homeschooled me, protected me, and most of all loved me. She was a stay-at-home mom until her and my dad divorced and she had to get a job. Of course though, I don’t expect you to listen to this little ol’ comment. Most ignorant people don’t. All I want to know is, what woman screwed you over to make you this hurtful, venomous, and mean.
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Cynical much Mr. Public?
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Hate is the product that the right wing sells and Joe Pubic is buying by the truckload. Always with the welfare cheat stories, living the high life in their tenement hovels, getting fat and lazy on all that delicious government cheese and bluish powdered milk, shame on them! The vast majority of welfare in this country goes to corporations and big business who have the money to pay politicians for their favors. Talk about whores!
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Great data! Thank you very much for it. It’s amazing how much complaining we hear about welfare costs that add up to nothing of our annual budget. We keep taking from the have nots just to give more to the uber rich.
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Gee, you sure do believe a lot of gibberish. Where exactly do you get these “facts?” I can’t find backup for any single one of your insane assertions. I mean, for example, Newt Gingrich fixed welfare, it’s 5 years lifetime max, so how exactly do these people you “know” about keep doing it for life? Would it change you opinion if you knew that most people receiving welfare are white? I’m positive it would, although I must admit you showed admirable restraint in not actually dropping the n-bomb.
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Dear Greg and Joe Public
OMG I am so tired of the ignorance. People rotate on and off the system when the economy contracts and expands. You are not seeing people on it for generations, you may however see people who are disabled collect through SSI or SSDI.
Also if people claim this is and should be a Christian nation- would Jesus condemn people like this or would he work with others to try to solve the problems? Either live up to that or shut up.
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Some of you are full of hate and ignorance.
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It’s not hate it’s the fact we have to provide for the lazy Americans of this country because they are too lazy to provide for themselves yet continue to have babies from different men all the time.
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Jose, I suppose the men had nothing to do with these babies you claim lazy people have? Jeez.
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I believe you missed the 300 Billion dollars in Welfare payments categorized into the Federal Budget under Health Care – Vendor Payments (Welfare). In addition, you’ve completely neglected State and Local government contributions to the less fortunate. While the Federal Government pays about 70% of National welfare benefits, States and local governments contribute the remaining 30% of all means tested welfare programs. Lets pretend that the Federal government only contributes an exact 300 billion dollars in Federal welfare programs. State and local governments combined contributions would be an additional $128 billion in additional moneys toward welfare programs.
You fault other people for their general look at the Federal Government’s “Welfare” category, but fall victim to the same mistake by ONLY looking at that category. Your analysis, like most, still deals with the large categories and does not delve into all of the Means-Tested welfare programs that come under almost every Federal budgetary category that exists.
I take no issue with aiding poor and low income families. However, the average household at the current poverty line within the United States owns a car and two TVs. Does this sound like the completely indigent? Additionally, while a recent study on Welfare recently showed that there is a great deal less fraud within the welfare system than believed, the issue of monetary distribution takes a huge hit when confronted with the numbers that are eaten by the government bureaucracy.
If the government decided to take it’s welfare expenditures and contract out Welfare programs to the private sector, my guess is that businesses holding those contracts would be able to turn a small profit, and help twice as many people as the Government currently aids. But, God forbid we allow businesses to turn a profit…
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How could businesses possibly turn a profit on providing ‘assistance’ to low-income households? In addition to making no sense at all, you just throw a blanket statement like it must be true, while you show nothing to support your argument.
There have been experiments in ‘privatization’ of government services. I can’t tell you the numbers, but I can definitely tell you what my experience has been. I’m a 12-year Child Support professional; a few years ago under PRWORA (which was Clinton’s by the way), the law changed to force states to create a ‘unified, statewide disbursement unit’ for processing Child Support payments.
The result??? Oh, ho…well, I can’t even tell you how many states I have notified that their SDU has processed an entire payment incorrectly…a ton of money & I work in a fairly small agency. The best answer I have ever received? Idaho…’so, what do you want us to do?’ when I advised they they posted a $2500 payment belonging to 20 people on one person’s account. ‘What do I want you to do? I want you to FIX it’…but in private contracts to these units, the first thing I learned is that these less-than-minimum wage employees get ‘paid’ by the item they process, and they get ‘unpaid’ for errors or payments that have to be corrected. Private industry at it’s finest.
Add to that the Prisons…privatized prisons have been operating for quite awhile now. They pay workers squat, very little benefits, but somehow they engender loyalty. They violate all types of civil rights, and in MN the courts are now passing laws based on lobbying by the ‘prison owners’ to make MORE CRIMES PUNISHABLE BY IMPRISONMENT. Private industry…meet the Dollar Knows No Ethic it Ever Abided.
Read about Florida’s private prison system; or the judges recently sentenced in PA private juvenile facilities. And THEN tell me how great it would be if we gave corporations, whose boards of directors have hearts that bleed dollars, MORE POWER over our lives. Get Real.
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I have to agree with much of what Joe Public says. I have relatives that fit that description perfectly. The truth hurts, but it must be said. I know people that get help from the church, government, etc. They will not work, therefore they don’t have medical insurance. As a result, they practically live at the ER (someone has to pay the bill.) I also know some people that get disability, but they can party 7 days per week and this is NO exaggeration. Politicians pander to these people, because that is how they get into office. There are not enough middle and upper class individuals left to put them into office. I believe this downward spiral is increasing exponetially. This isn’t about hate. It’s about reality.
