| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 7/31/2009 6:06:34 PM | | I think a requirement of receiving aid should be you have to have a job. Even if it's at McDonald's flippn burgers or at Kinko's straight flippin copies (if you understood that Kinko's bit, message me because I'm sure we would get along lol). I have seen ONE instance in my life where a women was raisng 2 kids, no help and wasn't making much money but she worked and got food stamps. I really think it's a system that needs a MAJOR overhaul. I am a single mother raising two kids, and the state tells me I make too much money to receive anything.....geez. (I applied to get medical ins. on kids) | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 7/31/2009 6:23:45 PM | ^^ be lucky you are in ontario and not new brunswick... myself and my 2 children qualify for $770 per month. for me it was a temporary thing and now that my kids are school aged i am in the process of looking for work however good paying work is hard to come by in this province... reading some of these posts we should all pack up and move to the states..... what the heck are food stamps and how far into the states do we have to move to get them. just today i payed my rent, bills, groceries and let each child spend $5 on a luxery item (they each got a new book), i have $5 left in my wallet to last the next 3 weeks. I cannot wait to get back to work unfortunatly most of the available work in this area is low paying so my finances will not improve by much.
my definition of abusing the system are the ones who take that $770 and after they pay the rent (if they even bother to pay it) they go to the bar, liquor store, drug dealer, etc, have no groceries in their house for their child, etc etc. , the ones who stay on the system their entire lives with no desire to re-enter the work force, the ones who do go back to work but keep that secret so they can still continue to receive benifits, the ones who move a half a dozen rent paying roomates in, again secretly, and said roomates amount's added together equal enough to pay the rent for the residence and leave the assistance recipent still making a good profit while still receiving assistance. it is those people who give the rest of us that do use it as a short term solution such a bad name within society. We all get lumped into the same sterotype without looking at the individual situations because the ones most often seen or heard about are the ones who are abusing the system. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 7/31/2009 6:26:47 PM | | I think people who have never worked and aren't even legally adults, like teen mothers, absolutely should not get welfare. They are the responsibility of their parents, and those parents should also have to care for their grandchildren. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 7/31/2009 7:38:13 PM | I live in PEI, Canada. I am "in the system" and have been for a few years due to my child having special needs. I recently learned about the Disability Tax Credit, which is similar to Child Tax Credit for those Canadians or other who know what it is. It would give a couple hundred dollars a month to help with extra cost of having a child with disabilities. It can be backdated to date of birth or diagnosis (each case varies).
So I figured GREAT, I can apply for that, it would be backdated to birth for my son, I'd have a decent nest-egg, be able to go back to work AND afford the special care he needs when I'm not home.
Found out last month that I was SO...very....wrong. My income support worker told me that if I do get a back payment of thousands of dollars, they would take it from me, to be counted as income I would have been getting all along. So..I'd STILL be stuck on "welfare" not having gotten ahead at all, so what the hell's the point of applying for it?
Frustration? Just a tad. I'd love to be able to have the feeling of making my own money, to be able to get out in the world and have contact with adults again. But the "system" people complain so much about people abusing...make it too damn hard for someone like me to get the hell out of the hole that I'm in. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 7/31/2009 9:56:56 PM | I have SOOOO much I can say about the topic of welfare... here in the US...
I few years ago I had a wonderful job and supposedly wonderful husband.... until he turned abusive on me while pregnant. I quit that job and moved home to my family, 3000 miles away. I was 6 months pregnant and could not find a decent job and was also distressed at the idea of leaving my soon to be newborn at a day care center...
So, I applied for assistance. It was really hard for me based on all the stereotypes you hear. But I needed it, my baby needed it.
It took me about 2 years to get back on my feet. I had so many experiences those 2 years I was on the welfare system. Good and bad. The social workers try really hard to help you get on your feet - have you take job search classes, make you prove you are applying for jobs. They really are great people and have the best intentions.
But as other posts have stated, the system if flawed. There really is a point where it pays you MORE to stay at home than it does to go out there and work. I am a numbers-person; I did the math. And at one point, when I first started working again, I had less $ for my living expenses than I did when I was staying at home/looking for work and receiving assistance. The formulas need to be reworked - there needs to be more incentive for people to get out there and make their own $.
Abusers of the system? Most definitely. And it makes me sick. I personally know people who do not work, have not looked for work in years, stay at home and smoke all day, and accept all the assistance they can take. Granted, alot of these people also have emotional/mental issues that prohibit them from taking the initiative. But they need to be gently nudged somehow.
