# Only Women Get "Welfare" **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 26, 2019, 10:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/only-women-get-welfare/833077 "2019-04-26T10:19:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Corry\_El](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecae2f/32.png) [@Corry\_El](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corry_El)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2019, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/only-women-get-welfare/833077/41 "2019-04-27T14:47:46Z")
> [@TimeWinder](#): > > Honestly, using the term “welfare” at all is stupid. There are specific programs with specific names, none of them are called “welfare” any more, and in my experience anyone actually using the term is trying to deceive or make a point while being able to handwave objections away by continually redefining it to cherry pick the answer they want. I agree, the level of debate at which that term is even used has declined over time. It’s more likely nowadays if anything to be used aimed at programs like Social Security, criticisms of the corporate tax system, or expanded to just any case where the govt does not collect money the speaker thinks it should (‘you pay a 37% tax rate but it should really be 50%, therefore the other 13% points are welfare’). The various points about those other non-welfare programs aren’t invalid necessarily, just the analogies. However cash assistance to poor families is hardly negligible in the US. It in theory requires employment by a household member, but there are significant exceptions in practice. That’s also not to say it’s too high or too low but the general impression of a large amount of money spend subsidizing poor household is not a hallucination. It’s $1tril+/yr, though that includes subsidies for medical, housing, school lunch etc which aren’t cash. In theory SNAP (‘food stamps’) isn’t cash either. Nor is Social Security Disability in theory a program to support people who semi-voluntarily withdraw from the workforce during normal working years but it’s become more that in practice, etc. Again that’s not saying those programs should/shouldn’t be expanded or contracted as a whole. I personally think it’s clearer there’s serious room for consolidation and greater transparency at least and don’t see a strong argument against that. Social Security is a public old age pension system, like in every other developed and many developing countries. Economically the taxes paid by an individual during working years are not put in a ‘lock box’ for that individual’s retirement, obviously. However still the taxation has limited progressivity (income cap on SS component of FICA wage tax) corresponding to a limited benefit. As with (social) welfare spending, average people are not hallucinating when they feel that paying that tax targeted toward public old age pension entitles them to the pension when they get old. Nor is it ridiculous to separate that program conceptually from aid to poor people during their normal working years. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2019, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/only-women-get-welfare/833077/42 "2019-04-27T17:31:32Z")
Back in the 70’s and 80’s, the leaders of Canada’s NDP, the socialist party of the nation, would rail against “corporate welfare bums”. That included not only clever tax breaks where companies get to write off all sorts of investments and past losses to the extreme, but also because many corporations were the beneficiaries of largesse from assorted government levels. See the recent outcry over Amazon’s “second headquarters”, where the allegation was that they could escape billions in future taxes from the city and state. Sadly, this is business as usually for bigger corporations. The difference between corporations and humans, is that human living expenses (food, rent, mortgage, transportation, hiring a maid) are not considered “operating expenses” to be deducted from money received, and humans are not taxed only on money left over after living expenses. If corporations were taxed on gross revenue there might be an apt comparison. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2019, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/only-women-get-welfare/833077/43 "2019-04-27T20:35:14Z")
I too think that the term “welfare” is a bad one since it is so loaded with an implied judgement on the recipients, but if anything _is_ to be called welfare, Social Security is one of them by almost any objective measure. The only one it fails is it is not means tested on wealth. But it subsidizes the income of those in the lower middle class when they are old enough that they might find it hard to work or get a job, far more than they put in, and in that it is not much different from programs that do the same for younger people who also have difficulty finding employment. It’s certainly more appropriate than the term “corporate welfare” and I find little problem with that term as long as we use the word welfare at all. (There are exceptions like when the government props up an entire industry which might fail otherwise, but a lot of corporate recipients of government largesse aren’t doing too bad for themselves, so in those instances it’s even _worse_ than welfare.) ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2019, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/only-women-get-welfare/833077/44 "2019-04-28T04:56:38Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > I have long maintained very few if any men in America get cash “welfare” payments. I have made this statement knowing most of what we call “welfare” is Aid to Families with Dependent Children. Further, “Food Stamps” is not really cash. > > While some (how many?) men might get help with rent or groceries, almost none get any form of cash. > > Am I mistaken? > [@puddleglum](#): > > In [2016](https://www.acf.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/ofa/fy16_characteristics.pdf) there were 637,472 adult recipients of TANF. Of those 85% were women and 15% men. Yep, looks like you are mistaken. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/only-women-get-welfare/833077.md?page=2)