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It gets tiring, hearing about people who “know someone on disability but party seven days a week,” which presumably implies that this is a healthy individual who does not need to be on disability, correct? And yet you stand by and do not report this matter of fraud to the authorities, instead using those people as an excuse to tear down the system which should rightfully be used for those with real problems. Don’t penalize those who need the system….start doing something legitimately and legally about those who are engaged in fraud. Be an activist for change that insures these programs work as intended, and benefit those who really do need it.
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Besides, isn’t it interesting that he notes that the person ‘doesn’t work’ so has no insurance & spends all their time in the emergency room. So…something IS wrong then??
Flawed logic, from the ‘I’m better than some ONE out there’ Tea Drunk Fools.
[...] Our Government spending programs in Corporate Welfare, NOT Social Welfare programs, have been undermining jobs and the ability to make a sustainable living for years. (2) [...]
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Well, let’s hope this does not ever approach the scenario in Greece or England at the moment- so many terrifying images of people injured or killed as they tried to defend their businesses and themselves at the hands of a mob ‘entitled’ to carry out hate and revenge on the ‘wealthy’ they seem to despise so deeply- honestly, there are people in this world who cannot provide for themselves, my sister has an incurable mental disorder and is one of them. Even she has a part time job though. Life has not been easy for us, but we won’t be out destroying things or carrying out these heinous acts on display recently. And certainly not out looting either.
The truth is taxes are high here, and we cannot afford to pay them- I do know a few state and local govt. workers though and no one in my family makes anywhere near what they do, with salaries extending up above 40k, this kind of scale is unknown to us- with school admin. and police over 100k. I cannot blame anyone for taking a job offered, but it does seem obvious that the state will take my mom’s house or anyone else’s for that matter, when you can’t keep up. I also do not have the privilege of the law being used as an enforcement tool for my neighbors to pay for what I do for a living. I have been on 30 hrs./wk for the past 2 years and just cannot afford this. I also do not see why my employer or anyone else ‘better off’ should be sent to pick up the tab either, if the discussion is going to be about rewarding destructive behavior.
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reformed lib, where did you get this misguided analysis of the underlying causes of the unrest in Greece or England?
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The state will take your house? Don’t you mean the bank?
[...] 4.) Most people in the US are not #WelfareQueens, as Reagan called them. Welfare spending (spending on the poor) is less than 6% of our annual $multi-trillion budget. Compare that to other spending programs. http://www.ourdime.us/102/budgetinfo/how-much-do-we-spend-on-welfare/ [...]
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I believe you are definitely mistaken on welfare spending. You are counting only the actual money, food, etc. that the poor receive; when you count the bureaucracy (funded by taxpayers) that it takes to administer that amount (with salaries, benefits, retirements, etc.), the figure was (about 2 years ago) was about 4 to 5 times that amount. Now it is exponentially exploding as the liberals desire to turn us into a socialist country by stealing enough of workers’ money to hand out and “equalize” people’s lives – that includes young girls who have found that the government pays you to have babies (and implicit in that is their vote for the party that consistently gives other people’s hard earned dollars to them) If this continues, soon we will all be in universal poverty because the government workers do not earn one dime that has not come from a taxpayer who works every day and tries to feed a family, fund a retirement, send children to college, etc, A government worker including Congress and the president and every cabinet appointee, is a “kept” person. They create no real jobs. If they run companies, it’s because they stole them from the people who built them, like Chavez did recently in Venezuela, and obama with his acquisition of a car company that had tried a mini-socialist exercise and couldn’t pay their bills. He took stock holder’s money and gave it to the union that had caused them to go bankrupt. The people who had invested for their retirements lost all of their savings, but obama got some more votes.
What you don’t understand is that there will be nothing awaiting the USA but universal poverty if capitalism is voted out. (Look online at some of the cement block apartments that contain families whose countries were corrupted by bureaucrats and others who were jealous of people who had earned money. Bureaucrats don’t know anything about creating or inventing or making money. They can only spend. Sooner or later they will run out of other people’s money.
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There is a lot of typical right-wing ranting and raving in this comment, but wanted to point out 2 important things.
First, you accused me of counting only the actual benefits. You are wrong. I counted every dime the federal government spends on benefits, it’s own administrative overhead, and vendor payments. So yes, it is true. We spend less than a quarter on the poor than we do on national security – even during the worst recession in a lifetime.
Second, your ranting and raving about America heading into socialism. If it is, why is it that income inequality is getting worse in this country? The gap between rich and poor has been increasing for over 30 years and is now at historic levels in the United States. One of the defining attributes of Marxist socialism is equalizing income distribution. And yet despite these two conflicting facts you think we are heading into some kind of socialist regime. I am against Marxism, but I don’t worry about it because we are not even close to getting there. We are way on the other side of that spectrum.
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To me poor people I feel would be better off dead, so we don’t have to pay for their keep.
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I meant to say lazy people, but lazy people also are poor until they find out they can get what they want for free as long as the fools that give it to them use our tax money.
