I see I have made a dreadful mistake. When I use the term incompetent, I am being unfairly pejorative to many readers. I do not mean to blame anyone personally. I use the tem in its legal sense. I am incompetent to practice medicine, but that does not mean I am a bad person or stupid. It simply means I have not been educated in this area. Most Americans are fiscally incompetent, amazingly, even most of the ones who are wealthy. How else do you think we get so many bankruptcies of people making over $100k/year?
The problem is that society does not require or encourage a fiscal education. Consider the people whose single biggest asset is their 401k, but do not know what a stock is. Society must make a concerted effort to change this. Simply pumping money into social welfare is not going to help.
I also think things have got a little out hand in regards to perceptions of my opinions. To prevent people from accusing me of beliefs I do not hold (which I have seen a stream of), I will summarize:
It is desirable, even essential, to move the poor out of poverty. Everyone benifits.
The poor are largely poor as a result of their own decisions. These poor decisions are largely a result of a non-existent fiscal education and a inability to consider long-term effects of behavior. These problems are not limited to the poor, but disproportionatly affect the ppooor due to lack orf resources.
No child is responsible for the acts of their parents.
Most poor will stay poor without social welfare programs to help lift them out of poverty. However, social welfare programs are a waste without a change in the underlying behavior. I.e., if you want the handout, you are going to have to change how you live.
No one has the right to abuse their children simply because they are poor. I.e., I have no money so I will not bother to feed my kids. However, being poor is obviously not child abuse. Far from it.
I have many other opinions, which I will be happy to share, but that seems enough for now.
Thank you for the clarification Culture. And yes, using the word “incompetent” is probably not too good an idea in this context. Even with the explanation of your intent, it still comes across the wrong way. Perhaps you should start using a different word to get your point across? I think you’d put off less people that way.
I agree with most of your points as you explain them. However, I think one thing you’re missing is that for those that hardly make enough money to get by as it is, reducing the standard of living by 10% really wouldn’t make too big a difference. Not enough of a difference to prevent catastrophy if a sudden halt of income were to happen.
I don’t make excuses for myself, and I’m certainly not one to brag about being fiscally responsible. My problem lies in little things that constantly come up which deplete my savings on a consistant basis. I do put a little bit in savings every month, but the amount of money I end up having to take out almost always exceeds the amount of money i’m able to put in, and thus, I’m always a part of the “one paycheck away from being homeless” camp. For example, everything I was able to save used to always go towards my tuiton twice a year. I’d save and save, and bam come tuiton time, my savings is gone. Now that I’m graduating (yipee!) I think to myself “wow, now i’ll finally be able to retain my savings!” Not the case. I’ve decided to go to law school, and am now faced with lsat fee’s, application fee’s, tutoring fees on top of graduation fee’s, retroactive tuiton hikes, my taxes that are due, ect. Just can’t seem to ever catch up. I’m planning on getting financial aid when I do start school again in the fall but as an undergrad, I was bound and determined to pay my own way to avoid some major debt when I graduate.
But hey, if you’re serious about that scholarship, let me know
Anyways, this is the case with almost everyone I know. When you’re constantly living on the financial edge, such as myself, if anything major happens, such as unemployment, you’re pretty much screwed. It’s not easy and just not possible for a lot of people to save up enough money to avoid having the unexpected rock their world in the worst possible way. And sometimes circumstances dictate that even the most diligent fiscal habits can end up just not being enough to prevent catastrophe.
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4) If you think eating p&j for every meal instead of steak is what makes children go bad, we are on such different planets that we might as well stop talking now.
Where did I say anything about steaks? A well-balanced diet need not be equated with extravagance. I just have a problem with your rather flippant attitude towards the nourishment of children. You said there is nothing wrong with having children subsist on pb & j sandwiches, and I say there is something wrong with that, especially when we live in a country that gives millions of dollars to foreign aid every year and can drop billion- dollar missiles on countries that pose little danger to us at present. A three-old doesn’t give a damn about learning from the sins of its parents, but you seem to think that somehow letting the kid get by on junk food will keep it on the straight and narrow. I don’t get that.
