21,000 Detroiters losing welfare benefits

[Novine]

"The expectation by some posters in this thread that people whose benefits are cut off will "go out and get jobs" when nothing else about their situation has changed strikes me as completely unrealistic."

It also clear that some people believe that the best way to address the problem is to "punish" those on welfare by taking away those benefits. The primary losers in this effort is the children of the families being kicked out of the program. According to the state, the cash assistance program covers:

"...low-income families with minor children and pregnant women. FIP helps them pay for living expenses such as rent, heat, utilities, clothing, food and personal care items."

That means when about 30,000 kids are going with less today than they had a month ago at a time when the state is experiencing historically very high unemployment. You can blame the parents of these kids for getting them into this situation but that doesn't change the reality for those kids of living with even less than they have today. Maybe some people will tell us how forcing those kids to go without will build character.

[Detroitnerd]

That means when about 30,000 kids are going with less today than they had a month ago at a time when the state is experiencing historically very high unemployment. You can blame the parents of these kids for getting them into this situation but that doesn't change the reality for those kids of living with even less than they have today. Maybe some people will tell us how forcing those kids to go without will build character.

You could lay good money down that, 10, 20 years on, the same people who pulled the rug out from under those kids will start sounding alarums about a new generation of "super predators" -- young, sociopathic criminals who must be jailed at great expense to save the nation from their predations. Oh, and that it will cost 10 times as much as it would have to feed and educate them. But, never mind, there is no punitive measure too expensive for this mind-set. All they object to are "freeloaders" -- paying for tomorrow's prisoners gives them no qualms ...

[bailey]

"The expectation by some posters in this thread that people whose benefits are cut off will "go out and get jobs" when nothing else about their situation has changed strikes me as completely unrealistic."

It also clear that some people believe that the best way to address the problem is to "punish" those on welfare by taking away those benefits. The primary losers in this effort is the children of the families being kicked out of the program. According to the state, the cash assistance program covers:

"...low-income families with minor children and pregnant women. FIP helps them pay for living expenses such as rent, heat, utilities, clothing, food and personal care items."

That means when about 30,000 kids are going with less today than they had a month ago at a time when the state is experiencing historically very high unemployment. You can blame the parents of these kids for getting them into this situation but that doesn't change the reality for those kids of living with even less than they have today. Maybe some people will tell us how forcing those kids to go without will build character.

I would be curious to know how many of those kids are 4yrs old or younger.

[English]

I think the difference of opinion in this thread is more fundamental than that. The question isn't "how much is enough?", the question is "given that there will always be some number of people who slip through the cracks of society, what is the most cost-effective way to deal with that problem?" If small monthly payments to each member of that group can keep them from freezing to death in my alley this winter, or turning up at Receiving with third-degree burns from falling asleep on a steam grate, that's an investment I'm willing to make.

Reducing the number of people who end up in long-term poverty situations in the first place is also a worthy goal, and one that should absolutely be addressed. My contention is that it's a separate issue from whether or to what extent welfare benefits should exist, and will require a separate solution. The expectation by some posters in this thread that people whose benefits are cut off will "go out and get jobs" when nothing else about their situation has changed strikes me as completely unrealistic.

Thank you for your excellent framing of this issue. It's human nature to resent freeloaders, but the larger question is this. What kind of society will we be? As I've said before on these threads, we've spent 40 years telling people in the nation's ghettos to clean up their act, straighten up and fly right, get a job, get married, stop committing crimes, etc. We have told them and we have built more prisons. So how safe and prosperous is today's America compared to 1971? Sure, there are more individual freedoms and minority rights, but even folks from marginalized groups say that the city, the state, and the nation were better off in the mid-20th century than we are today.

Guess what the marginal tax rate was back then?

Guess what kind of social safety net existed back then?

[Scottathew]

Thank you for your excellent framing of this issue. It's human nature to resent freeloaders, but the larger question is this. What kind of society will we be?

Yes, but flip the issue. If someone knows that they can not work and get government assistance instead, what kind of society will we be?

Once again, people are still getting assistance, there's just a cut-off at four years. The net is there for those that need it, and for those that are staying in it too long, they're getting booted out.

I do agree with some that the timing is rough, the notice was short. However, if you've been on assistance for four years, then you've known you need to change things.