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I’m trying to figure out how many of out tax dollars are spent paying for state employees health insurance. I know they make a contribution but wouldn’t we save a lot of tax dollars and put teachers as well as others back to work if we just provided all state employees (including the Governor) with medicaid (welfare). Welfare as far as I can determine costs much less per person vs the insurance companies that are making record profits.
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I believe you need to first look at Pentigon spending.. the cost of wars.. the cost of rebuilding the Iraq the Afganistan. How much is spent on State employees health insurance is governed by each state. Our state recently required a bigger contribution from state employees. BUT The object of the republicans is to pit one group against another.. The Government failed to protect our pensions for years then when retiress began retiring the companies called on the government or the courts to end their pension plans .. the government found most pensions were underfunded and took over the pension plans through PBGC (Pension Benefits Govenment Corp) So much of the pension money grafted is going to cover BIG BUSINESS’s underfunded Obligations… JUST LIKE bailing out the Banks only this has been going on for YEARS
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I cannot read any more of this … We middle American Seniors have to admit we have raised the most selfish – me first greedy hatred people this nation has ever known. I personally adore my family.. they have not become haters nor are they selfish.. but the generation that they were raised in who have such distain for the poor, such hatred for mexican americans.. or black… I am soooo sick of seeing them post online here.
Stay at home mothers were what this country was built on.. They instilled morals in their children, they taught them right from wrong. Where this nation went to hell is when all the mothers had to work to make a decent middle class income. The people who depend on assistance need to have laws such as Wisconsin… they have a lifetime of 2 years maximum assistance. But the exagerations above in the posts of Joe Public … there are every kind of people in this world.. some may be cheating the system but overall I respect those people more than I respect the people who condemn them. Maybe your mama should have stayed home and raised you right…
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Stay at home moms? Maybe a very long time ago. However women wanted to be equal as a man as many women liberals. I some women wanting more rights than a man.. You ask how so? well lets look at the facts. Women stayed at home yes, many years ago while the husband / father went to work. Now fast forward to the present time, roles have changed. Men now clean the house, take care of the kids and make dinner. Ummm did women learn the role of a man. I think not. Do women go and work outside like a man, nope, women usually tend to get those inside aircondition jobs. While men have more on their plate than women do, men just take it. Umm need more info? Sure, how about the laws in divorce. Divorce now a days is corrupted because it supports and favors the women side. Do the kids go to the better parent? Absolutely not, kids go to the mother even if the mother cant even afford to feed herself. What do men get, the bills and child support payments. Child support is another government fail law because as we all know, most child support money isnt spent on the kids. Yes , yes most will complain it cost money to keep the roof over his head. But then again, why does a parent who recieves child support charge their own child for bills?
Read enough on how fair it is, well lets get back on topic. Our government supports welfare dead beat parents to not work. Just a few months ago, i saw on the news that their were 5 generations from grandma down the line who never worked their entire life. And as we know now a days women are having kids from different guys. Lets say 1 women 3 different kids from different dads. thats 20% from each guy while she lives free and preg from next boy friend. wow this is so amazing i thought prositution was illegal. But some how the working class is paying for it. Lets support the women who like having money but frown on responsibility. I have a friend who is a social worker. She told me of a girl with 20 kids most from different dads and wants another baby.
Now from what i see not only are women abusing the welfare system, but my other friend went to the social security office to retire. Guess what he saw. A bunch of welfare dead beat moms trying to get disability for themselves and their kids. This is just amazing. What else can they get free. I know one thing. I have worked since i was 15 years old and I still work.
Doubt me in anything I say… easy way to prove my evidence. Go past any project in your city and see how many women with different kids are walking around.
Then count how many tatoos and rings / jewelry they have on.
Then go look at the vehical they are driving with those huge 26″ chrome rims.
I never knew welfare was a carreer.
I dont care if you believe me, if you dont. Open your eyes wider. And yes its true, our government doesnt want to help the elder class. My grandmother asked for help, she was only given 20 dollars for food stamps. The only time in her life she asked for help. She was laughed at.
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What about disability, so many poor people take advantage of this and this was not included in your budget break down.
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To get disability you have to be… disabled. Being poor is no qualifier. It is impossible to know how many of them are poor, middle class, or wealthy. Disability insurance doesn’t track that because it’s something everyone is eligible for if they become disabled, regardless of income.
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Being poor ( qualifies you ) for SSI, so these people never worked a day of their life and once they hit age 65 they can get SSI for being poor. I know because I know people that are poor and get SSI and I tell them it’s not right, but to them it’s okay.
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Maybe it would help some by addressing the issue of welfare from a practicle stand point. Forget helping people if you want. COnsider this though, there are all kinds of people. THe fact is, some will run into trouble at some point, and some will simply not work. No matter what. Sad but true.
In my view, one aspect of welfare as a good investment, is to keep the level of crime and poverty down. How much do you think we would spend if the crime rate rose?
What kind of country would we be with streets packed with indigent people and prisons twice the size?
People ought to do this, and people ought to do that.
But some won’t.
Fact of life.
I’m getting old. I’m over “judgement”.
Practicle solutions are the best.
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”. Mohandas Gandhi said, “I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”
I never heard that one before. I like it.
