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Report: Enough Spent on Welfare Programs in 2011 to Write Every Poor Household a $59,523 Check
CNS News ^ | October 30, 2012 | Matt Cover

Posted on 10/30/2012 1:00:42 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet

The federal government spent enough money on federal means-tested welfare programs to have sent each impoverished household a check for nearly $60,000, according to figures from the Census Bureau and the Congressional Research Service (CRS).

According to a report from the CRS produced for Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), $1 trillion was spent on federal welfare programs during fiscal year 2011 – with $746 billion in federal funds and $254 in state matching funds.

The U.S. Census Bureau reported that there were approximately 16.8 million households living below the federal poverty level of $23,000 per year for a family of four in 2011. ( See: 2011 Households Below Poverty 2011.pdf )

If each of the estimated 16.8 million households with income below the poverty level were to have received an equal share of the total welfare spending for fiscal year 2011, they each would have received $59,523.

If only the 2011 federal share of welfare spending (no state matching funds) were spent as direct cash payments, each household would have received $44,404, which is nearly double the federal poverty level for a family of four.

This federal welfare spending does not include programs such as Medicare and Social Security, because they are not means-tested programs. Means-tested programs are those that only pay out benefits to people whose incomes fall below a certain threshold, such as food stamps, traditional cash welfare, and Medicaid.

In other words, if the government were to discontinue its myriad federal welfare programs, such as housing vouchers, food stamps, and Medicaid, and instead just wrote every poor household a check, it would nearly quadruple their income: increasing it from at most $23,000 per year to nearly $83,000 per year.


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; Extended News; Government
KEYWORDS: congress; foodstamps; obama; welfare
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1 posted on 10/30/2012 1:00:42 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
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To: All


VOTE THE MARXIST OUT!

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2 posted on 10/30/2012 1:03:16 PM PDT by onyx (FREE REPUBLIC IS HERE TO STAY! DONATE MONTHLY! IF YOU WANT ON SARAH PALIN''S PING LIST, LET ME KNOW)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

If you were to give these households 50k each. They would never buy healthcare for themselves or anything like that. They would spend it on crap and still cry poverty.


3 posted on 10/30/2012 1:03:59 PM PDT by tshaun
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

According to one of the “Parkinson” Laws 70% of the money for welfare programs goes to the administrators and bureaucracy not the poor.

C. Northcott Parkinson was a sociologist who annunciated this and a couple of others. Expenditure rises to meet revenue for governments was another and I can’t remember the third.


4 posted on 10/30/2012 1:06:10 PM PDT by arrogantsob (The Disaster MUST Go. Sarah herself supports Romney.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

All of those SEIU gov’t employees would be hittin’ the bricks.


5 posted on 10/30/2012 1:06:10 PM PDT by Paladin2
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

After hearing Rush talk about this, I can’t think of a single more important story for the American people to be aware of.


6 posted on 10/30/2012 1:06:24 PM PDT by bigbob
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

They just keep pushing...


7 posted on 10/30/2012 1:12:23 PM PDT by SENTINEL (Romney is to Conservatism what Mormonism is to Christianity.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

I’ll make them a deal.

Go ahead and write those checks then shut the department down for good.


8 posted on 10/30/2012 1:12:32 PM PDT by cripplecreek (What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his soul?)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Helping the poor isn’t really the point.

For the liberal “architects”, it’s about control and power.
For the sheeperals, it’s feeling good about themselves as good people without any effort expended on their part.


9 posted on 10/30/2012 1:12:42 PM PDT by MrB (The difference between a Humanist and a Satanist - the latter admits whom he's working for)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

History has been that every welfare program that the federal government deals in sucks 75 cents out of every dollar for the administrators.......let’s all sing now.....”look for the union label.”


10 posted on 10/30/2012 1:16:47 PM PDT by wesagain (The God (Elohim) of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is the One True GOD.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

That’s a lot of crack cocaine, tattoos, Aire Jordan tennis shoes, and Cadillac Escalades for the inner-city tribal parasites, and they vote 95% FOR MORE !


11 posted on 10/30/2012 1:16:59 PM PDT by traditional1 (Don't gotsta worry 'bout no mo'gage, don't gotsta worry 'bout no gas; Obama gonna take care o' me!)
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To: onyx

I have been saying it for years- there is THE EQUIVALENT OF one full-time government employee for each family on welfare

The government ADMITS Welfare is only 27% efficient. So that means for every family getting $27,000 per year in ‘benefits’ there is an additional $73,000 per year that the government keeps, which is a darn good full-time salary.

we could save HALF of the cost of welfare if the governent would pay a company $50K to hire someone off welfare.

The company gets a free employee... the government saves 50%


12 posted on 10/30/2012 1:19:53 PM PDT by Mr. K ("The only thing the World would hate more than the USA in charge is the USA NOT in charge")
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To: Paladin2

Actually AFSCME and AFGE are the two big government unions, SEIU is more dishwashers, nurses, orderlies and that type, IIRC.


13 posted on 10/30/2012 1:21:03 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet (You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind every blade of grass.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

70+% of that went into government bureaucracy


14 posted on 10/30/2012 1:22:30 PM PDT by GeronL (http://asspos.blogspot.com)
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To: tshaun

You beat me to it—I was going to post that you could write them each a $60K check, and they would still want their foodstamps and Obamaphones.


15 posted on 10/30/2012 1:26:06 PM PDT by rightwingintelligentsia (Be careful of believing something just because you want it to be true.)
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To: Mr. K

Excellent math...but are you sure that many companies would want the “free” employee?


16 posted on 10/30/2012 1:33:39 PM PDT by sanjuanbob
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To: sanjuanbob

For $50k I would have the cleanest bathrooms in the corporate world

also the parking lot would shine


17 posted on 10/30/2012 1:38:22 PM PDT by Mr. K ("The only thing the World would hate more than the USA in charge is the USA NOT in charge")
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To: Mr. K
Yes, but the problem is they don't want to work and they're not qualified.

They should be forced to work, even menial work, and paid accordingly, and supplemented if totally necessary, but work, nonetheless.

Unions are an enemy and public employee unions are an enemy within.
18 posted on 10/30/2012 1:43:50 PM PDT by onyx (FREE REPUBLIC IS HERE TO STAY! DONATE MONTHLY! IF YOU WANT ON SARAH PALIN''S PING LIST, LET ME KNOW)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

You’re forgetting about all those government employees pension plans. It’s not about the poor, it’s about government employees.


19 posted on 10/30/2012 1:54:04 PM PDT by skinndogNN
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To: tshaun
America, as an ongoing proposition, is being dismantled step by step. See Losing America's Multi-Generational Purpose.

Corrupting the susceptible into dependence on Government, is but one of the many steps in the process of our destruction.

William Flax

20 posted on 10/30/2012 2:10:29 PM PDT by Ohioan
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