[Detroitnerd]

Yes, but flip the issue. If someone knows that they can not work and get government assistance instead, what kind of society will we be?

Once again, people are still getting assistance, there's just a cut-off at four years. The net is there for those that need it, and for those that are staying in it too long, they're getting booted out.

Nonsense. You know damn well that you're kicking off legitimately unemployed people who need assistance. You're just soothing your conscience by choosing to believe they're "freeloaders."

A similar analog would be approving of people being sent to jail for life for any felony. Sure, some innocent people would get caught up in that, but it's better to PUNISH WRONGDOERS than to worry over any innocent people who get caught up in that, right?

Congratulations, 48091. You are the single most morally repugnant person posting on this board today. I hope you lose everything, cannot find a job, and then find yourself friendless and without help the day your benefits run out.

[aj3647]

You could lay good money down that, 10, 20 years on, the same people who pulled the rug out from under those kids will start sounding alarums about a new generation of "super predators" -- young, sociopathic criminals who must be jailed at great expense to save the nation from their predations. Oh, and that it will cost 10 times as much as it would have to feed and educate them. But, never mind, there is no punitive measure too expensive for this mind-set. All they object to are "freeloaders" -- paying for tomorrow's prisoners gives them no qualms ...

Yes, I forgot the "Mad Max" style societal collapse that occurred 10-20 years after the Great Depression. All those kids who lived through the 30's grew up and just started clubbing people to death in the streets, forming roving bands of marauders that make Somalia look like Disney World.

I'll tell you one thing about the Great Depression though...people found a way to survive. And they didn't have food stamps. Or Medicare. Or four years of welfare. Although i'm sure they would have been immensely grateful for even one of those things, instead of complaining that it "wasn't enough."

These kids will still have food, still have a free public education for 12 years, still have health care through Medicaid, etc. They'll still be better off than every previous generation of poor people in America [[who somehow found a way to survive) and still be better off than 90% of the rest of the people who inhabit this earth in places like Africa, South Asia, Central America, etc. So no, I don't expect Michigan to turn into a crime-ridden post-apocalyptic nightmare 10-20 years from now because the lifetime cap on welfare dropped to 4-years. I don't subscribe to that kind of hysterical fear mongering.

When the federal welfare reform was passed in 1996 [[signed by Bill Clinton) and placed a 5-year lifetime cap on benefits, there was no explosion in crime nationwide. In fact, crime rates have been on a declining trend nationwide since the mid-90's.

[Scottathew]

Congratulations, 48091. You are the single most morally repugnant person posting on this board today. I hope you lose everything, cannot find a job, and then find yourself friendless and without help the day your benefits run out.

I'm morally repugnant because I only want to help out folks for four years?

I don't wish welfare recipients ill, as you do to me. In fact, I wish them the exact opposite. I wish for people on welfare to get jobs and become productive members of society. I wish for them to go out there and make decisions that cause them to be in a better situation than what they were.

Life is about personal choices. If you don't want to be poor, make good ones. But don't expect the taxpayers of Michigan to pay for the choices that lead to not being employed for a period longer than 1,459 days.

I find giving unlimited lifetime assistance to be morally wrong. Folks should work for a living, and not take from others for a living.

Keep in mind, the temporary, limited assistance is good. I'm against UNLIMITED assistance. I think four years is a good limit and goes beyond generous.

[Detroitnerd]

Yes, I forgot the "Mad Max" style societal collapse that occurred 10-20 years after the Great Depression. All those kids who lived through the 30's grew up and just started clubbing people to death in the streets, forming roving bands of marauders that make Somalia look like Disney World.

Yeah, um, that didn't happen because of the New Deal.

I'll tell you one thing about the Great Depression though...people found a way to survive. And they didn't have food stamps. Or Medicare. Or four years of welfare. Although i'm sure they would have been immensely grateful for even one of those things, instead of complaining that it "wasn't enough."

You don't know jack shit about the Depression if you think people were taught valuable lessons by intense privation. My dad lived through the Depression. My dad had to wear rags instead of play clothes. My dad had to put fresh cardboard in old shoes instead of have a new pair. My dad had to pull hot tar out of the street when he really wanted chewing gum. And you know what? You don't have the faintest idea what the fuck you're talking about. You embarrass yourself. Along with 48091, I hope you live in a hut someday and get rolled by teenagers for what meager belongings you have.