That’s great, good for them. I’m happy for them. Hurray for lard sandwiches!
I’m not saying food is the end all and be all of producing the next Albert Einstein. People are amazingly resilient creatures and have managed to live through some amazing circumstances and still come out on top. I just think it is unnecessarily stingy to begrude food to people who actually may need it quite desperately. We could always let the poor folks “eat cake”, but history should tell us what happens when we think that’s a good idea. A poor man in India may envy a poor man in rural Alabama, but that doesn’t mean the poor American should be left to starve when our country has the means to help him out.
I agree wholeheartedly. I just don’t feel welfare negates that. It is possible to have welfare in place and still have good families.
Look, I’m as frugal as they come; there’s no need to school me on the art of saving. Your main beef seems to be with individuals who do not manage money well. That’s fine. I just don’t see how cutting welfare will help these people. If their problem comes from ignorance, they should be taught how to manage their money. Maybe that will keep them off the dole. But they will not become money savvy just because someone contemptously says that they should become that way. Letting their kids suffer for their ignorance is not fair, either.
Since sterilization is permanent and poverty need not be, I agree.
However, what about a requirement that women on welfare to support the children that they have get Nor-Plant inserted? ( Or some other reversable but effective birth control ) If you can’t affort to support the kids you’ve got now without my ( the taxpayer’s ) help, why should we subsidize more kids?
Rather than a requirement, I wish that effective, reliable birth control could be offered for free to all poor women. (I wouldn’t suggest Nor-Plant, though, because it’s somewhat painful to insert and remove. Perhaps Depo-Prevera would be a better option.)
As for requiring it, some women’s religious beliefs might forbid their use of birth control. I don’t quite think it’s right to force a woman to chose between food for her children and obeying the tenents of her faith.
I certainly have no problem with offering Norplant-type solutions as a matter of choice.
Requiring them as a condition of public charity still strikes me as barbaric. I recognize that opinions may differ on this point. But from where I sit, it treads dangerously close to eugenics and represents an intrusion into a very sacred purpose of marital life.
The counter-argument voiced by Weirddave and milroyj, among others, is that we as a society will encourage the birth of more children by parents unable to feed them.
I don’t know how much of an incentive such payments actually are. But assuming that they do, in fact, cause women to have children they otherwise wouldn’t… I still believe we are wealthy enough to bear this burden, and that, as a society interested in compassion and concern, we should feed hungry children, even if this action causes some women to have more children.
I agree with Bricker more than one might think. Requiring Norplant doesn’t sit well with me either, and of course we should feed hungry children regardless of their parents actions.
Nevertheless, I think we have to find some way to inject more personal responsibility into the welfare system. To me, if one is on public assistance and already has kids they can’t provide for, it is just wrong to place oneself into a situation to have another child one can’t care for. I don’t have any answer, though.
Well, first of all, it was only a suggestion for y’all to comment on.
Second I was thinking more along the lines of unwed mothers, rather than intruding into someone’s married life, although I could see increasing the $$ ammount of the monthly payment to married welfare receipients who voluntarily agree to Depro or Nor-Plant.
Just so you know, the average amount of money granted to a mother per child per month is $90, which–as any new parent knows–is barely enough to buy diapers and formula. And the birthrate of mothers on welfare is not significantly different than the birthrate of other mothers. In fact, welfare families support, on average, 2 children. So let’s not think that welfare is 1)an incentive for making babies and 2)forcing birth control will do anything.
The last time I checked, you can’t be on welfare longer than 5 years, right? A woman can’t have more than 5 kids in that period of time. How many can a man have? You’d be better of finding the impregnators of welfare mothers and cutting off their dicks. Not that I’m advocating something as terrible as that, but if your goal is to save money…
I never said welfare was an incentive to have babies. My position is that if we( the taxpayers ) are supporting you and your child(ren), you have no business having more babies. Period. If you can pay for them, have as many as you want, if you can’t, you have no business having more.
Gee, monstro, spend much time looking for an inflamitory thing to say here? If safe, reversable birth control was available for men, I’d advocate their being requited to take it as well. Satisfied?
