Welfare

[Arkacia]

I have been reading a lot of different views on whether or not people should be allowed to recieve welfare payments or not. Some say yes, but only as a helping hand, not as a wage and with restrictions/means testing, some say no-one should be able to access it under any circumstances, some say everyone should be able to access welfare whenever they need it without restriction.

Personally I'm with the first group. There are some segments of the communtity that I do believe should get welfare payments without question. These groups include the elderly and disabled. As these groups can not work, through no fault of their own, they should be able to claim welfare, which should be a decent amount to live on, with only a generous means test.

One of the groups I strongly believe should'nt get it indefinetly include single mothers. My opinion here is they should only get payment for the first 6 months after the baby is born. This may sound heartless, but my feeling here is, you breed em, you feed em. I know every situation is different, but the 6 months is more than enough time for a new mother to get child care sorted, and find a job, or for a parent to get themselves sorted out after a breakup. I do know women (a cousin in paticular who had 4 kids to 3 different fathers in the space of 6 years), who deliberatly got pregnant to go on the pension, and escape having to work.

The unemployed I believe are singled out for a lot of slagging, because some think that if you don't have a job, you don't want a job. Again every situation is different. The person who was retrenched at 45 and is having huge problems finding another job because most empolyers don't like hiring anyone over 40, is a different case from the 24 year old who has never worked in his/her life and would rather spend the day on the beach than find a job. I'm not trying to discriminate with the ages either, I do know there are young people who are long term unemployed, but do try to find and want a job, and older people who don't. They're just examples.

I don't know about elsewhere, but Australia has a "work for the dole" scheme, and I do thing its a good thing. Long term unempolyed have to work 3 days a week at a venue chosen by their social security office (I think that how it works). These venues include charity shops etc. This gives them some self confidence, and gets them back into the work habit, and means they are giving something back to the community for their payments.

Well, I've waffled on long enough. What do you think of people receiving welfare, and the way the welfare system works in your country?

[Mick]

I do think that welfare should be available to those who really need it, eg the elderly, disabled and new mothers. As for how long new mothers get welfare, I think they should get up to a year.
I agree it is wrong for women to get pregnant just for welfare and what about the payments the government handed out for people with kids. This was an Australian thing where parents received payments for having kids. When it was discussed on the radio, I was shocked at the number of girls(some very young) that were planning on having a baby just to get the payments. The cost of raising a child was much higher than the payments, it was just a stupid scheme to gain votes(Yes it was shortly before elections).

Anyway, back onto the topic... I certainly don't think welfare should be available to anyone. The way things are today there are still far too many welfare cheats and those taking advantage of the system. I know of one person who is on a pension, he is 24 and has been getting benefits since he was 18. He supposedly has ADD and was tested by a doctor who gave him a certificate to get the pension. I know for a fact, there is nothing wrong with him apart from an attitude problem. He is quite capable of working, i've heard he does some work on the side. It is people like this that make me really angry when they are qutie capable of working but they say "Why should I work if I don't have to?"

On the other side of the argument, there are certainly many people out there who desperately need help and I think they should get it. But how do you decide if someone really needs it? We already have a system that is supposed to determine this but does it work? I don't think so.

I do think the work for the dole scheme is a good idea, at least if our taxes are paying these people they should give something back. There are plenty of community service jobs they could do, for those who are unable to do physical work there are plenty of admin jobs or charities who need help.

From what I have heard the American welfare system is more strict and less forgiving than the Australian, but perhaps we should hear that from our American members ;)
It certainly is a subject that you could type many pages on.... but then i'm not getting paid for this so why should I bother :D

[Arkacia]

I agree it is wrong for women to get pregnant just for welfare and what about the payments the government handed out for people with kids. This was an Australian thing where parents received payments for having kids. When it was discussed on the radio, I was shocked at the number of girls(some very young) that were planning on having a baby just to get the payments. The cost of raising a child was much higher than the payments, it was just a stupid scheme to gain votes(Yes it was shortly before elections). I do totally agree with you about the "baby bonus" Mick, but did'nt incude it because it technically is'nt welfare, as its available to all new mothers, single or married without any kind of means test.

Like you said, it was just a vote buying exercise by the current government, and a cynical attempt by Howard and co to get Australian women to breed.

In the long term, I believe this payment will cause a lot more probs than it solves, as at least some of the single mothers who had babies to get this money, will end up on the pension for the next 16 years. I wonder if they will ever tell their kids "I only had you to get $3,000 from the government, I did'nt really want you". A very sad scenario.

[Eric]

With regards to young women falling pregnant, I can help but feel there are other social issues behind this. Frankly, kids shouldn't be having kids! Bringing their baby into the classroom? Really, I find this sort of thing completely unacceptable and the baby bonus certainly encourages this 'welfare state' attitude.

I suppose that we pay has much in welfare payments as we are socially and morally required to. These payments, from my brief experience with such things, are not huge and allow one to merely survive... not really 'live' ...and perhaps for those with little ambition or desire this is satisfactory.


