Posted on 04/04/2015 9:28:27 AM PDT by Libloather
Kansas welfare recipients will be unable to get more than $25 per day in benefits under a new law sent this week to Republican Gov. Sam Brownback's desk by the state legislature.
The bill also prohibits welfare recipients from spending their benefits at certain types of businesses, including liquor stores, fortune tellers, swimming pools and cruise ships.
"We're trying to make sure those benefits are used the way they were intended," state Rep. Michael O'Donnell (R) said, according to the Topeka Capital-Journal. "This is about prosperity. This is about having a great life."
(Excerpt) Read more at msn.com ...
Government should not be doing charity. As with everything else, government sucks at it. Every government program is riddled with waste and fraud, and it’s the taxpayer who has to foot the bill.
If a person is truly in need, he/she should deal with a reputable charity. I can tell you that because charities, unlike government, do not have a seemingly infinite amount of money, they will only help the truly poor and only with the basics. They won’t stand for their assistance being spent in casinos and on cruise ships.
“But....but...but, they should be able to spend their money anyway they want.”
There were a couple of Freepers who actually seemed to have either forgotten their medication or showed just how liberal they are in promoting the social justice meme on this thread yesterday. It was downright painful to read all the childish posts by a bleeding heart retired woman whose argument devolved into a “I know you are, but what am I?” sort of childhood playground ‘debate’.
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3275469/posts?page=1
So the solution to a government created problem (uhh, yeah, we handed them ATM cards so they could get the cash they give them each month without going to a check cashing place...) is to put in more regulations to solve a pretty non-existent problem.
Look, if an EBT card is used at a casino or a cruise ship or a fortune teller, going to guess that this is an indication of fraud. Go after the people committing fraud.
This stupid $25 a day limit (oh yeah, so many ATMs hand out $5 bills... so really a $20 cash limit) will just increase fraud. After all, if people want the cash, and you make it so that to get the $400 on the card in cash that 20 days and twenty trips to the ATM are required, that people will likely just sell the damn cards for $200 in cash a month.
But in the long run, if you really want to micromanage what people spend the money on, how about stop giving them a cash equivalent and just give them what you want to?
I’d go the other way.
Cut off section 8, Obamaphones and food stamps and just hand them cash every month. Let them learn to live on that and make their own budgets, pay rents, buy food and stuff.
Cut out about 75%-80% of the bureaucracy too, this would be a huge savings for the taxpayers and not really a “cut” for the recipient (except in expensive states and places like NYC)
OH if states want to kick in some $$ because they have a higher cost of living, that’s on them.
Failure would be on the recipient alone, not the taxpayers.
It was downright painful to read all the childish posts by a bleeding heart retired woman whose argument devolved into a I know you are, but what am I? sort of childhood playground debate.
She argued that private charity couldn’t help people as “effectively” as the government.
I’ve no idea what she’s doing on FR. She’s definitely a big government “progressive.”
Pretty sure we’re on the same page. If you don’t want them to have the money, don’t hand it to them. If you do, hand it to them, then don’t whine as to whatever they spend it on.
As for cutting all these stupid programs - absolutely. I’m sure that we spend a fortune each month on Obamaphones - for services which could be purchased for under $20 a month.
Section 8 housing just encourages more fraud. If the government really wants to be in the housing business, then build it and police it. Of course, such projects have proved to be awful - so government’s solution is to spread the pain around and give every community their own little projects...
Go back to handing out bags of flour, tubs of lard, cans of beans, ham, and cheese. Don’t like what you’re given? THEN DON’T ASK FOR IT.
Each time, government comes up with a solution that causes more problems. Government is almost always the problem, and almost never the solution.
right. Merge all welfare into a single monthly cash dole, fire 90% of the bureaucracy and reap the savings, even without cutting the “benefits”.
I think the GOP should propose this. I wonder how getting all those benefits in cash sounds to the recipients.
Even charities are subsidized by the gubmint. They do not pay taxes on their income, so others have to pay extra taxes on their behalf.
Portland Press Herald
LePage will introduce new welfare-reform bill Monday
His measure would limit benefit card use, require job applications and increase penalties for abusing the system.
By Edward D. Murphy Staff Writer
Gov. Paul LePage says he will once again push for welfare reform, even though most of his proposals to change the system were defeated last year.
LePage said he plans to introduce a measure Monday that would ban those getting benefits from the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program from buying alcohol, tobacco and lottery tickets with money from the program or to use the money to post bail. He also wants to prohibit using TANF cards out of state, require most TANF recipients to apply for three jobs before getting welfare benefits and strengthen penalties for those abusing the system.
http://www.pressherald.com/2015/04/03/gov-lepage-to-introduce-new-welfare-reform-bill/
Paul LePage is unveiling similar legislation here in Maine on Monday.
Do you think that it is okay to spend welfare dollars on cruise ships?
“How many cruise ships are in Kansas? If this is what Brown back is spending his time on just quit.”
First of aticle,5tice it aid this was passed by the legislature, NOT the Gov who can only sign or veto it.
Secondly do you think people who receive the free from us have to stay in the state? Think they can’t travel?
Well, I suspect that the ATM fee is collected by whichever institution owns the ATM. But the real scandal is the money that is raked in by one company who gets to run the show with EBT transactions, no matter which company is selling goods.
I remember reading about it some time back. Can’t remember for sure which company. (Goldman-Sachs keeps coming to mind, but that does not sound right.)
Okay, I did a search, and it was not hard to find the answer to my own question: JP Morgan.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/10/01/jp-morgan-s-food-stamp-empire.html
I do not care if they can print money or not - eventually it will all fall apart, which is what I meant.
Both major parties are pretending there are not rules to an economy. There are rules, sort of like gravity. You can defy gravity under certain conditions but eventually you have to land. Our economy is going to crash and printing more money is not going to prevent that.
Then it is going to get ugly.
Theres no cruise ships in Tennessee either but a couple of times Ive managed to find one in other states...the states with a coastline..
I don’t get food stamps or EBT cards but those who do can use them anywhere in the country..the EBT are just like check cards or ATM cards etc..the govt loads them every month with fresh cruisin’ money..
Every cruise ship has ATM machines..
When we lived in Chicago, we indulged in 15 or so Caribbean cruises. It was our own money, so relax. There is no ocean near Chicago. There is something called air flights from Chicago to Miami.
“How many cruise ships are in Kansas?”
EBT cards are not limited to state boundaries. Kansas’ poor or not, will take vacations.
This is obviously racist. They are just doing this to pander to white bigots who don’t want to encounter black people as fellow passengers on a cruise. What other reason could there be?
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