These kids will still have food, still have a free public education for 12 years, still have health care through Medicaid, etc. They'll still be better off than every previous generation of poor people in America [[who somehow found a way to survive) and still be better off than 90% of the rest of the people who inhabit this earth in places like Africa, South Asia, Central America, etc. So no, I don't expect Michigan to turn into a crime-ridden post-apocalyptic nightmare 10-20 years from now because the lifetime cap on welfare dropped to 4-years. I don't subscribe to that kind of hysterical fear mongering.

Theoretically, of course, depending on the level of their community income, and setting the bar extremely low by saying they're better off than, say, 10-year-olds working in a coal mine and dying of black lung by the time they're 21, more in debt than ever to the company store.

Anyway, you managed to completely [[purposely?) miss the point. Kick-em-off-the-dole types have no problem spending 10 times as much money to incarcerate people than they do feeding them. And that's a fact.

Why don't you go read some books about the Depression, or talk to some of the survivors? You might learn something.

[Detroitnerd]

I'm morally repugnant because I only want to help out folks for four years?

Oh, that gentle, "Who, me?" Your remarks have shown just how disgusting your political philosophy -- if you can call that jumbled mess of prejudices a coherent philosophy -- really is.

[Scottathew]

Oh, that gentle, "Who, me?" Your remarks have shown just how disgusting your political philosophy -- if you can call that jumbled mess of prejudices a coherent philosophy -- really is.

You attack me instead of my positions. Now you're calling me "prejudiced", although against what I'm not quite sure.

Explain to me how unlimited welfare helps people to not be poor? Explain to me how a four year limit is unreasonable? Explain to me why someone needs government assistance for a time greater than 1459 days.

Capping welfare to a four year maximum still gives assistance to those that need it, while helping the state to be financially responsible enough to offer the program in the future.

What's heartless and disgusting is to setup a system that enslaves people to poverty for years, decades, and generations. That's what unlimited welfare is.

Limited welfare is a helping hand while you get back up.

[Detroitnerd]

You attack me instead of my positions. Now you're calling me "prejudiced", although against what I'm not quite sure.

I don't have to explain anything to you. This is not a deposition. You're the one cheering on throwing thousands of families off of assistance. This is analogous to throwing the innocent in prison with the guilty, or punishing the victim with the small-time chiseler. All the while the super-rich pick our pockets clean. Your remarks prove you to be a very angry person who is behind this for the emotional satisfaction it involves in socking it to those whom you see as freeloaders. You don't need a political party, man. You need a psychologist...

[Detroitnerd]

I think about the stories Dad told me. He was born in 1930. He was born into the world the super-rich are desperately trying to push us back into. He described to me never growing up with breakfast. He described perhaps being lucky enough to have a few kernels left at the bottom of a popcorn bowl to eat in the morning. Never having steak or eggs as a kid. All while his dad desperately tried to hold down work -- any work at all -- and feed him and his two siblings. I have seen the pictures of him in rags, barefoot, looking like a street urchin. All in the richest country in the world where the elite had plunged the country into economic chaos.

What a wonderful world some of you would have us return to.

[Scottathew]

I don't have to explain anything to you. This is not a deposition. You're the one cheering on throwing thousands of families off of assistance. This is analogous to throwing the innocent in prison with the guilty, or punishing the victim with the small-time chiseler. All the while the super-rich pick our pockets clean. Your remarks prove you to be a very angry person who is behind this for the emotional satisfaction it involves in socking it to those whom you see as freeloaders. You don't need a political party, man. You need a psychologist...

Once again, you attack me, slap labels and accusations on me, instead of trying to argue the points.

Explain to me how providing unlimited welfare does anything but provide unlimited poverty for someone? How does it help them?

Explain to me how our poor are so poor that statistically, the vast majority have cable TV, air conditioning, and at least one vehicle?

All unlimited welfare does is perpetuate the very things you don't want for folks. Unlimited welfare perpetuates and guarantees a low, but still comfortable standard of living.


Now I know it's easier to try to demonize and label rather than argue the points and the subject, but I dare you to try to make a somewhat intelligent case of how unlimited welfare helps people get out of poverty. I dare you to do so without attacking or labeling me.

