The World Beyond BetterMost > Anything Goes
Why are the poor, poor?
Luvlylittlewing:
--- Quote from: broketrash on April 30, 2008, 12:50:32 am ---they are certainly a back up plan to get more welfare and WIC benefits.
--- End quote ---
Those welfare and wic benefits don't pay for much, and they are only allowed a few years to collect those benefits and it is off to work or else.
delalluvia:
--- Quote from: broketrash on April 30, 2008, 12:50:32 am ---they are certainly a back up plan to get more welfare and WIC benefits.
--- End quote ---
Good thing, eh? The economic world certainly won't take care of them.
Nothing to say about the rest of the post? OK.
You need to hang around more poor people. They have families. Why do you think you see these great big families living in one house or apartment? Granny can't pay for her own place and neither can the kids when they work full-time at McDonald's. What, did you think they were living like that because they liked each other's company?
Oh, and just try telling them that if they couldn't afford children then they shouldn't have had them and therefore deserve everything that happens to them and their children. That'll go over well.
A friend of mine had an ex-boyfriend who was marrying a woman - strange wedding. I met the man and his brother at the bachelor party - don't ask. The brother had a fiancee. A pregnant fiancee. She was currently living with her folks because they had had a fight where he slapped her. In the meantime, he hoped to win her back because he had a good job at the feed plant - making $8 an hour.
"That's good money, right?" I just stared at him.
These weren't your inner city stereotypical folk that you're thinking of broketrash. The man's brother had gone to college and gotten a degree in marketing. I kinda doubt the brother will ever be able to show me his stock options and portfolio. Not all the people who wind up on social programs are girls who couldn't keep their legs together.
delalluvia:
--- Quote from: injest on April 30, 2008, 01:27:21 am ---see it IS complicated. Which is why people try to reduce it down to a simple "Poor people are lazy and stupid and slutty". Makes it easier to feel superior and to not do anything about it.
I dont' like the 'cradle to grave' thing. I think it hurts more than it helps. But I also believe there are people on welfare that we need to support. I am unwilling to deny food to the elderly or the children.
We need concrete solutions and 'privitazation' of all social programs is not the complete answer.
--- End quote ---
It is complicated. But I do agree that 'cradle to grave' is excessive and yes, there is plenty of corruption in the system. Name a system that doesn't have problems.
I met a very nice woman once. She was divorced with two kids, working temp, hoping to get a full-time job. Her ex-husband lived back east with his new wife. You see, HE was the breadwinner in the family not HER. So, when they got divorced, she got the kids and the small child support payments from her ex- who wasn't making much money at the time of the divorce. By the time HE met his new wife, he'd gotten a better job and they could now buy a house together. Where did that leave his ex-wife and the kids? Living several states away, with no money to hire a lawyer to take him to court to increase her child support payments. So while he was constantly trying to get her to take less child support money so he could pay more on his house, their children were going without medical care - she couldn't afford it - when her girl needed glasses and her boy had asthma. She thought the national healthcare plan was a great idea. She could take her kids to the doctor. But I had to explain to her that many people thought her being unable to afford medical insurance was her own fault because she was poor and in this great country of ours, with all the opportunities for getting ahead, being poor was a personal failing and if her boy died from an asthma attack because she couldn't afford treatment, well, it was just too bad. :P
Clyde-B:
--- Quote from: injest on April 30, 2008, 01:24:31 am ---around here you are considered to have a 'good' job if you can draw in $8-10 an hour. Good luck finding more.
yet they are only building megamansions. Who are buying these homes? and where are the $8-10 crowd supposed to live?
--- End quote ---
This is a good point. You can't get ahead, you can't save if you barely have enough money coming in to meet expenses.
We may, (and I'm doubtful here) have equal opportunity in this country, but people don't all have equal abilities. I hear a lot of people that sound like they are saying that it's perfectly alright to deny a decent wage to someone who is unskilled, even though they do jobs that no one else is willing to do .
At the same time, those same people who are denying decent wages to workers are grabbing money with both hands and doing less work for it every year.
Meanwhile the people in the middle keep silent hoping to eventually earn membership in the grabbing with both hands crowd.
Big business is notorious for being fuelled by greed. That's why labor unions came into being. That's why the minimum wage was created. That's why they have armys of lawyers to protect themselves from each other. And they think nothing of taking advantage of the unfortunate, the uneducated, or the unsophisticated. They speak as though equal opportunity somehow puts us on an equal playing field. It doesn't matter that they have more knowledge. It doesn't matter they have more experience. It doesn't matter that they have more power. It doesn't matter that their winning could destroy their opponent, while their losing would be a mild inconvenience to themselves. They have to win.
The U. S. is one of the few countries where the rich have actually been able to convince many average people to trust them.
brokeplex:
--- Quote from: Littlewing on April 30, 2008, 12:56:00 am ---Those welfare and wic benefits don't pay for much, and they are only allowed a few years to collect those benefits and it is off to work or else.
--- End quote ---
one of the positive benefits that occured at both the state and federal levels in the 1990's is workfare. It is good that there is a time limit on claims cases. But, any change in "status" causes a welfare claim to be reevalutated. So, have yet another child without a father to support it, and bingo - Vanna White turned the wheel and you get a prize!
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