Welfare Reform Extension Act

[The Duke]

http://www.cepr.net/publications/TANF.htm

CEPR data, shows the largest sector where work was found for former welfare recipients was retail, an houlry wage of over $10 p/h was earned.

[opebo]

http://www.cepr.net/publications/TANF.htm

CEPR data, shows the largest sector where work was found for former welfare recipients was retail, an houlry wage of over $10 p/h was earned.

That only says that in the retail sector as a whole the average hourly wage was $10.64 per hour.  Which says nothing about what the wages of the welfare people were. 

[The Duke]

http://www.cepr.net/publications/TANF.htm

CEPR data, shows the largest sector where work was found for former welfare recipients was retail, an houlry wage of over $10 p/h was earned.

That only says that in the retail sector as a whole the average hourly wage was $10.64 per hour.  Which says nothing about what the wages of the welfare people were. 

"I'm sorry Mrs. Opebo, but your boy ain't right."

[opebo]

http://www.cepr.net/publications/TANF.htm

CEPR data, shows the largest sector where work was found for former welfare recipients was retail, an houlry wage of over $10 p/h was earned.

That only says that in the retail sector as a whole the average hourly wage was $10.64 per hour.  Which says nothing about what the wages of the welfare people were. 

"I'm sorry Mrs. Opebo, but your boy ain't right."

OK, read this quote from your own posted link:

Most former welfare recipients found employment in a relatively small number of industries over the late 1990s (Table 1). Current Population Survey (CPS) data[2] shows that the largest proportions of former welfare recipients found jobs in either retail trade (one-sixth) or eating and drinking establishments (one-sixth). Nine industries, mostly in the service sector, account for the employment of nearly two-thirds of all former welfare recipients. Overall, these are relatively low-wage industries: in the second quarter of 2003, retail had an average hourly wage of $10.64 while food establishments averaged $6.94 per hour (not including tips), both of which were much lower than the $13.94 average for the private sector as a whole.

Retail had an average houly wage of $10.64.  Not welfare recipients made $10.64 upon leaving welfare, just that the average wage in the sector was $10.64.

[migrendel]

I must say it is shameful that we ever passed welfare reform. This is one of those issues that exposes how our nation's working class has sold its soul to the right wing.

We are all familiar with the familiar stereotype of the welfare recipient, of the stories of Jezebels who mother an enormous brood to increase their allotment, of career criminals who use it as a source of income as they pursue their dastardly endeavors. This has extraordinary staying power in our culture, but mythology, in this case the bourgeois folklore of an aspirational middle class, usually does. It is a sad fact that many people simply think that they have no obligation to the poor, that any money they earn should be theirs alone. Such a view can be safely held by a hermit, but we must remember that we live in a society. One of the sacrifices we make when we decide to live among people is an acceptance of certain foibles that befall many of us.

I would, however, like to address the ghastly exploitation of race, gender, and social class in this debate. Many Americans have a siege mentality. They feel their social and moral standards are under assault. One of these standards is that of white superiority. This began out of economic convenience, for I am sure we would all prefer to the reap the fruits germinated by the sweat on another man's brow, but it has an entirely different function in today's world.

 Much of our working class, which should support a measure to protect the basic sustenance of the poor, has been seduced by false promises. They have been told of how they are being financially squeezed by a government ladling out a brew of support to the mostly unseemly people in our society. For many, steeped in racism, their one way to act in a superior fashion, have blamed society's victims. They have blamed those who have grown up among unimaginable deprivation, reared by violence, and betrayed by many who did not care about their welfare. When such people act in a fashions deemed "anti-social", like a caged animal would run amok when freeded from its cell, no indictment is issued for the society, but the innocent are castigated. Racial minorities fall disproportionately among this class because of centuries of slavery and segregation, and some very real forms of racial discrimination that endure today. They have become scapegoats, and any measure designed to make even the most elementary improvements in their well-being, from affirmative action to slave reparations, are rejected by the multitude. They claim that minorities are unworthy, but they might also refuse to acknowledge the guilt that burdens them for tacitly accepting and thus perpetuating our racist society.