I think it is sad that so many people abuse the system. I honestly needed the assistance at one point in my life. People can judge all that they want, but it saved my life. It has saved many people's lives. That is what it is there for. When people take advantage of it, it only takes away from the next person than might really need it.
Ok, enough of my soap box! I don't even know if I had a point, but just had to share my own experiences... | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 7/31/2009 10:26:30 PM | As long as there is a welfare system, there will be those who abuse it. But it is necessary to have a viable means within the government to help those in need. I believe there need to be stricter controls on who recieves benefits, and who doesn't.
Like in Medicare and Medicaid, there are doctors and hospitals who commit fraud all the time. They need to be severely punished.
If you sell your foodstamps for cigarettes and drugs, you should be jailed and fined.
For the most part, those recieving assistance need it, and try to establish themselves within the work force again as soon as they are able. Those who don't should be exposed and cut off after a reasonable amount of time, barring illness or disability.
Basic fact...if you are getting foodstamps, section 8, fuel assistance, and a living expense check every month, you shouldn't be driving an Escalade.
Beth | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/1/2009 12:32:53 PM | The system makes it tough to get out, while constantly urging its recipients to get work, keep it and manage to wean themselves off. That's extremely hard to do when you can't even save anything. I guess you have to stash it away in some anonymous place and forget about it.
Thankfully I qualified for Disability. I have osteoarthritis in both knees and lower back, as well as starting in my left hand. My right foot has plantar fasciitis so I'm basically in ongoing discomfort. The pressure to get a job is not a factor. I can have one, and I'm exempt up to $500 a month earnings, but I'm not being leaned on about it. Still ... there are always critics who think I'm just enjoying a free ride.
Sure, I enjoy it! About as much as I'd enjoy a free plane ride while having about 100 pounds of luggage sitting on my knees. Oooohhh, turbulence. Shifting weight.
............................................ ow.
Waahhhhh...
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/1/2009 4:26:10 PM |
The system makes it tough to get out, while constantly urging its recipients to get work, keep it and manage to wean themselves off. That's extremely hard to do when you can't even save anything. I guess you have to stash it away in some anonymous place and forget about it.
Thankfully I qualified for Disability. I have osteoarthritis in both knees and lower back, as well as starting in my left hand. My right foot has plantar fasciitis so I'm basically in ongoing discomfort. The pressure to get a job is not a factor. I can have one, and I'm exempt up to $500 a month earnings, but I'm not being leaned on about it. Still ... there are always critics who think I'm just enjoying a free ride.
Sure, I enjoy it! About as much as I'd enjoy a free plane ride while having about 100 pounds of luggage sitting on my knees. Oooohhh, turbulence. Shifting weight.
Anyone who thinks a person with a medical issue is abusing the system is a moron. Let them walk a quarter of a mile in the shoes of anyone with chronic pain. They wouldn't last 5 seconds. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 2:14:14 AM |
As long as there is a welfare system, there will be those who abuse it.
I say: As long as there is "do gooders" that say, oh poor them, they don't know any better, its sad, lets stop picking on them and help them, lets make it easier for them, just like their parents did for them "gave them everything they wanted and if they didn't get it, they screamed until they received"..
I say: People should stop listening to the annoying bloody "do gooders".. There is a difference between helping people, and assisting their laziness.. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 11:00:01 AM |
I say: As long as there is "do gooders" that say, oh poor them, they don't know any better, its sad, lets stop picking on them and help them, lets make it easier for them, just like their parents did for them "gave them everything they wanted and if they didn't get it, they screamed until they received"..
I say: People should stop listening to the annoying bloody "do gooders".. There is a difference between helping people, and assisting their laziness..
Well ok, I agree to a certain extent, but not all people on welfare are lazy. I do think a civilized society needs a safety net of some sort. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 5:55:34 PM | Abusing welfare is when a woman continues to have more children to get a bigger check. If she cannot afford the children she has, don't have more at the taxpayer expense.
Octomom is a welfare queen who makes me sick. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 5:57:02 PM |
Abusing welfare is when a woman continues to have more children to get a bigger check. If she cannot afford the children she has, don't have more at the taxpayer expense.
Octomom is a welfare queen who makes me sick.