Cheers,

Eric

[Baller]

i THINK PEOPLE shouLd be able to revieve welfare payments, but only to help them get out of hard situations. They should be working or at least be looking for a job. Otherwise people would drop out of school, never work, and live off of welfare payments.
If I sound like a total idiot its because I dont know much about how welfare works

[Arkacia]

You don't sound like a total idiot at all :).

I agree with you about the unemployed, but welfare goes a lot further, and covers a lot more than that. The elderly and disabled, who can't work, do deserve welfare, and a decent amount so they're not just scraping by from payment to payment, but get to enjoy their lives a little as well.

[pollovivo]

Maybe if there was a limit as to the period of time you could collect welfare during unemployment to keep people from dying, but still enticing them to look for a job...

[HinesDaMan]

I differ from the views of most Republicans on this topic...I think that welfare is an ingenious and noble idea, and that it is great that our country has a program to help those less fortunate than the rest of us. I would agree in a little reforn to help people become less dependent, but I think that if that doesn't happen the program is fine as it is.

[Freakums]

hmmm . . . i would say that it should be given with non-obvious checking to elderly, (such as making a check to see if they cheated the system in the past, and if they could be doing so now, or what other benefits are they receiving, because if you ahve a 1500 payment form your retiremtn paln comign in, you arenm;t poor and don;t need welfare, sorry! but not as muich questioning and more acceptance, yes). for retarded people, i think it shoudl depend on how much retarded. i have met mentally retarded peopel who are as mucghb able to qwork as you and i, if you only have a small communiucation barrier because they don;t know hwpo to control their speech muscules ezxcatly right, or physically ratarded peopel with no legs, but could carve excellantly, or liek ym granbdpa who is both, mentally and physically, (because of pollio) but 2was one of the leadign enigneers in Germany, and, in fact,had (or he miught still have it, i don;t know) a world record for winnign the most gold medals (and still won other medals too) at the paralmpics. i think he won ten. I learned that just yesterday, actually.

as for the rets of the groups,
well, i don;lt think mothers should exactly receiev welfare. They should receive housing, clothes, and food and 0other nesscessities. first of all, thats cheaper, thats ebnoughnb to live on, and iot can be given indefenitly until they have earned so muich money, and they can move out. Then they slowly pay the system back, about halfway in total. oh, and onyl until all the kids are past the age
of 10 or so, or maybe the legal working age. that way the money couldn;t be abused, stolen, etc. and the mother (or father . . .) could spend more time searching for a job as opposed to spending every weekend at the social workers, fending off land lords, (or ladies), goping to church everyday to take advantage of the church help the needy programs . . . (most often they don;t request you believe in god, or that you do anythign more then want to take advantage of the help the needy programs, so long as you at least listened to the daily sermons. the needy make up most of the daily sermons, excpet for sundays.)
I lived through all that as a kid. then mom moved to Newfoundland.
she bought a house for 2000$ and then was able to go to uni on the same amount of money . . . but eway lower living costs and expenses, and didn;t need any more hlep the needy programs. but she had to save up for 6 years to get that 800$ she needed to get here no frills from toronto. which was mostly the last payment of her rent that she withheld from her landlord because he was an a$$hole and refused to fix problems that weren't legally allowed, and raised the rent every time mom complained. he only kept us in the house because dad sold him cheap pot when he was high.
enough story. you see where i'm coming from wuith ym stiff and strict opinion.

beyondf those cases, i am reading somehting interesting right noiw, which declares the Newfoundland premiers (Danny Williams) opinion, but not nescessairly political intent, oin this problem. He suggests keeping welfare for special groups, and giving the majority a boosted unemployment check for a shorter time, as long as they applied for at least 5 jobs honestly each time.
(so many checks = 5 job applications)
and everytime they reapplied, they would ahve toi show iomprovement on their job applization skills . .. on their resumes,. at the interviews, etc.
or to be trying to show improvement (which is the same thign, oif you think about it)
and then peopel who are poor, but coulodn;t qualify for any welfarew would get extremely poor housign and foor and clothes. becuase if they can;t even bother to apply for a job, aren;lt serioiuslyt disablked or retarded, aren't seniors, and are just lazy, well, tough luck. you could always apply for a job . . .
of course, you wouldn;t be allowed to keep oin this allowance after you got a job offer. until you were fired. quitting ios not an option, as you should be able to address any issues through legal ways, or else, say your boss ansd you don;t get along, you would be fired anyway.
I like that idea. but it probably won';t egt ebnforced becuyase
" . . . there isn;t enough time bteween elections for me to pu tit in place, as it would probably lose me most of the Newfoundland vote. And i don;lt think peopel could forgive me in ten years let alone .. ."
:D
rememebr, newfoundland unemployment = 70%
employment if every job was filled = about 60%, plus unadvertised (in anyway, whatsoever) jobs (The "hidden job market".).
course,mt hgat assuming evryoien has suffcient education.
besides, employmenmt in ontario if every advertised job woulkd be filled is about 270%. not i8nclidign temporary residents, which are proabbly most of the provinces actual population.