It’s easy to hate. I think if I wasn’t myself disabled and receiving benefits I would hate. I also wouldn’t have known the situation fully. And deep down I would have realized I didn’t really know these people but I’d hate them anyway. I’d hate them for having needs and for being weak. I’d think those that are weak and can’t take care of themselves shouldn’t live. But I’ve walked in my own shoes and seen the injustice given to anyone different. Ive tried to make it and was laughed out of school and the workplace. And so I know in cases like mine it’s a wider problem. I can’t work if nobody wants to put up with me. And there is no reason a person can’t have more patience. I would work if I was born Amish because within my abilities I could still have some dignity. The state of the world today-we differently abled just don’t fit in and are spit on when we expose ourselves to the mainstream. It’s ugly and cruel. Maybe some of you who hate having to support us would appreciate seeing one of us at least trying even if it takes us a little longer to catch on or to get things done. But there are many younger ones who act like they would rather we get out of the way and just stay home. They are idiots yes. Indeed they are. But that is the world for you..full of hatred.
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I am a 25 year old man working 50 + hours per week just to make ends meet. Meanwhile you have joe scum bag who get welfare, rent assistance, heat/cooling assistance, food stamps, state health insurance, money for having kids, prepaid cell phone, and if you have a number of kids expect a tax return of around 6-10 thousand dollars come tax season. Now lets back track to me I have to work alot of hours to pay for my rent, heat/cooling, food, health insurance, car insurance, etc..
In 2010 I paid in 10 thousand dollars in taxes i got back 1600.
Somehow joe scum bag paid in 0 dollars and gets back thousands.
This country and our systems where built around the fact that everyone contributes its hard to not raise taxes when only 49% of people actually pay them. The free ride has to end I can understand that everyone goes through tough times and needs help from time to time. But to milk the system in one way or another for your whole life is wrong. People need to stop having kids that they cant afford why are you going to have five kids when you are on welfare or have no source of income Because the goverment will pay for them the only problem is that those five kids are going to turn out just like their parents uneducated and poor living of the system. If you dont pay taxes for 10 years you should be kicked out of this country how are we suppose to make this the America it used to be if we are taking care of millions of useless people. And FYI for all you people who are blind a great deal of these people who are getting food stamps are selling them for 50 cents on the dollar i get approached by people often when at my local food pantry. Why should everyone else have to work their lives away to get by while joe scum bag gets to do what ever he wants all day while the goverment pays all of his bills. WAKE UP and see whats actually going down
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The Government doesn’t care because our tax money pays for these people to live better then the people supporting them. If we were given the chance to stop welfare by voting to keep it or not then it would be a thing of the past since we would vote to stop welfare once and for all.
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Well said Beamen…… I see what you speak of on a daily basis. The free cell phone thing is absurd. whats really sad about it is that its private companies who are receiving the money to be able to offer these “free phones”. I go to many, many, housing projects 5 days a week, and I speak to many of the tenants. I cant give you an exact number but, the only ones that seem to be working that live there are the boyfriends,kids, grand kids, friends, baby-daddy’s, etc. And the only reason they stay there is for the free housing. But sadly, It will take more than reporting this crap to “The proper authorities” to make it stop. Just for thought….. responding to a post that I read a few minutes ago in here… “there are more whites on welfare than blacks” … well thats true by ONE percent but relatively speaking as far as population ….there are roughly 5 million americans on welfare…37% black….38% white … Approx. 42 million black people are in america… appox. 197 million white. more than 4% of black americans are on welfare and less than 1% of white americans are on welfare. Thats where joe public got his hate-full prejudice from. color doesn’t matter but the waste of tax $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ does
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just face it… the american dream is a nightmare… not one of you here is happy.. you are all so defensive and offensive that you make an incredibly sore show of what humanity should be.
and to think, this american dream is infecting much of the planet.
the way the american govt behaves with regards to foreign policy, and war, is exactly the way you are all behaving now.
how, can your govt defends its actions in trying to fix other nations, when it is as a screwed a placed as you will find.
with regards to welfare, if your govt stopped spending gazillions on war, armaments, and kickbacks to big business, there would be plenty of money to go round for every one. with the amount of money spent on war, every single person in the u.s. could eat for free, and be homed securely for free.
you could have a good nation.
the irony is, i am now displaying the same characteristics as you, by, having a shot at you all…
shit, i must be infected too.
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@nielly, pay no mind 2 Manis,…his children probably aren’t going hungry. That’s assuming anyone would breed with such an irrelevant man. His conscience would be guilty if he had one and from what I have gathered he’s about to be unemployed and homeless. See how that works Manis? Anybody can pretend to be psychic on the internet.
@”just a mom”,…God bless you and your family. That was a heartwarming and poignant piece.
There’s a lot of hate in the opinions left here and each one has selfishness at it’s core. Fear and greed drive a lot of people. Believing there is not enough to go around makes people hate the ones getting a “free lunch”. If you think those “free lunches” aren’t paid for in hardships then you’re sadly mistaken and don’t know how life works. There is more than enough to go around. Ask the farmers who still get subsidies even though their crops are profitable. Ask General Electric who made $14 billion in profits and paid no taxes. And then there’s Wall Street and the Banking industry that received billions in bailout. Those “people” become dependent on your tax dollars too. “They” don’t want to stop getting the handouts. And now that corporations are “people”,(thank you Supreme Court),…we can have a President sponsored by Coca~Cola. Now Coca~Cola can pay the President and Congress to pass laws saying Coca~Cola will always get subsidies and never have to pay taxes. But don’t expect it to stop there. It won’t be enough for the greedy or the ridiculously wealthy. They will want more. Just like those greedy starving children ,…always wanting something to eat.
