Is the Welfare System Making Americans Incompetent?
August 23, 2011 by admin
Filed under News Stories
August 23rd, 2011
The Huffington Post
By: Janell Ross
Sasha Mandel says she never imagined going on welfare. But her plans for a career and the independence she craved ran headlong into a pair of unforeseen developments — an unplanned pregnancy at 18, and the worst job market since the Great Depression.
In April 2009, freshly unemployed and devoid of savings, Mandel reluctantly walked into a state office in Phoenix to apply for welfare. Her caseworker was sympathetic, swiftly arranging emergency food aid along with cash assistance. But she was also clear on the limits of that relief: Under the terms of Arizona’s welfare program, Mandel could draw a welfare check for no more than three years.
That timeframe was about to get shorter. This April, cash-strapped Arizona tightened the limit on welfare payments to two years. Mandel learned about the change when she received a letter from the state in June. She was only a few weeks away from exhausting her benefits.
“That letter,” she said, “it just said to me that they decided to change the rules when the game for single mothers is already really, really hard.”
Fifteen years after President Clinton joined with congressional Republicans and affixed his signature to a law that “ended welfare as we know it” — imposing a five-year time limit on federal cash assistance for poor families, while allowing states to set shorter limits — the social safety net is failing to keep pace with the needs of struggling Americans, many experts say. Millions of single mothers are falling through the cracks, scrambling to support their families with neither paychecks nor government aid.
Welfare reform, one of the hallmark events of the Clinton presidency, was supposed to be a healthy tradeoff: Single mothers who had grown dependent on government checks would instead go out and work. The federal government gave the states lump sums of money, known as block grants, to create programs that would prepare, prompt and push poor single mothers accustomed to living on welfare into the workforce, providing job training, resume-writing tutorials and subsidized child care.
But the time limits on cash aid were enacted in the mid-1990s, in the midst of one of the most vibrant job markets in modern times. Today, with nearly 14 million people officially out of work and jobseekers outnumbering available positions by more than four-to-one, the logic of those reforms is being overwhelmed by the reality of a stark shortage of paychecks, experts say.
“Today, everybody is expected to work,” said Sheila Zedlewski, an economist at the Urban Institute and co-author of an institute study released last week that examines the consequences of welfare reform during the recession. “The problem is finding a job is incredibly hard.”
Since the beginning of the recession in late 2007, the nation’s unemployment rate has increased by 88 percent, while welfare caseloads have grown just 14 percent, according to the Urban Institute report.
Experts say this disparity reflects the inadequacy of remaining welfare programs in the face of a veritable epidemic of joblessness. During a period of national distress, fewer and fewer people have been able to secure help to meet their basic needs, according to the report.
Between 2007 and 2010 — just as the economy was contracting and joblessness was rising, generating greater demand for public assistance — welfare caseloads dropped in 13 states, according to the Urban Institute report. In Arizona, which faced a particularly powerful blow to its finances in the form of a sustained plunge in housing prices, the welfare caseload dropped by 48 percent during that timeframe.
Many of those who advocated for ending welfare as an unlimited entitlement say the change has been beneficial — the share of single, never married mothers in the workforce climbed from 62.9 percent in 1996 to 72.4 percent a decade later, according to federal data.
“Poverty rates are still lower and work rates still higher than before welfare reform,” said Ron Haskins, who played a key role in shaping the policy as a senior Republican congressional adviser, and who is now co-director of the Brookings Center on Children and Families. “In that sense, welfare reform has been a success.”
But as Haskins acknowledges, the reforms have never managed to address the barriers confronting a small subset of welfare recipients with very limited education, significant physical and mental health problems, or unhealthy children, preventing them from entering the workforce.
The share of people who both live in poverty with no reported income and lack welfare assistance has changed significantly since welfare reform. In 1996, 1 in 8 single mothers fit this profile, according to Zedlewski. By 2008, the most recent year for which this data is available, that figure had climbed to 1 in 5, she said.