I have not attacked, labeled, or made any questions of your moral character.

[Detroitnerd]

Once again, you attack me, slap labels and accusations on me, instead of trying to argue the points.

You must think you're very, very clever. You get to bombastically scream and swear about poor people [["Get a fuckin' job!") and then, when somebody finds you repulsive for that, you adopt a gentle tone that meekly raises complaints about personal attacks, labels and accusations, as if you occupy some high moral ground. And then you trot out a bunch of framed and loaded questions and demand to be engaged. Ha, ha. Very funny.

Explain to me how providing unlimited welfare does anything but provide unlimited poverty for someone? How does it help them?

It is quite possible for somebody to be unemployed or underemployed for a long time, longer when taken cumulatively over a lifetime. I think of my father, my aunt and my uncle. I think of what some assistance would have provided for them in the early 1930s. They would have had, for instance, breakfast. They would have had shoes you didn't have to put cardboard in to keep your socks dry. They would have had better health care that might have allowed their brother George to live more than a week. They might have tasted steak as children. They might have had a lot of things they didn't. As it was, my grandfather practically killed himself working, and didn't drink or smoke. All in the richest country in the world, the kids didn't have fit clothes or three good meals.

Provide unlimited poverty? How would assistance have provided them with unlimited poverty. That's what the MARKET gave them. If you cannot understand that simple point, perhaps you are too blinded by the very rhetoric you seem to regurgitate.

The Depression didn't last four years. It lasted 11 long years. And, for black workers, among other workers, the Depression never fully went away. I believe I posted some statistics in this thread on the unemployment rate for black teens. It is more than 40 percent, far above Great Depression-era statistics. The market is what is causing the poverty. The assistance is a mere palliative to render it less harsh. And as long as labor statistics are that grim, the assistance should be rendered as long as it is needed. As for the "job-creators" -- they are dodging taxes and sending American jobs overseas, which is keeping unemployment at sky-high levels. Perhaps we should cut off their corporate welfare, since they do so little to aid the common welfare of the nation.

Explain to me how our poor are so poor that statistically, the vast majority have cable TV, air conditioning, and at least one vehicle?

I haven't the faintest idea what you are talking about. Where are the statistics showing that people below the poverty line have cable, A/C and a car? Until you can furnish said statistics, I am going to have to believe you're blowing smoke.

Anyway, if it were true [[though I am sure it is nonsense), I wouldn't have a problem with a poor family having some small luxuries. I'd counter with the question, "What good comes from wanting to make sure that the poor are as poor as they can be?" [[After you produce those statistics, of course.)

All unlimited welfare does is perpetuate the very things you don't want for folks. Unlimited welfare perpetuates and guarantees a low, but still comfortable standard of living.

This is called "begging the question." You see, you're not ASKING a question. You're stating something as if it were true and incontrovertible. You think living on welfare is comfortable? I would take away from that statement that you haven't the faintest idea what living on welfare is like, and are basing your statement on discredited theories about Cadillac welfare mothers. In other words, more nonsense.

I dare you to try to make a somewhat intelligent case of how unlimited welfare helps people get out of poverty.

First of all, welfare is limited. It is limited in that it comes to you in meager amounts periodically. The way you put it, it sounds like you call for another wheelbarrow-full of cash when you're out.

Getting rid of poverty, huh? Assistance ameliorates the worst of it, but you'd really have to look at punishing corporations that offshore American jobs, putting high tariffs on goods imported from American operations overseas, stop American corporations from arbitraging labor costs between here and the Third World. They wanna be called "job-creators"? Make them do their job.

But assistance does reduce the intensity of poverty. It takes some fresh thinking, but it's worth getting past the words of pundits like Daniel Patrick Moynihan or other establishment pundits over the years with their allegations of "pathologies" or "cycles of poverty." Those were all emotional appeals to voters, not scientific or statistical analyses of what happened. The truth is that the War on Poverty did get results ... in a decade, poverty rates dropped to their lowest level since comprehensive records began in 1958 -- from 17.3 percent in 1964 to 11.1 percent in 1973.

In other words, that translates roughly into 1/3 fewer children having their minds turn to mush because they lack a healthful breakfast. Or 1/3 fewer kids having to wear ragged clothes or spend a night without heat in the winter. Or, put it another way, a future that is that much better for the people who suffer the most in this, the richest, most powerful country in the world.