However, gender is slowly replacing race as the bete noire of this class of oppressors. When a woman bears a child out of wedlock, she is accused of harlotry, a social convention that our Calvinist forebears left us. When many suggested that family planning would be an effective remedy, this too was rejected, for one again, the poor are considered undeserving and abortion, when not used to preserve a family's honor when one's daughter is knocked up by the gardener, is outside the bounds of this stifling ethos. We begrudge poor women the means to preserve their childlessness, then we spite them for having children. Any child should be welcomed with open arms by an fair society which desires that the light of the dawn of life continues to shine, but those who so assiduously deny the right to make that choice also deny the children who come into the world because of that abscence. The spiteful air of cherchez la femme that informs this mentality while simultaneously finding men blameless is equal in its inequity to the racism at the heart of welfare reform.

The most important thing we must always bear in mind is to be charitable on a personal level. We must give of ourselves first and foremost, with open arms, but a chasm between charity and human needs will still exist, for we are not all generous. Such a gap must be bridged, and the government is the only thing which can do that. How sad that welfare reform denies it that ability.

[opebo]

Great post migrendel!  Working class hubris!

The 'reform' welfare needed was to be trebled in budget, not reduced or subjected to limits in duration.

[The Duke]

Migrendel,

No one is exploiting race here, or gender.  You're the only one to bring either up in this thread.

Opebo,

Your defense has become strained, particularly by your refusal to support your claims with evidence.

[TeePee4Prez]

Migrendel,

No one is exploiting race here, or gender.  You're the only one to bring either up in this thread.

Opebo,

Your defense has become strained, particularly by your refusal to support your claims with evidence.

I'm not going to sit there and say migrendel made a bad post.  In fact some of it I agree with despite the fact I lived in an area where lazy welfare recipients took advantage of an otherwise good program and decided to smoke crack on taxpayer dollars.  Granted good paying jobs are hard to come by even for college grads. 

However, you must realize that there are people that are on welfare for large amounts of time and don't even bother looking for work or to improve their standing in life.  This is not a race issue either because I have seen plenty of whites abuse the system as well.  I can sit here and say I am for a strong safety net and welfare reform at the same time. 

Here's what we need to address- good paying jobs relative to education.  It is quite sad that even with a college degree one only starts at $40,000 per year and is asked to work 60+ hours per week.  Granted, it only starting out, but that's outright cruel considering the cost of living and exorbitant student loans.  Compared to about 30-50 years ago a college degree paid MUCH more now WITHOUT the heavy student loan burden.  Also, a high school diploma could easily support a family back then even with one income.  It can't anymore.  We are heading back toward the turn of last century.

[opebo]

Flyers you are absolutely correct about the sad state of employment opportunities and the sorry wage levels in the US.  However I take issue with the assumption that people should be expected to get off of welfare.  Built into the capitalist system is a requirement of about 4 or 5% unemployment to prevent upward pressure on wages - this is orchestrated by the Federal Reserve as the main lever for implementing its stated purpose, which is to prevent inflation. 

It is unreasonable to expect people to get off of welfare if they don't want to.  I mean why should we care?  Really it is just the puritan work ethic, which demands that people 'work' for their living - of course the rich never do.  We need to get past the work ethic as the Europeans have before we can ever look at these issues reasonably.

[A18]

Someone needs to look up the Humphrey-Hawkins Full Employment Act.

Why don't you take a look at unemployment in the countries with economic systems of the sort you advocate? Yet unemployment in the laissez-faire 20s was a record low of 3 percent.

If the rich never work for their living, what is my father doing every day?

[dazzleman]

One of the most important rules in life is to do things in the right order.  That means education first, then marriage, then children.

You can usually get away with one screw-up on this, but not two.  People on welfare generally have done things in totally the wrong order - children first, then, if at all, educaton, and then, if at all, marriage.

If I had had a kid while still in high school, and never had been able to finish my education, AND had to raise the kid alone, I'd be in a terrible position.  Back then, I was working for a little above minimum wage.  That where everybody starts out.  With experience and education, you climb above that.  But some people make choices that ensure that they will always remain there.

Raising kids is a 2-person job, both financially and emotionally.  Even a non-working spouse provides financial benefit indirectly by handling issues outside work so that the breadwinning spouse can focus on making money.

The single parent often does not have the psychic energy to climb the career ladder, because the situation at home is so demanding, and they effectively have to do the job of two people.  But if that's what they've chose, whose fault is that?