In the early days after welfare reform, many states enacted stricter time limits, Arizona included, and beefed up programs offering subsidized child care — a crucial component for single mothers required to work. The budget crisis assailing states has prompted many states to effectively roll back these programs.
States around the country are slashing cash benefits, reducing time limits and, in some cases, imposing strict work requirements on welfare applicants, said LaDonna Pavetti, an expert on welfare who works at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. The practices also make it very hard for parents already dealing with a job crisis, a disability or other complications to qualify for cash aid, she said.
In the 2000s, states also began shifting federal funds that could be used for cash benefits for single mothers to cover other costs. Some of the money went to cover the cost of child care or transportation assistance. But large shares were also used to fund state child welfare agencies, which frequently don’t get all the resources they need from states.
In 1997, the first year the reforms took effect in most states, Georgia used 73 percent of its federal welfare block grant to provide cash aid to poor families, according to data the state reported to the federal government. By 2009, the most recent year for which complete data is available, Georgia spent just 11 percent of its block grant on cash aid. Spending in Florida, Texas and Arizona plunged by similar margins.
The impact of these cuts is easy to discern: Far fewer poor families are being given cash assistance. In 2009, Georgia and Texas each provided cash aid to less than 10 percent of poor families, according to the Urban Institute report.
“You have so many people who were pushed off welfare who didn’t find work in the beginning, and today there are so many people who can’t get welfare at all,” said Peter Edelman, a Georgetown University law professor who resigned from a senior position in the Clinton administration to protest the President’s decision to sign welfare reform into law. “As an anti-recessionary tool, welfare as we know it today is useless.”
Edelman compares the paltry expansion of the nation’s welfare rolls during the recession — from about 3.9 million families in 2007 to about 4.4 million families in 2010 — to what happened to the food stamp program. During the same time period, food stamp program participation rose from about 30 million households to 44 million, reflecting real levels of economic need.
“What we’ve done is make things worse,” Edelman said. “There are now people who cannot find work, and who can not get welfare.”
What I don’t seem to understand is how people keep saying that they can’t find a job or any kind of work for that matter!! I was working two jobs at once. Then I quit one of those jobs. Now I am working 3 jobs. I mean, how bad does one really want to find work? Just a thought!! Seek and ye shall find!!! Keep up the great work KT and staff!!
Just had another thought on this topic. What about corporate welfare? Are bail outs, subsidies, etc. making corporations incompetent?
There has to be something else besides the welfare system that makes American people incompetent. I say this because incompetency seems to be very common, especially in workplaces. It’s so common, I wonder what standards employers use to hire employees. I have spoken to numerous incompetent, educated, employed people at all kinds of levels. It’s going to take something more than just welfare reform to eradicate incompetency.
The whole point is to make people impotent. An improperly educated populace who are energetically devoid of making positive choices and decisions is exactly the plan. Welfare took an individual principle to help neighbors in need and made it an apparatus of the state to control communities by having people relinquish their decision-making. Having the appropriate self-image, awareness, and desire to achieve your goals is all that is needed to get yourself to a place of personal success.
There is no need to redistribute wealth, just as there is no need make people equal by law, as the mere act of doing so dis-empowers all involved by taking positive energy from those who have very little to begin with. Build the people and the people will build the nation. Individuals who can stand on their own make for a greater community and nation.
Just my 2 cents. Stand for you, Stand with KT.
I believe that the welfare system needs a complte overhaul. I have worked at a dental clinic for years I have seen second and third generation welfare recipients. All because they choose that way of life. It is one thing to need the help for a short period of time, but to make it a way of life!!
beanie
How come welfare is neither well or fair?
LIKE OUR GREAT PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY SAID AS NOT WHAT YOUR COUNTRY CAN DO FOR YOU IS WHAT YOU CAN DO FOR YOUR COUNTRY. IT IS TIME AMERICANS STAND UP AND TAKE CHARGE OF LIFES AND BE PRODUCERS ONCE AGAIN.
