Of course, if you are comparing whatever welfare is today to work, I suppose the welfare cases get full medical benefits too?
The “teachers only work 10 months a year” thing really gets me, even though I am not a teacher. It’s not like there’s someone out there waiting to hire hundreds of thousands of teachers for 2 months of the year when they are not teaching.
As for pensions - the one teacher I know who retired, barely could afford it. After 30 years, her husband left her for a younger man, she had to remortgage the house to buy his half off him, 15 years of following him all over with his career left her with not a great pension, and AFAIK she had to split her good pension with his minimal one… Based on the life she lead in retirement, she was NOT rolling in it. Anyone who is under the illusion a cushy defined benefit pension plan will still be the norm in 30 years probably should start working today earning no more than $22,000 to start.
I’m not saying it to criticize teachers or to necessarily imply that their salaries are too high/low*. I’m just saying that we need to compare apples to apples as best we can. If you get two job offers and one gives you $25,000 a year with two months off, and the other offers $25,000 a year to work for 12 full months, we all know which job you’ll take. (All other things being equal.)
And then the OP’s original example goes even further. Having compared the benefits of welfare recipients to cash wages, they compare these people to teachers by ignoring teachers’ benefits and considering only cash wages. So we’re not even comparing apples to oranges at that point - it’s like comparing apples to orange-flavored Kool-Aid.
*If pushed to offer an opinion, I’d say that half of the teachers we have are incompetent and shouldn’t be employed at any price. Let’s double the average salaries we offer, eliminate tenure and seniority, and base continued employment on results.
If you are going to compare benefits - I asume someone on whatever social assistance is available gets medicare/medicaid - so counting an employee’s health benefits as “income” only works if you put a cash equivalent on the medical benefits of the poor.
(Pension benefits - yes, you have a valid point).
Yes, I’d take a 10-month job over a 12-month one. However, it’s not like teachers have a choice. That’s how the job is laid out - and if you don’t get paid for 2 months, then apples-to-apples means counting yearly salary, not hourly.
How competent are teachers? Good question. I have no data for an opinion one way or the other. In Canada, generally, teachers must have a university degree nowadays. that should give a marginal degree of capability. That does not mean the person has the temperment of capability to teach, but I would hope that a few years of practice teaching and evaluation during the B.Ed. also provides some feedback.
lance strongarm, given that I’ve already issued one reminder about not making political jabs in GQ, I’m making this one a warning. Do not do this again.
Well, it’s been explained that this isn’t really a relevant study anymore. Also, that it omits many of the benefits that teachers and other workers receive while maximizing all of the possible benefits a welfare recepient could receive. Is that right?
So, I’d like to see some explanation on how people become eligible for welfare, and what level of benefits they generally receive?
In PA, my home state, I’ve seen on the government website that an average welfare recipient is a single mother with two kids and only receives about $466 monthly. I think that may even be dated, and that welfare spending has been cut since then.
Well, you have to define the term first. “Welfare” can conceivably cover any of a dozen programs- anything from food stamps to Social Security disability benefits. The eligibility for each program varies (and often varies within a program between states).
See that’s what I mean. I’m pretty clueless about the subject. I know enough to know that it is difficult to even become eligible, and that they receive little I the way of benefits. But when talking about this with people who say, “those lazy people who sit on their ass all day collecting welfare…”, I like to hit back with facts. Right now, all I can say is “you’re wrong” but have a difficult time explaining why or backing it up.
The “big four” modern welfare programs that I can think of are these:
Food stamps: usually a debit card nowadays; only usable to purchase food. Interesting fact: more people qualify for this than actually use it.
Housing assistance: a payment only for rent. Around here, it’s called Section 8 and is paid directly to landlords.
Child health insurance: for those who do not have employer-provided health insurance and meet income requirements, the state pays for some or all of the kids’ insurance.
Disability: could be a combination of Social Security disability or different state disability programs, maybe even related to worker’s comp (and there’s no consensus on which, if any, of these are “welfare” - everyone’s got their own opinion). It can provide medical benefits and/or cash payments. It’s often possible to qualify even if you can do some work.
There are also some programs like shelters for the homeless (who are often families with jobs, not just crazy winos), food banks and other programs.
I would start by looking up the programs in your particular state. As noted by others, there is no such thing as “welfare” such that you can talk about what the benefits are across the entire US – there are 50 states with 50 different sets of social services programs. You don’t have a location posted in your profile.