I don't agree that most jobs are minimum wage or a little above.  I know a lot of people, and I don't know anybody who works at the level job they had as a teenager.  

The problem is much more complex than that, and is really two-fold.  One is social and demographic, the other economic, and they overlap.  On the one hand, there is a political philosophy, loosely called feminism, that effectively encourages people, particularly women, to eschew traditional values, one of the most important of which was to have a husband before you have a child.  This, coupled with perverse incentives from the government to the underclass, has created a boom in single-parent families.

At the same time, women have been encouraged to work outside the home, and a circular problem has been created.  Demographically, the housing market is largely driven by 2-career families, meaning that prices have risen dramatically, relative to a single person's income, in the last 3 decades.  A family living on one average income, and needing to provide its own housing, is worse-off today than 30 years ago because of this.

On the economic front, the loss of global manufacturing supremacy by the US, in the 1970s, something that could not have been avoided, means that today there is more of a premium on education than there was in the past.  Real earnings for unskilled workers have fallen, while real earnings for educated workers has risen sharply.  This has been compounded by the switch from predominantly single income to two-income households, effectively widening the gap between the educated and uneducated, since the uneducated have lost the ability they had previously to narrow the earnings gap by having the wife in the family work.

So in sum, there is a confluence of social and economic factors that has entrenched poverty and deprivation more deeply for those who don't do things in the right order.  We should be telling our kids this, drumming it into their heads, so that they see the consequences of messing up in this area, because this is not something that any of us can fundamentally change.

opebo's proposals, as always, are laughable.  They will only deepen the problem.  The only real solution is to discourage people from getting themselves into a situation in which they have a child with no spouse and no job skills.

[dazzleman]

Flyers you are absolutely correct about the sad state of employment opportunities and the sorry wage levels in the US.  However I take issue with the assumption that people should be expected to get off of welfare.  Built into the capitalist system is a requirement of about 4 or 5% unemployment to prevent upward pressure on wages - this is orchestrated by the Federal Reserve as the main lever for implementing its stated purpose, which is to prevent inflation. 

It is unreasonable to expect people to get off of welfare if they don't want to.  I mean why should we care?  Really it is just the puritan work ethic, which demands that people 'work' for their living - of course the rich never do.  We need to get past the work ethic as the Europeans have before we can ever look at these issues reasonably.

You're smoking crack.  It's people who work who support people on welfare.  Your comment that the rich don't work may be true of your family, but it generally is not.  Your view of the world is seriously skewed and distorted.

[opebo]

Flyers you are absolutely correct about the sad state of employment opportunities and the sorry wage levels in the US.  However I take issue with the assumption that people should be expected to get off of welfare.  Built into the capitalist system is a requirement of about 4 or 5% unemployment to prevent upward pressure on wages - this is orchestrated by the Federal Reserve as the main lever for implementing its stated purpose, which is to prevent inflation. 

It is unreasonable to expect people to get off of welfare if they don't want to.  I mean why should we care?  Really it is just the puritan work ethic, which demands that people 'work' for their living - of course the rich never do.  We need to get past the work ethic as the Europeans have before we can ever look at these issues reasonably.

You're smoking crack.  It's people who work who support people on welfare.  Your comment that the rich don't work may be true of your family, but it generally is not.  Your view of the world is seriously skewed and distorted.

No, the tax money that supports a welfare system should come primarily from the rich - the owning class.  From profits or return on capital, in other words, rather than 'earned income'.  Of course there are some people who work but are paid a lot, such as yourself.  These people are rare, but can certainly afford to pay a hefty tax.  After all, their work is much easier than that of the lower classes.

[opebo]

Someone needs to look up the Humphrey-Hawkins Full Employment Act.

Why don't you take a look at unemployment in the countries with economic systems of the sort you advocate? Yet unemployment in the laissez-faire 20s was a record low of 3 percent.

If the rich never work for their living, what is my father doing every day?

The primary purpose of the Federal Reserve is to prevent inflation.  In practice its goal is about a 4% to 5% unemployment rate.  Did you notice in the late 1990's when the unemployment rate got too low the Fed raised rates?  (also conveniently underminding Al Gore). 

As for unemployment in Western Europe - it is about the same, though their more honest reporting make it appear higher.  Besides, where is the sting of unemployment in a country with a civilized, generous welfare state?