@ellis dee,….you’re right. If we stopped spending money on war and “bridges to nowhere” and government offices out in the middle of nowhere with computers still sitting in their boxes unused,… we could feed and house all Americans. There is so much government waste it’s not funny. Remember when VP Al Gore made a point of cutting red tape so staplers didn’t cost $400.00 by the time they were delivered,…or was that the toilet seat? Ridiculous either way. And yes, hatred/fear is infectious.
@MRCano,…the pie charts are self-explanatory,…look closer.
@Joe Public, JoSe, willie beamen and deliveryguy,…if you think these people are so well off why don’t you quit your jobs and join them. The government will pay for all your desires right? Do you think that nobody hiring uneducated black people might have something to do with them making up the greater percentage of people on welfare? You hate them. I doubt,…no, I know you wouldn’t give them a job. I’m pretty sure you would like JoSe‘s resolution,(better off dead than us paying for them), to be explored. JoSe,…you could find yourself in such need before you know it. I’m sure you’ll do the right thing. ;D
I’d like to know how many of the haters commenting on this board consider themselves “Christians”. Mohandas Gandhi said, “I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” Remember “You will know them by their love”. Do you really think these people on welfare and food stamps are truly happy? Because if you do then you don’t know what happiness is.
My apologies for the rant but our poor on welfare are not the problem. Our priorities are. In Texas we pay for our Governor,(Rick Perry), to stay in a $10,000 a month mansion since the “Governors Mansion” was Molotov-ed back in June of 2008. No one was injured because the mansion was already being refurbished for $10 million so no one was staying there at the time. If they finish restoring the mansion on time it will be completed in just under 4 years at a cost of over $25 million. We also just had a mother shoot her 10 year old son and 12 year old daughter before killing herself because she was denied food stamps. Of course she chose the wrong way out but,…compare the two expenditures. Millions to repair the Governor’s Mansion versus food stamps for a mother and her two kids. Priorities.
@Dustin,…lol@”parking lot turkeys” Thank you for the laugh. I’ve been having trouble finding that parking lot myself.
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People will always be lazy and, if the parents are lazy their children as they become adults too will follow their example. I only feel we as tax payers have to feed our children and children we had no part in breeding, but these days most women don’t use their brains anymore, when it comes to deciding their future with someone that will provide for them instead of us paying their way. You may think it’s fine to support them, but in my book they have to do something other then just having sex and breeding children they will never be able to support on their own. We never had to resort to begging for help to feed our children because I worked and provided for my family as every man should do, if they decide to get married and have a family.
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Oh, by the way I’m an Atheist, but work to provide for my family and I don’t care; if people pray since it’s a free country. I am not like the other Atheists that feel they have the right to stop prayer.
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I’m a 32 year old Portuguese citizen who has been living in this great country since 1988. We (Mother/Brother) moved here on a trip visa and stayed. My Mother lived her young life at the hands of my abusive father and that’s what prompted my Mother to move here and meet someone who eventually was my stepfather. My Mother worked her butt off cleaning peoples homes and offices for cash. Many times I remember her coming home late crying because someone did not want to pay her because they knew the situation she was in. Eventually, my mom worked and saved her money and we eventually got our green cards. I remember her crying all the way to the immigration office because she knew that she had made it. Mom always said and to this day still say’s “if you have 2 legs and 2 arms then your ass can work”.
I have been working for a highway surveying company for 11 years now. But, before that I started working 1 week after my 16th birthday flipping burgers. Did I mind? No, because my mom taught me better.
Me or my family have never taken any government money, ever. I heard recently that foreigners taking in all this government assistance. Maybe that’s true in another state but not here in Florida. Now for my point, we moved here with nothing and worked our way to manage a decent living. Why in the world we have a bunch of lazy people in this country stealing from everyone else who works for what they have. Like the saying goes ” give a man a fish, and he will eat for a day. Teach a man how to fish and he’ll eat for a lifetime”. Well, me and millions of working people are tired of feeding fish to people who can’t go out there and do their own damn fishing. It’s a damn shame knowing that when I wake up at 4:30am and drive to my office 40 miles away and get home at 6pm that millions of people don’t even have to leave their home and still get paid. The government is on the same level as welfare thieves! You steal from the working class and pay the lazy class. You (government) are the middle man in this shady deal and for what, votes? You steal our money and do whatever you want with it. All we are to you is just another social security number. 18 trillion in debt and we have millionaires in office. Huh, I guess they worked hard all they’re lives! Example: Mr. Newt Gingrich taking in over 1 million dollars from Fannie Mae for what? These government thieves won’t ever have to worry about a thing because we pay them too. As long as there’s welfare, they’ll have their vote to stay in power.
I’m 32 and my girlfriend is 28 and we have a house, cars, and money because we work. We have no kids and won’t have any until we pay off cars. That is called being responsible! For those who read this and work hard for what they have, I congratulate you. We tryed!!! Now I must get to work.
