Tag: Government aid

Welfare Made Easy and Popular…

Welfare Made Easy and Popular…

One of the many problems I have with America’s new socialist lifestyle (Since the 90’s) is the Welfare system. I fully support helping people when they need it. I fully support the government giving assistance to those in need. I fully support the “Hand up” programs that have worked since the 30’s. What I don’t support is the version of welfare we are seeing in our nation.

Let me explain:

Back in my youth I had experience with people on welfare, or state aid. I actually helped some attain that benefit by being there. The people that were granted that aid did everything they could to keep it quiet. They didn’t go to the grocery store when it was crowded, they used the food stamps during odd hours to avoid the “stares” of their neighbors and they did everything they could to get off the state aid. Including working two jobs. We all pitched in when we were able and only used the food stamps when it was necessary. After about a year the family I lived with got off Government aid programs all together. And they were BETTER for it.

NOW we have made it easy for people to spend that aid. We put the aid on EBT cards (Electronic Benefit Transfer) and it is more of a badge of honor to have an EBT card than a scourge. The stigma of “Government assistance” on the person has been removed. The feeling of shame has been removed. Now it’s more “This is better than working” than “I want off this by whatever means necessary” This in my opinion is a large part of the reason so many people are on state aid. Which also explains the inner city Democrat vote. Odd huh?

On a daily basis I run into people in stores who do not speak English, their cart full of everything from toys to beer standing near a checkout line. They will have a kid with them that speaks English, who will ask if you would mind switching your FOOD (Whatever it is) with their Beer or toys and they will pay for it using an EBT card. There are always people standing outside 7-11’s trying to get you to let them buy what you want with their EBT card and you give them cash so they can buy smokes or liquor. No shame in their game at all.


Now I know some idiot will troll by and say I want people to feel bad for taking state aid. YES I DO. I want it to be painful, I want it to be embarrassing, and I want it to be monitored like good parent monitors their 13 year old kid. WHY? because if it’s treated like that it will spur people to grow, it will spur people to get off of the aid, it will motivate people to get a job and be better than that. It will cause people to get into the asset column of Americans and out of the deduction column. We need assets and we need them badly.

What we have done in our country is make State aid an easy alternative to becoming successful. Not intentionally I’m sure. But because of our “Feel Good” policies that is what has happened.  I am not saying the program should be scrapped. I am saying it needs to be reformed in a way that makes it more difficult, and it needs to be temporary. It also needs to be monitored in a tough love type way.

We also need to drug test those on the aid. Odds are if you have a job you had to get drug tested. You have to be clean to work to put money into the state coffers, why should you not be tested to take it out? I find the lack of drug testing Welfare recipients a slap in the face to those of us that work and have to undergo that either random or yearly. The benefit of regularly drug testing the welfare recipients is if they are looking for a job, drugs shouldn’t be the reason they don’t get the job. NOW what we have is Welfare is conditional upon looking for a job, if they don’t get the job because of a failed drug test, state aid doesn’t stop and they have met their condition of receiving the aid.

Dumbassery in effect across the entire system.