Lastly, if your father is working so much, perhaps he isn't rich.

[A18]

The Federal Reserve is the only thing that can cause long-term inflation. If preventing it were their only purpose, they would do nothing.

There is no sting with a generous welfare state. That's the problem.

If we're not rich, then obviously the average American isn't doing as badly as you claim.

[A18]

If wealth should be determined by how 'hard' someone works, then I guess picking up large rocks in the middle of nowhere should earn me a lot of money.

Thankfully, that's not how our system works. It's about the value of the work to people, with money that they fairly earned or received (from someone who earned it, down the line).

For the record, working at Roy Rogers is not more difficult than computer programming or the type of thing dazzleman does.

[dazzleman]

No, the tax money that supports a welfare system should come primarily from the rich - the owning class.  From profits or return on capital, in other words, rather than 'earned income'.  Of course there are some people who work but are paid a lot, such as yourself.  These people are rare, but can certainly afford to pay a hefty tax.  After all, their work is much easier than that of the lower classes.

Tax revenue does come mainly from "the rich" as you call them.  And you are wrong that highly paid work is easier than low-paying jobs.  In most cases, the reverse is true, though high-paying jobs surely have more status.  Whether they are harder or easier depends on level of training, and personal preference for type of work.  Not having worked at all, that's not something you'd know a lot about.

[opebo]

The Federal Reserve is the only thing that can cause long-term inflation. If preventing it were their only purpose, they would do nothing.

Strange theory.  In any case, their goal is not 0% unemployment but around 4-5% unemployment.  In other words it is the government's goal to impoverish about 4-5% of the people.

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I don't consider it a problem - only those afflicted with a protestant work ethic would consider it a problem.

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If he has to work, I suppose he is not 'rich'.  My definition of rich requires leisure and living off of return on capital, not merely a highly paid working class.

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Absolutely!  My point was to denigrate the idea that 'hard work' matters at all.  In fact most lowly paid work is highly unpleasant, while higher paid work is fairly pleasant.  None of which has any bearing on anything, so why should it be such a big part of our protestant work ethic? Lets just recognize that income level and status is determined by class and not individual 'effort'.

[opebo]

No, the tax money that supports a welfare system should come primarily from the rich - the owning class.  From profits or return on capital, in other words, rather than 'earned income'.  Of course there are some people who work but are paid a lot, such as yourself.  These people are rare, but can certainly afford to pay a hefty tax.  After all, their work is much easier than that of the lower classes.

Tax revenue does come mainly from "the rich" as you call them.  And you are wrong that highly paid work is easier than low-paying jobs.  In most cases, the reverse is true, though high-paying jobs surely have more status.  Whether they are harder or easier depends on level of training, and personal preference for type of work.  Not having worked at all, that's not something you'd know a lot about.

I'm just making the point that 'hard work', pleasantness, unpleasantness, individual 'effort, and all that sort of thing is rather vague and subjective.  One has one's job because of one fortune of birth and class identity, not because of any of those canards so prized by believers in the protestant work ethic.

[migrendel]

Unreformed welfare was only 1% of the national budget, far less than we give to useless missile shields, pointless public works programs, and a large group of old people who could survive on their savings without grasping for their Social Security check. The fact of the matter is that there is enough private wealth in this country to support every shiftless Faulpelz for the rest of his or her life. The only thing that stops us is an ability to countenance the suffering of others.

[The Duke]

Unreformed welfare was only 1% of the national budget, far less than we give to useless missile shields, pointless public works programs, and a large group of old people who could survive on their savings without grasping for their Social Security check. The fact of the matter is that there is enough private wealth in this country to support every shiftless Faulpelz for the rest of his or her life. The only thing that stops us is an ability to countenance the suffering of others.

Missile Defense was is far less than 1% of the Budget.  Its actually, about 0.4%

[opebo]

Unreformed welfare was only 1% of the national budget, far less than we give to useless missile shields, pointless public works programs, and a large group of old people who could survive on their savings without grasping for their Social Security check. The fact of the matter is that there is enough private wealth in this country to support every shiftless Faulpelz for the rest of his or her life. The only thing that stops us is an ability to countenance the suffering of others.

Missile Defense was is far less than 1% of the Budget.  Its actually, about 0.4%

The wealth-transfer program known as the military budget is about 15% of the budget.