What inflammatory thing did I say? The chopping off the dicks thing? Sorry that offended you so much, but I thought it was clear I was being tongue-in-cheek.
And how do you know I was addressing you? I neither addressed my post to you or mentioned any other names. You did not say that welfare is an incentive for making babies, but that argument has been trumped out here and elsewhere on this board. I was addressing that myth, not you personally. Got it?
I’ve been on your side for almost all of this debate but when you claim it’s impossible for welfare mothers to have more children in order to get more welfare, I have to disagree.
I’m not a welfare expert, but according to a welfare mother I knew personally, the “time limit” on being able to recieve welfare re-starts when one has a new baby. I repeat, I could be wrong about this, policies may have changed in the past few years. All I know is that the mother I knew, actually waited until she would have had to get a job or go off of welfare (I believe because of time limits) and then she would have another baby so she would be “safe” again. I believe she had 5 children when I last spoke with her. She lived and was supported by her parents, but still recieved welfare.
I wholly support social programs, and I know that people like the one I mentioned above are few and far between and that you cannot base your opinion on the entire program based on these obnoxious cases, but I just wanted to voice that while uncommon, it is still possible for a woman to intentionally get pregnant in order to continue recieving welfare.
I have the misfortune of working with someone who while not in need of welfare (she doesn’t even have to work, she only does because her husband doesn’t recieve health benefits through his employment) she has taken disgusting advantage of the Family Leave Act. She doesn’t go to work, she’s insubordinate to her superiors, she’s nasty and agressive to her coworkers and we can’t fire her or she can sue under the family leave act. She brings her children to work with her every day, disrupting meetings, and there’s not a damn thing anyone can do about it. As long as you have a child under the age of 2, you’re covered by the act. When her son turned two, everyone jumped on our boss to fire her while she could, she lagged and within a few months she was pregnant again, and again, protected under the Act. Now we’re stuck for another two years, and she’s become even more obnoxious since the birth of her second child.
Sorry for the hijack, I just had to vent, and give another example of how people do abuse existing systems. :mad:
lezlers, I have no doubt–absolutely none–that there are people who abuse the system. I’ve never said that welfare was perfect or that all who receive benefits are angels.
However, I don’t think abusers make up the majority of the population receiving benefits. I think if people have a problem with abusers, go after the abusers. Don’t go after the people who aren’t.
When people say things like, “welfare mothers should be put on birth control”, part of me says “well, that’s not a bad idea”. But then another part of me thinks, “Isn’t that a little extreme, if we assume the stats are correct and welfare folks aren’t baby factories?” And birth control comes with risks. I’m not sure I would want to make someone incur those risks just so that I feel comfortable at night knowing my money isn’t going to feed any more crumb snatchers. (Plus, birth control isn’t accepted by some religions. I guess the good little Catholic woman won’t be getting her foodstamps).
I’m not sure about the five year limit restarting with each child, but I’m not an expert on welfare so I don’t know. If this is the case, it’s such a gaping loophole that it would almost render the policy useless.
The five year limit isn’t set in stone, as a state does have some amount of discretion. But for the same reason, it seems to me that they would be able–through casework evaluation and whatnot–to “find out” someone abusing the system like the woman you describe, lezlers.
Oh, I totally agree, monstro, I had inferred from your post that you didn’t believe any woman would ever have another child just to continue recieving benefits. We’re on the same page then.
I’m actually one of those women who can’t do hormonal birth control. I’m not on welfare, don’t have any children and do use forms of birth control other than hormonal. I’ve tried hormonal birth control and ended up in the hospital, my body can’t deal with it. I have severe heart palpatations, dizziness, shortness of breath, ect. That’s why I would never dream of trying depo or norplant, or anything I can’t just stop taking whenever I feel like it, whenever it started making me sick. So while I wish there were someway to prevent welfare mothers from having more children, I couldn’t get behind the depo or norplant idea because of my own experiences with them…
Monstro, I read your “cut off their dicks” comment as you being offended at the idea of requiring birth control for women and trying to find something that would be similarly offensive to men. I’m sorry if I misread your statement, and no, it didn’t bother me a bit. I just thought you were reaching, that’s all.
