Posted on 06/25/2012 12:01:45 PM PDT by Hunton Peck
But the greatest toll of government welfare is not the money spent, but what it does to the spirit of those who become dependent on it, including the bureaucrats who administer it.
I read somewhere back in the nineties that European poverty levels had remained the same even after 60 years of socialism...................
I'm not sure it is possible to completely rid a human of the satisfaction of a hard day's work, but the government is trying its best. All of this to build a permanent constituency of Democrat voters.
Poverty is only a state of mind.
Just keep increasing the spending till the next 5 generations owe 100% of their labor to pay it off.
Once we’re all completely ruined the poor won’t Feel so impoverished because everyone will have the same life full of poverty.
What tools do you think the govt should or could provide that they do not already?
Your premise is flawed.
hint...it ain’t about “poverty” ...its about the “poverty industry” .....which is about as useful and productive as the “green energy” industry...and the “global warming scam industry”
The flim-flam “war on poverty” was one of the first and most successful of the scam industries. It inspired a lot of wanna-be knockoffs leading to a Federal gov’mt that is increasingly less Federal and governed.
“You can have power over people as long as you don’t take everything away from them. But when you’ve robbed a man of everything, he’s no longer in you power.”
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
I don’t think it will take 5 generations... not the way we’re being robbed right now
No, it won’t take us another actual 5 generations of continuing like this.
What I meant was once we’ve already sold out the next 5 generations, which at the current rate ought to be sometime around next tuesday.
“LBJ declared war on poverty, and poverty won”
Government also has declared war on drugs and failed pretty miserably at that as well. Unless it is handicapped by politicians, our military does a pretty impressive job of fighting wars: our government, not so much. Think about the things that people complain about most these days: education, health care and government. Is it any coincidence that government is integrally involved in all three?
because throwing money at “poverty” only sustains it.
Duuuuh, ya think that might be because there's no incentive to get off welfare?
During February 2010, 1 in 8 Americans were enrolled for food stamps, an increase of 260,000. Since reaching 31.78 million in December 2008, enrollment in Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) has set a record each month. USDA estimates enrollment for fiscal year 2010, which ends Sept 30, is expected to average 40.5 million people, at a cost of up to $59 billion. Average enrollment for fiscal 2011 is predicted to be 43.3 million people. Reuters, Food-stamp tally nears 40 million, sets record, May 7, 2010
The USDA dedicated $5 million in 2011 to improve access to and increase participation in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program [SNAP] . http://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/2011/04/usda-spends-5-mil-to-recruit-food-stamp-recipients/
The Congressional Budget Office said Thursday that 45 million people in 2011 received SNAP benefits, a 70% increase from 2007. The CBO projected that one in seven U.S. residents received food stamps last year. http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2012/04/19/food-stamp-rolls-to-grow-through-2014-cbo-says/?mod=e2tw
2012. Around 5.3 percent of the population between the ages of 25 and 64 is currently collecting federal disability payments, a jump from 4.5 percent since the economy slid into a recession. Mental-illness claims, in particular, are surging. During the recent economic boom, only 33 percent of applicants were claiming mental illness, but that figure has jumped to 43 percent, says Rutledge, citing preliminary results from his latest research. NY. Post., Jobless disability claims soar to record $200B as of January, February 19, 2012,
In just the first four months of 2012, 539,000 joined the disability rolls and more than 725,000 put in applications. As a result, by April there were a total of 10.8 million people on disability, [SSI and SSDI?] according to Social Security Administration data, a 53% increase from a decade ago, after accounting for all those who've left the program (about 700,000 drop out each year, mainly because they reached retirement age or died). http://news.investors.com/article/608418/201204200802/ssdi-disability-rolls-skyrocket-under-obama.htm?p=full Also see http://www.akdart.com/poverty.html
A record 5.4 million workers and their dependents have signed up to collect federal disability checks since President Obama took office, according to the latest official government data, as discouraged workers increasingly give up looking for jobs and take advantage of the federal program. From June 2009, the number of new enrollees to Social Securitys disability insurance [SSDI, financed with Social Security taxes paid] program is twice the job growth figure. ^
SSDI now accounts for more than 16% of Social Security's budget and more than 15% of Medicare's (SSDI enrollees can qualify for Medicare after two years.) ^
The amount of money the federal government hands out in direct payments increased 32% during first three years of Mr. Obama's Presidency. http://patriotupdate.com/17823/food-stamps-up-45-federal-handouts-up-32
In 1988, there were 4.46 million SSI [Supplemental Security Income, financed through general revenues from taxes, meaning benefits are not based on your prior work history] recipients, 6 million in 1993 and in 2011 there were 8 million. http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-224.html; http://www.socialsecurity-disability.org/disability-benefits
The top 10 States with the highest percentage of non-poor residents of each state signed up for government assistance were Vermont, Mississippi, Maine, New York, Massachusetts, Alaska, Rhode Island, Hawaii, Connecticut, Arkansas. http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/the-moocher-index/
Much more
The way to treat poverty is to raise the level of average real wage rates by increasing the productivity of labor. This is done by increasing the division of labor, by capital accumulation, and by technological progress.Government intervention in the economy inhibits the institutions of capitalism which leads to inhibition of all three.
Bingo.
Save for a small percentage of true charity cases, it’s a matter of will.
Money is not value. Value is not money. Neither are durable.
“He who does not work, neither shall he eat.”
One must produce more value (wealth) than he consumes. If not, poverty ensues.
Money is just a convenient token representing value; acquiring it without trading for value produced does not end poverty, it just forestalls it - while that money gets routed back to those who do create value.
I can make a hamburger and sell it for $1.
Needing food and lacking $1, the gov’t could give you a dollar.
You give me the dollar, I give you the burger, I’m $1 richer, you’re satiated for a couple hours.
This doesn’t help your situation. A couple hours later, you’re hungry again and don’t have a dollar.
The feds could declare war on the problem, print a lot of dollars, even take a lot of dollars from me, but the problem remains. So long as I create things with inherent value, I’ll attract money; so long as you don’t, you won’t. Lots of currency gets injected into the system, existing currency gets devalued, producers get annoyed, and the non-producers remain poor.
Go figure.
After Katrina residents of the area were given $2,000 gubment money cards. One guy came back to an area shelter with a flat screen TV (about the full two grand back then). “Whete you gonna put that??”
The poor you will have with you always.
What the government taxes it gets less of. What the government subsidizes it gets more of. We need to quit subsidizing poverty and start taxing it.
So weary of this. Just beyond weary.
Stop these programs. Tomorrow. Not one more dime. No more checks, no more, no more.
It would fix itself in a hurry, one way or another. Baby daddies would have to move back in with the baby mamas ...sort of like the rest of us, you know? Or they’d have to face the consequences.
We need to allow consequences, or responsibility. Nothing in between.
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