If you don't understand that, sir, I have tried to explain it to you. Ignorance is no crime.

But if you knowingly REFUSE to understand the facts just so you can hold to your precious point of view, then you really are the repulsive character I have surmised you are.

[Scottathew]

MUCH better DetroitNerd [[except the last part where you attack me in the case that I still dare not to agree with your position).

I respect your position but disagree with it. I disagree on the same grounds and reasons stated in my previous posts.

I feel that children don't simply "turn to mush" when their parents are limited to four years of welfare.

If I am immoral, then I guess the Michigan legislature, the governor, and the majority of the voters are immoral too!

[Detroitnerd]

MUCH better DetroitNerd [[except the last part where you attack me in the case that I still dare not to agree with your position).

Please, save your praise. The parting shot is a condemnation of willful ignorance; if the shoe fits ... Now where are your statistics?

I respect your position but disagree with it. I disagree on the same grounds and reasons stated in my previous posts.

Without addressing the facts, you're not engaging in discussion, but stonewalling. You'll have to do better than that agree-to-disagree act, if you want to be taken seriously.

I feel that children don't simply "turn to mush" when their parents are limited to four years of welfare.

You should examine nutritional studies proving that poor childhood nutrition damages future learning ability. Oops! That would require you to confront facts contrary to your beliefs, something you've shown you are unable to do.

If I am immoral, then I guess the Michigan legislature, the governor, and the majority of the voters are immoral too!

A lynch mob is a majority too.

[detroitsgwenivere]

Well folks....


http://detnews.com/article/20111004/...423/1409/rss36


...looks like somebody else thought the sudden cut-off was a shitty thing to do.


Does anyone want to take a guess how this will legally pan out? [[Please refer to other thread for non-legal banter)

[getmoore]

Well it looks like they stopped the 4 year limit for now.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/j...ogram-14667543

[detroitsgwenivere]

I'm moving the legal part of this story to another tread. Tired of reading the same 2 points made 100 different times on a hundred different posts.

[BagAJellyDonuts]

Well it looks like they stopped the 4 year limit for now.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/j...ogram-14667543

Guess that's a perception [[IMO), all the ruling says to me is that the judge feels there wasn't "enough" notice of the change.

Michigan limiting time isn't anything radical. Check the history of the benefit. Unless I am have been totally misled, only Michigan & Vermont had unlimited benefits. Most states capped at 5 years. Heck Clinton signed legislation supporting a time limit.

Again IMO, it's not that support isn't out there. Problem is the current "system" seems to be awful easy to game. Some people that need justified help are going to get cut off because there is no doubt there are plenty of scumbags that figure it's easier to sluff off and get a check than bust their butts to get ahead. Get mad at them, not that the well has run dry.

[stasu1213]

Thank you Jesus. This is good news!

[Scottathew]

I don't feel that a four year limit is unreasonable, but the timing did seem to happen quickly.

I hope that the end-result is that the four-year limit will be implemented. A short delay won't bother me too much.

[bailey]

Umm.. ok, if we're going to ignore the FOUR years of advance knowledge that this day was coming....how is THIS not clear enough? :

Assistant Attorney General Raymond Howd explained that the state Department of Human Services sent three written notices to every recipient, and caseworkers personally called every individual, in many cases making changes to their welfare plans that provided money from other funds.

Just 267 people requested hearings, and 5,000 of the nearly 41,000 affected called a telephone center that was supposed to answer questions about the change.
From The Detroit News: http://detnews.com/article/20111005/...#ixzz1Zvu2Gerc

Further it only stops the implementation until mid-october

"We will abide by Judge Borman's ruling and issue a fourth notice with the legal language ordered by the court," said Maura D. Corrigan, director of the Michigan Department of Human Services. "While this will delay the implementation of the federal laws governing lifetime limits until mid-October, Judge Borman did not prevent welfare reform from going forward."

From The Detroit News: http://detnews.com/article/20111005/...#ixzz1Zvv5SrJ0

[Det_ard]

From Michigan Radio, manufacturing jobs [[described on air as "load part, push button, remove part for QC inspection) are plentiful in West Michigan and SE Michigan. WTF?

http://michiganradio.org/post/help-w...mps-are-demand