How about cutting out handouts to able-bodied people who are on the take for generations. There’s the biggest problem.
The other welfare
A legacy of unintended side effects
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2010/12/12/with_ssi_program_a_legacy_of_unintended_side_effects/?page=1
An excerpt:
As the Globe investigated the surge in SSI cases — mostly by visiting housing projects, Social Security offices, and downtown districts — many parents were reluctant to talk, fearful of losing this coveted benefit. Still, some two dozen families agreed to be interviewed, in part to vent their frustration at what they perceive to be the government’s arbitrary approval process in mental disability cases. Some wanted only their first names to be used as they described their persistent efforts to figure out what Social Security wanted, and their growing conviction that medication for the child was a critical step.
Waiting on a bench in a rundown commercial strip of Lawrence, Yessenia was among the frustrated.
The 28-year-old woman said late last summer that she will be trying, for the third time, to obtain SSI payments for her 7-year-old son based on his ADHD symptoms: impulsivity and inattention.
Yessenia said she is convinced her son’s first two applications were rejected because she had nothing to list in the section labeled “medications.” But in recent months, she has convinced the boy’s doctor to write a prescription. Her son is now taking a stimulant often used for ADHD.
“If you child doesn’t have medications, the SSI office thinks he doesn’t have any big problem,” she said.
Yessenia and her extended family have long experience with the SSI program. As a child, she said, she qualified for SSI based primarily because of learning disabilities, and after her 18th birthday, she requalified as an adult on the same basis. Her older sister, diagnosed with bipolar disorder, has been receiving SSI benefits since childhood.
Yessenia said she has other reasons to be optimistic that her son’s new application will be approved.
“Since he was denied all the time, the therapist said she’d give him another diagnosis, and that’s when she said he’s got depression,” said the mother, who has yet to submit the new application. “She’s also recommending another drug.”