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some of you are really ignorant. you take it for granted if you have the short term memory to remember an order or instructions, of enough motor ability to type more then 30 wpm or drive a stick or enough perception to sculpt a nail or even put mustard on a sandwich fast enough for your employer, yet neat enough not to splat it all over. Being able to do something isn’t enough. You have to be fast. You have to be accurate more then 70%. You look at me and say I can work. If I can type I can work. If I can spell I can work. You didn’t see how long it took me to type this. You are ignorant and hateful and you are just mad because I gladly take money out of your hateful little pockets because when I was in school trying my very hardest you were laughing at pointing and calling me “retard”. It’s just not as funny now.
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So, all this is pointless. N just what the one percent and corporate America wants and laughs hysterically at. Welfare, homosexuals and abortion has been used to upset people since the MASTER LIAR Ronald Reagan. Get people all stirred up so they dont know we are gonna steal everything. If you dont stand against the Bush tax cuts and Corporate welfare…America is gonna be so broke and so broken…It will be the latest empire to fall. Like the Roman, the Ottoman and all the others. Ya, the welfare program isnt perfect. Do you believe Cheny giving his own company no bid contracts is ethical?????????? Stop bitching about this n do something about the aids virus that is killing our country—the 1%using lobbyists n bribes to steal money n ship jobs to slave labor in other countries. U r being so ridiculous!!! Our hair is on fire.
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This “welfare” chart should be shown next to a chart that shows the amount of our tax dollars that subsidize the rich corporations and rich people. All the people who complain about some poor people taking advantage of the “system” should redirect their anger at the wealthy corporations and wealthy people who are taking advantage of the “system” and the poorer taxpayers. The amount of welfare received by the rich is well beyond that received by the poor.
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For a greedy government welfare is the biggest Jobs program and voter guarantee of all. It appears that of every $100 robbed from the taxpayer to pay for welfare, only $30 actually goes to the needy, while $70 pays for the bureaucracy that administers it!
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pcuvie, try this: http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2011/11/13/366988/over-half-of-all-us-tax-subsidies-go-to-four-industries-guess-which-ones/
Comments sections has accounts of corporate subsidy “fraud” examples.
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We are not judged by our works. Look at the lilies of the field. The fowls of the air. Faith in God seems at odds with the idea that everyone should be in servitude. Don’t we work just so we can live comfortably and retire with dignity? Spend 1/3 of your day away from your family, your garden, your chores? A wise society should have figured how we can all help this Kingdom come on earth. You know. Like it is in heaven. You’ve have said it. Don’t you mean it?
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The abuse happens because we allow it! Our government is probably most at fault because the same people they’ve hired to regulate the system are much like the recipients.
It boils down to the government would need to shift funding from the system to enforce the frauds. All recipients of welfare and section 8 housing should have to pass monthly drug screenings. Let’s make them do community service to pay for there own drug screening. Let’s make it a felony to have an illegitimate child. Jail them or neuter them who breed irresponsibly. Let’s not allow them to abuse the system. It’s simple!
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We should get rid of welfare and give it to those really need it. Not to these lazy ghetto mother. (Criminal Breeders)
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I am tryig to buy cheap foreclosures and fix them up and rent / sell them on payments because noone can get bank financing. I have a well established Constuction business that has slowed to the point of living off our savings. Every few day I will get a call, about every 10th call, from somebody drawing SSI that wants to buy a house. No problem in that although that seems to be A LOT of people on SSI. The problem is when they offer to clean, rip out carpet and REPLACE roofs but . . . “I have to be paid cash so it don’t mess up my checks”. Pisses me off. I am glad we have the social safety net programs. I am sad they are abused so much. I dont think they should vote, it is a conflict of interest. They shoud by drug screened. They should be visited and held accountable as much as possible. They should be limited on their valuables, jewelry, vehicles, x boxes with games at $60 a piece, boats, motor homes, four wheelers. Every few days
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I find amusing that people are pointing out all the welfare fraud as if us upstanding middle class folks are footing the bill. Last. I looked a bunch of us were working hard to cheat the govt out of everything we could. When was the last time you bought something online from out of state and did not bother paying your state sales tax on it?
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You guys should take a step back and look at whats being said here. All this bickering is about something that’s supposed to help people…But I don’t see a single person screaming about the 800 billion a year the military uses, and its purpose is to hurt people and worse..
And lets not forget it was the military who supposedly “LOST” 3 trillion dollars and has no idea where it went. And to this very day still has not been able to account for it…How does any misplace a trillion dollars much less 3 trillion?
31688 years 32 days 1 hour 46 minutes 40 seconds.
That’s how long it would take you to count to a trillion.
Arguing things like this keeps you from focusing on the real issues. And by doing that you are doing exactly what the ruling class wants you to do.
And guess what?? They are the only ones who benefit from this as well, because no one else does.
[...] deductions between the years 2006-2009. Who’s welfare funds are pulling down this country? The welfare of the poor at $80 million dollars, or the millionaire’s welfare. This was only a small sampling of the wealth given in tax [...]
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i have big family 4 childrens old my mohter and father my house of rant no have big income child going school fees problems i am realy very thankful god bless usa. my account no 100-9118-6 ubl bank karachi pakistan
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I think the biggest problem is that this 191 billion is not that large a line item. we spend more money keeping the military running. I think we need to trim the large and set up new priorities.