I agree totally! Octomom is demented. Where has she been lately, anyway? | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 6:38:52 PM |
Abusing welfare is when a woman continues to have more children to get a bigger check. If she cannot afford the children she has, don't have more at the taxpayer expense.
anyone who beleives those who have children while on assistance are somehow obtaining big bucks really need their head checked.... im not sure how things work in the states, but in the canadian province i live in a person only gets around $30 per month added to their cheque for any additional children they might have after the first child.... considering the cost of raising said child is a few hundred dollars more than said $30 per month, no woman is out there trying to get rich on welfare by spitting out babies. if anything they are putting themselves further into an already poverty situation. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 6:54:27 PM | There are no people get pregnant and think "hell, I'll just go on welfare." Do you have any idea of the money that welfare pays? The people who "abuse the system" do so because they don't know any other way. We test them for job skill levels, etc. A lot of them who "abuse the system" have less than a 7th grade level of understanding. Those teenagers who get pregnant and "abuse the system" do so because they don't even know to think beyond it.
To clarify, to me, welfare isn't food stamps or Medical, but the cash. That little bit of money isn't doing anything for anybody. In MD, a mother with one child will get $453. Is that going to pay for anything? No. Not rent, not daycare, a car payment and insurance. Nothing.
The system will be way different when the supplements to welfare change. Take away the housing and it'll be a whole different ballgame. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 7:16:39 PM |
There are no people get pregnant and think "hell, I'll just go on welfare." Do you have any idea of the money that welfare pays? The people who "abuse the system" do so because they don't know any other way. We test them for job skill levels, etc. A lot of them who "abuse the system" have less than a 7th grade level of understanding. Those teenagers who get pregnant and "abuse the system" do so because they don't even know to think beyond it.
If welfare weren't there for them in the first place, they'd have to think, or maybe think about not having babies until they can afford them. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 8:11:18 PM | "If welfare weren't there for them in the first place, they'd have to think, or maybe think about not having babies until they can afford them."
You're probably right. But we'd have to go back a long ways and just not have started the system in the first place. They may make changes, etc, but they'll never do away with it completely. There will always be some kind of safety net. Like other posters have said, the babies are who welfare is for.
On the other hand, even if welfare wasn't there, would someone who doesn't have the capacity to plan for the future do so? There's a reason STDs are rampant too. People just don't think... | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 8:39:10 PM | I know this is old news but I must say I was kind of disappointed to see what people have wrote, Some of us on welfare don't choose to be ,but must. I myself had to use the system and I was not proud to be on it but when you are a single mom of a handicapped child you have to swallow your pride and do it for your child. Childcare for my son would of cost me $937.45 a week just because he is handicapped now you tell my what job (McDonalds) is going to pay that a week. I do not think so.
The people who abuse the system are the ones who lie about their income to get in the system people who drive expensive cars, wear designer clothes, the drug addicts who sell there food stamps to buy there next fix.
There is a new bill trying to be past: You must take a drug test before receiving welfare which only the beginning.
If it was not for welfare my son and I would of lost everything, Thank god they helped me with daycare costs.
Please do not think that all people on welfare want to be on it. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 8:51:57 PM |
I know this is old news but I must say I was kind of disappointed to see what people have wrote, Some of us on welfare don't choose to be ,but must. I myself had to use the system and I was not proud to be on it but when you are a single mom of a handicapped child you have to swallow your pride and do it for your child. Childcare for my son would of cost me $937.45 a week just because he is handicapped now you tell my what job (McDonalds) is going to pay that a week. I do not think so.
The people who abuse the system are the ones who lie about their income to get in the system people who drive expensive cars, wear designer clothes, the drug addicts who sell there food stamps to buy there next fix.
There is a new bill trying to be past: You must take a drug test before receiving welfare which only the beginning.
If it was not for welfare my son and I would of lost everything, Thank god they helped me with daycare costs.
Please do not think that all people on welfare want to be on it.
Not many people would begrudge others for needing assistance with a handicapped child. However, why would a single person who works at McDonald's have two children, even if both were perfectly healthy?
That just seems like an uphill battle, trying to afford raising two children alone, with a minimum wage, or slightly above, job. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 9:47:55 PM | What makes me laugh about this whole "Abusing the System" chatter is that I think people believe that when these folks get welfare that they are somehow living large. What are you given as assistance still leaves you way below the poverty line. You just scrape by. So their abuse of the system is just getting their kids fed and lets them buy the things they need. If they are going to party on this money, trust they are lacking necessities. For a mother and her two kids they may get with the combination of food stamps (which are on a card that can't be used for anything but some approved food items) and cash assistance is under $1000 a month.