Hey KT, Brandy and everybody at the ktradionetwork. I love the show and think you guys are awesome. Reading this story also made me think of another subject of wasting our money. Jail is big business to, I’ve heard that tax payers spend around $29,000 per person in jail, so If they took away food stamps and people start stealing we’re gonna pay for them anyways.
Also I don’t know how much you know about Stan meyers but was wondering if you ever got time if you could shed light on him. Stan meyers invented the first car that runs strictly on water and after refusing to sell his patent, mysteriously was poisoned and died.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a74uarqap2E
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S44eRCr-O7o
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__gHPblNumM&feature=related
Keep up the good work?
The welfare system is killing our society, whatever happened to going to the church in your community if you need help? Its very sad because some parents have kids with the main intention of getting on welfare and not having to work.
Hey KT, Brandy and everybody at the ktradionetwork. I love the show and think you guys are awesome. Reading this story also made me think of another subject of wasting our money. Jail is big business to, I’ve heard that tax payers spend around $29,000 per person in jail, so If they took away food stamps and people start stealing we’re gonna pay for them anyways.
Also I don’t know how much you know about Stan meyers but was wondering if you ever got time if you could shed light on him. Stan meyers invented the first car that runs strictly on water and after refusing to sell his patent, mysteriously was poisoned and died.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a74uarqap2E
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S44eRCr-O7o
Keep up the good work?
I agree we are in a recession. I do believe “Not to participate” despite all of the trials I go through. Kevin has a wonderful site and radio program to keep me up. http://ktradio.network.com is going to be my daily stop. Thanks Kevin. Your books and Gin affiliate member, Jackie Paulson
I agree that welfare makes a person incompetent! I noticed that when I was a teenager. When I was going up in Cabrini Green Housing Projects. I use to go out and walk every chance I got into the better neighborhoods like Lincoln Park and I like to go at night because white folks don’t have curtains, you see! I can see, what they have in their apartments. At least that was what I thought they were at the time. I know now, that most of them are condo’s! I told myself that when my child turned 11 y/o. I would leave. Because it was normal for a girl to be pregnant at 12 or pushing baby strollers around and on welfare. I saw that people where happy with living in piss, roach, drug dealing infestation and bringing up another generation to do just the same. I always told myself I would be different. I would be rich some day. I didn’t exactly know how. Because no one in my family had ever been rich. In fact most of us “were”, on welfare. I found that if you don’t get up, get out and do something. You will find yourself lazy and doing what everyone else is doing. And that’s watching soap operas all day, partying, and just being broke! I wanted better and am doing better than I was then. I’m especially getting closer to my dreams now, thanks to GIN! I believe that GIN is my way to success and financial freedom. I love you Kevin and the Council for making all this possible for us little people. I have more than hope and I can dream again because of you.
I’m so glad you brought this to our attention. Makes a lot of sense. I sure am spreading the word thank you so much Kevin for putting the massive time into everything that you’re doing.
I think the welfare should be eliminated
I dug this out of the achieve in support of what you shared.
DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH
Today on my way to lunch I passed a homeless guy with a sign that read “Vote Obama, I need the money.” I laughed.
Once in the restaurant my server had on a “Obama 08″ tie, again I laughed as he had given away his political preference — just imagine the coincidence.
When the bill came I decided not to tip the server and explained to him that I was exploring the Obama redistribution of wealth concept. He stood there in disbelief while I told him that I was going to redistribute his tip to someone who I deemed more in need–the homeless guy outside. The server angrily stormed from my sight.
I went outside, gave the homeless guy $10 and told him to thank the server inside as I’ve decided he could use the money more. The homeless guy was grateful.
At the end of my rather unscientific redistribution experiment I realized the homeless guy was grateful for the money he did not earn, but the waiter was pretty angry that I gave away the money he did earn even though the actual recipient deserved money more.
I guess redistribution of wealth is an easier thing to swallow in concept than in practical application.
LEGAL DISCLAIMER
The information transmitted is intended solely for the individual or entity to which it is addressed and may contain confidential and/or privileged material. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of or taking action in reliance upon this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. If you have received this email in error please contact the sender and delete the material from any computer.