Like how can we prevent people from getting into a situation that requires them to get welfare. once in welfare how can we get them out as soon as possible. These are the things we should do. No-one should be a life long welfare recipient unless they are disabled.
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helloo thats what the money is really for (military )thats for the most part is what the goverment is for .
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i pissed im tired of paying for other pepole problems cant aford kids , dont have them .hello commencents here knock knock . lazzy pepole to . this is were i’d like to call the cops , make a report of theft . steal from me for other pepole’s problems . and then they get a big tax return back . helloo you have to pay in to get a return . i pay in and then pay in some more for just being well not for shour anymore who is the smarter one . back in the day this pepole were trash . now ther rewarded . i think if they get my money they should have to work for the city for free . a few days a week
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First, I studied the 1996 welfare reform act in a Ph.D. program. The typical welfare recipient is a white divorcee with about 2.4 children. However, the typical view of the welfare recipient is much like those here among these comments. How much jewelry someone wears is cultural, not financial. Poor nomadic Romani in Europe wear jewelry. It’s their custom. Most welfare recipients don’t live in housing projects. So that’s not a representative population if you are inclined toward judgments of the people some would see as “trapped” in such housing. Some recipients of food aid are like me. I’m now 68 years old, white (well, 1/16th Cherokee maybe). As a retired community college professor, my employing college did not pay into social security. Period. So, my social security is based on office jobs I had long ago at lower wages. I now live on $775/month social security. As a young college student, I had to work. I was so poor, in fact, that I began working as a grocery checker my freshman year, worked 30 hours a week my sophomore year, and when that proved unsustainable, dropped out after that to work full-time in offices for the next ten years until I felt secure enough to seek my first degree.
I was able to get that degree because of work-study programs that allowed me to work on campus where I was more likely to focus on my studies.
With the help of work study, loans and grants, I graduated with honors. Now, again, students are in peril. Many of my students have had to work 2-3 jobs just to maintain their existence and study. Many are now being priced out even of a community college education as we increasingly do not provide assistance to those who need it.
I believe democracy depends on an educated populace. Therefore, democracy itself is in peril in these times, not just the economy.
Most charts will show that welfare spending at the federal level is half of defense spending (12 and 24%, respectively). However, what’s spent on the actual poor is less. See: ourdime.us/102/budgetinfo/how-much-do-we-spend-on-welfare/
Until you are actually in other people’s shoes, it’s very hard to judge others. There for but the grace of God go you!
I rose above my past as best I could. I was both a poor child and an abused child. I also had an inherited 6-year long illness (abscessed sweat glands) culminating in major surgery, offered as charity, at age 19 which involved a month in the hospital, 2 major surgeries, and one near-death event.
Yet, some of you assume I’m in need now because I didn’t work hard or smart enough. I taught your children or you in college. I was a secretary to deans of colleges and to chambers of commerce. In fact, I contributed much to my community and still do. I still actively volunteer in my community and for my political causes. I’m not defeated, or lazy. I’m a survivor and stronger than people who’ve never suffered.
And I’m just poor. It’s not a failing. It’s a condition and a circumstance. Often caused in part by the economy or policies, including those that result in a transfer of wealth out of the lower and middle class groups into higher brackets.
You know, people in the 1930s wanted to blame themselves for their poverty when it was a world-wide phenomenon experienced at a local level. Some committed suicide, in fact, much as a Greek man did recently.
As to welfare fraud, well, it’s mostly not needy individuals themselves committing fraud, but entities that are supposed to be serving them or “vendors” as they are called. These opportunistic groups may take advantage of the poor in a very “entrepreneurial” move to grasp their aid for themselves. Even so, it’s not “rampant” as people may think. And it’s both discovered and prosecuted.
Those who take advantage of the poor are unlike those who gutted middle class incomes and pensions through speculation on the markets, bringing the entire world down economically just before 2008. Yes, the world. Americans don’t see how their lives affect lives in other countries. I do because I wss in Europe in 2008 and, believe me, Europeans understand the origin of these events in unregulated banking and other investment group’s speculative activity. In fact, Europe is still reeling as a result.
Don’t forget where it started. We have ourselves and trickle down economics to thank for the unregulated environment in which such investments occurred. Yet, Republicans and, of course, banking interests want more de-regulation. As if this wasn’t the problem in the first place. Read all about it in many books on the 2008 financial crisis.
For welfare issues and argumetns, there’s a fine book by a Harvard professor. It’s about the typical arguments used against welfare for the poor. There are a number of arguments that have been used ever since the 1860s poor laws in England to try to say that we should not help the poor, because it hurts them actually (that’s called “the argument of perversity”). The book is by Albert O. Hirschman. It’s called The Rhetoric of Reaction. The same or similar arguments–perversity (helping hurts), futility (the poor will always be poor), jeopardy (costs too high) have been used against democracy as well.
Don’t be fooled by these arguments. They mask a massive transfer of wealth from the middle class, gutting it really, to the wealthy. It’s not welfare that’s making you poorer (you may need some of the same benefits if something happens to you or your job in the future) but the pooling of wealth in concentrations where it no longer serves the interests of holders to use it to move the economy. Instead, it’s hoarded as a static bulwark against fear–fear of loss of wealth but also of legitimation in a society increasingly unlike the protected wealthy. If you are not the 1%, you should be standing with all those who are poor, because your interests are not with the 1% and the 1% knows that, but tries to convince you otherwise using the above arguments.
