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Your comment about the welfare system being calculated to keep people on it has a distinct ring of truth.

When most Americans in the Northeast hear about the $5.15/hr minimum wage, they think it's some hypothetical figure that only migrant workers would earn. When I lived in Massachusetts, I couldn't imagine even a high school kid rolling out of bed for a job at Burger King that paid less than $8.00/hr.

When I moved to Louisiana, I was horrified to discover that people really *do* earn $5.15/hr, and that a job paying $7.00/hr is considered a princely sum and too much to qualify for subsidy benefits.

A mother with one child in Louisiana who is a welfare recipient only receives $188/mo in actual cash, $247/mo in food stamps, 100% child care if enrolled in a vocational training program (without subsidy, figure $300/mo for full-time care for one child) and partial reimbursement of travel expenses to participate in the vocational activity. If this same mother and child are on Section 8 rental housing, 100% subsidized housing (which isn't much considering how low the rents are, maybe $400 and up for a 2-bedroom apartment) plus a monthly check to provide partial payment toward utilities (maybe $125/mo average for electricity in a 2-bedroom apartment, but drastically more in a trailer due to lack of insulation, maybe $300/mo). It isn't enough to get by because it doesn't cover car insurance of the full cost of utilities, BUT...

When this mother finds a job and gets off the welfare roll, she finds out the hard way that it wasn't worth it after all to work. Say she gets a job for $7-8/hr (and that's shooting really high because most will get minimum wage) and takes home $1,000/mo net pay. Now she's suddenly responsible for one-third of her gross income in Section 8 rent, all the utilities, only partial reimbursement of child care, all but $120/mo in transportation expenses (you do get what's called a post-FITAP check for that amount but only if you can stay consecutively employed for 12 months after getting off welfare) and all the groceries because your food stamps have been shut off, plus auto insurance if she can even afford a car. You'd be astounded at the number of people in Louisiana who don't have driver's licenses, just state ID cards.

Do the math -- taking net versus gross income into consideration, if you were a single mother, which might you choose?

David Vitter had these TV commercials during his campaign where he stood in his kitchen pouring a bowl of Cheeries and pontificating about how "I think welfare recipients should work for their benefits." A lot of people agree with him in theory, but if he knew how much it cost to make them do it, he would realize that it isn't cost-effective.

Specifically, a woman who walks into the Louisiana Office of Family Support and applies for welfare benefits is told that in order to qualify for benefits, she has to be engaged in a job-related activity for 35 hours per week.

They used to evaluate the applicant's skills and experience and route her accordingly. A woman who had clerical experience might be assigned to do filing right there in the OFS office and decide to pursue a civil service career using that as a base. Another woman who had no skills might be sent to Goodwill Industries to sort clothes, and they might keep her full-time if they liked her. How many people do you know who would willingly work 35 hours per week in exchange for $188 per *month*?

But they don't do it that way any more. Now they have this ridiculous thing called Job Readiness Training to which they even send mothers desperately in need of Parenting training. For 35 hours a week for the first 4 weeks you receive welfare, you sit in a classroom and have the teacher (a consultant brought in from the Louisiana Department of Labor) pick you apart and tell you what's wrong with you and why you're not ready for the job market. And God forbid you look for a job on your own during this month -- if you get called for an interview during class time, you are NOT allowed to go and meet with the prospective employer, because you're not putting in your 35 hours of your required activity. If you defy the teacher and go to the interview anyway, you are threatened with sanctions against your benefits.

And how much does it cost to put someone through Job Readiness Training? In addition to having the family on the welfare/food stamp rolls, the system also pays for daily transportation reimbursement and child care expense to make sure the mother is sitting in that classroom 35 hours a week...and NOT looking for a job.

The posters on FR who judge these women so harshly and call them "welfare queens" don't have all the facts. They've never seen the bureaucracy from the inside out. If wages were high enough in Louisiana that people could support their families without needing subsidies, more women would get off welfare. But until it becomes cost-effective to be self-sufficient, things aren't going to change in this state.