While I believe that there are some people that do take that money and piss it away, most use it to do what it is intended. Which is feed, clothe and shelter their family. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 10:13:04 PM |
If welfare weren't there for them in the first place, they'd have to think, or maybe think about not having babies until they can afford them.
There was a time where there wasn't welfare. And they sent their children to work in factories. In other countries they still do such a thing. A lot of children end up abused, prostituted or simply abandoned to die.
Babies will still be born. I just have to wonder, without aid what these children's life will be like.
But all this judgement is useless unless you have been there. I've seen two friends struggle trying to take care of thier kids. Both with three kids with marriages that broke apart and they had to take care of their kids. Neither expected it. No one wants to be on welfare or poor.
And to say that mothers that are underage should not get a cent? So a parent that barely could cope, now having their child have a child, should try to make do with monies that weren't making it? Of course it's easy to throw the word abortion out there but hey, did you know that costs money too? And mostly if you aren't already on welfare they will not front the cost.
Sounds to me like they would be screwed either way. We already have teens leaving babies in trash cans, suffocating or drowning their newborn children because they believe that they are in an impossible situation. I can't imagine how they would feel if they had no help what so ever. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 10:24:57 PM |
There was a time where there wasn't welfare. And they sent their children to work in factories. In other countries they still do such a thing. A lot of children end up abused, prostituted or simply abandoned to die.
Babies will still be born. I just have to wonder, without aid what these children's life will be like.
But all this judgement is useless unless you have been there. I've seen two friends struggle trying to take care of thier kids. Both with three kids with marriages that broke apart and they had to take care of their kids. Neither expected it. No one wants to be on welfare or poor.
And to say that mothers that are underage should not get a cent? So a parent that barely could cope, now having their child have a child, should try to make do with monies that weren't making it? Of course it's easy to throw the word abortion out there but hey, did you know that costs money too? And mostly if you aren't already on welfare they will not front the cost.
Sounds to me like they would be screwed either way. We already have teens leaving babies in trash cans, suffocating or drowning their newborn children because they believe that they are in an impossible situation. I can't imagine how they would feel if they had no help what so ever.
First of all, these teens should stop having babies, period. Many of them are getting pregnant purposefully. Maybe if there weren't as many government programs as there are, some of them would choose not to have children. As for the ones who get pregnant by accident. abortions cost A LOT LESS
than giving birth, raising a child, etc., etc. If they can't even do that, and their own parents can barely afford to feed them, they should give their newborn up for adoption. Wouldn't it be better for the child to be raised in a happy, financially comfortable 2 parent home, with as much unconditional love as any bio parent could give? Rather than living in poverty, even with welfare? | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/2/2009 10:46:40 PM | Teens should stop having babies... that's your solution? If you find a way to get teens to stop having sex that would solve the problem too? The point is that it happens and there is no definitive way to stop these things from continuing to happen. And a teen is still the parent of their baby. A parent can not force their teen to give up their child if they don't want to.
It would be great if these things would happen and people would do the right thing. That is the point. Life doesn't work the way we want it to. Welfare is not the miracle that you think it to be. Not the patch that heals the wound. None of these are a fix to the problem. It's a band aid to a hemorrhage.
If we could stop teens and parents who shouldn't be parents from having kids that wouldn't stop people from needing welfare. I think that is the point that you need to understand. The families on welfare are not all teen life drug addict deadbeats sucking the money from the "good people". Sometimes there are just people that are down on their luck. | |
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| Defining the Term Abusing the System Regarding Welfare
Posted: 8/3/2009 5:15:26 AM |
If we could stop teens and parents who shouldn't be parents from having kids that wouldn't stop people from needing welfare. I think that is the point that you need to understand. The families on welfare are not all teen life drug addict deadbeats sucking the money from the "good people". Sometimes there are just people that are down on their luck.
I never said welfare was a miracle, and I never said "The families on welfare are all teen life drug addict deadbeats sucking the money from the "good people". " In fact, I have said this: " Sometimes there are just people that are down on their luck."
What I also said was, I don't think minors who have never worked should be allowed to go on welfare. They are still the responsibility of their own parents. If their parents cannot afford another mouth to feed, it is their responsibility to impart that knowledge onto their own children.
Since when is society responsible for the costs incurred by other people's children? | |
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