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Here’s a site with some myths about the poor:
http://www.anitra.net/homelessness/columns/anitra/eightmyths.html
–Anitra L. Freeman at anitra dot net under homelessness slash columns slash anitra slash eightmyths dot html
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Too bad this article doesn’t include medicade costs for some reason.yet it wil include unemployment. If out included medicade which costs roughly 680 billion a year, it would double his estimate what percent entitlement programs are of our gdp to a value of over 25 percent. Idk about you guys but thats a pretty substantial burdon put on tax payers.
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For those worried re Medicaid, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, which the Washington Post calls the most fair and smartest policy think tank in D.C. today, breaks the budget percentages down as follows:
http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=1258
New provisions for Medicaid as it relates to state and local governments (including many benefits):
http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=3161
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wow some of you are so dumb im shocked if you even went to school. your worried about the poor taking a fraction of your check yet you know nothing about how much the rich steal and lie and cheat and take your checks. Educate yourselves please cause your looking like morons. In fact maybe you should look into what the federal reserve does that isnt even owned by the government but by private bankers. So how they lie and cheat and steal your money then come back and have a decent conversation. Those who are bitching about the poor have never even been poor and dont know what it is like to not be able to feed your self much less your kids, kid i might add you had while you had a decent job and then lost because of the recession and since most jobs are now shipped over seas where are people suppose to work??? Do they need to leave the country just to keep their jobs, which we know they wont get paid for on a decent salary.
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My last post meant to be reply to original post by Jan. Read Vaclev Havel’s “The Power of the Powerles”: http://www.hannaharendtcenter.org/?page_id=3640
It has a message for America. In my year in China, I saw how communists were very like the ultra-right in America. They were ntent on controlling people (the poor, women, etc.) and using them, not meeting their needs for opportunity and freedom.
Inhabit your freedom, folks. Defy the increasing loss of our civil liberties since 9/11, an erosion begun by George Bush and continuing today. Once lost, they are pretty much gone forever. It’s not just about one civil liberty–4th amendment say–but all of them, including freedom of speech, freedom from illegal search and seizure, etc., the right to a trial by a jury of peers, etc.
Freedom is not about conformity to any ideology–center, right or left. If government takes away your liberties; if government does not produce a climate to promote jobs, continues to support the wealthy in misguided, never-yet-productive-of-jobs supply side economics, continues unreasonable tax breaks favoring wealth and corporate interests and progressively moving wealth away from the middle class and into the 1%, then stand up for your real interests.
Your real interests may be parity and fairness in taxation, fairness of opportunity, a minimum social support system including education and wellness, ensuring the pursuits of life, liberty and happiness as our founders intended, and the reclaiming of Constitutional guarantees of civil liberties.
Inhabit your freedom! This is possible at any economic level.
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Job creation since Truman:
http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2009/01/09/bush-on-jobs-the-worst-track-record-on-record/tab/print/
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Why is it when a WORKING TAX PAYING CITIZEN can’t kick out more babies, needs help from the welfare system but is told to go to hell? But yet we pay women to sleep with their legs open kicking out babies one a year and we pay them for it, plus FREE medical? The kids goes to school, she stays home all day…she should be forced to go to work, tell the state who the father, is the state goes after his tax return. Why is the tax payers always being screwed over, maybe I should figure out a way to do this, since I have paid into it for 35 years, I do not have medical, I had to pay but I do not have medical now. All she has to do is kick out kids…amazing isn’t it?
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Despite all the hate, I decided to respond to this comment since it has the most nonsense in it:
75% of all people on government assistance have a full or part time job that doesn’t come close to paying the bills.
“Welfare” or TANF – as it’s actually called – is limited to 5 years TOTAL. So, if you’re a single mother with a newborn on TANF, you have only until your child is in Kindergarten to find a job. Thankfully, they have until kindergarten because low-wage work isn’t enough to even cover the costs of daycare.
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People on welfare on losers that made poor choices that society now has to pay for. Case closed.
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people on welfare have failed in life ( im not talking about kids who are still growing up but their parents) get out and get a job ans stop taking the governments money its that simple you had the chance to better your self through education but yet you slacked off and it shows society shouldn’t have to pay for your mistakes!
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There are 4 times the number of unemployed people as there are job openings. Maybe “get a job” isn’t as easy as it sounds.
Plus, as stated above, most people on government assistance already have a working parent – it’s just low wage work.
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One thing is for sure, all of you ranting about lazy people living large on welfare, have never had the “pleasure” You really cannot live on what TANF ( tempory assistance to needy families) and food stamps give you. The waiting lists for subsisdized housing is years long. I gaurantee you people getting assistance are struggling. I can also gaurantee you that if our government stopped giving a cent to anybody recieving welfare it would not lessen your tax burden or improve your finances one little bit. You my friends are being raped by the rich not the poor. But it easy to hate the poor, becouse we don’t want to join them, and we all seem to harbor fantasies that we will one day be rich. It’s time to wake up and smell the coffee, you’ve got a whole lot better chance of becoming poor (even working 2 and 3 jobs) than you do of becoming rich. Now who do you suspose is resonsible for that?