That assumes they have sufficient income to both cover the necessities AND build up a reserve fund.
That is not reality. Minimum wage is NOT a living wage. Of course, you can argue about whether or not it should be a living wage, but the fact remains that there are many places in this country where working full time at minimum wage will NOT be sufficient for even a minimal lifestyle. Which is the whole reason we have government benefits for poor people, to supplement such low incomes so people don’t actually starve or die of exposure.
The problem comes in when you simply do not have sufficient funds to pay the bills AND build up a reserve. Poverty benefits are, in fact, typically spent in their entirety every single month by even the most frugal and responsible people because they are NOT intended or designed to the sole support of such people. They are a supplement, and a needed one.
It’s not a matter of buying “crap you don’t need”, TANF is intended to provide funds for children, to cover costs like clothing (kids outgrow their clothes, unlike adults who, if careful, can get years of wear out of items) and school supplies (education is good, right?). And, yes, soap and toilet paper probably comes out of it, too (adults without kids don’t get TANF at all - we have to do things like collect aluminum cans along the road and turn them in for TP money).
Never said that all poor people are “hapless victims”, again, that’s you hearing what you want to hear instead of what I actually said.
Maybe you didn’t get the memo but the nation went through an unusual economic event in 2007. Tens of millions were dumped out of work and many of them experienced years of unemployment simply because there were not enough jobs to go around. Yes, it DOES take years to recover from that, other nations that have gone through similar events have experienced similar problems with long-term unemployment of previously long-term employed people.
Oh, you got some nerve asking that of someone who has managed to stay debt-free despite an income below the official poverty line for the better part of a decade.
It’s not irrelevant if the “solution” burdens people who are already struggling.
WHY is Kansas sucking benefit money out of poor people and putting it in the pockets of a corporation? Other states manage to provide benefits without doing that. Why is Kansas the exception? Hell, even Illinois - long a paragon of corruption - manages to avoid that “solution”, what the hell is wrong with Kansas?
Most welfare recipients are not addicts. Most are people who work jobs that do not pay enough to cover living expenses or are temporarily unemployed. You aren’t going to prevent there people from rushing out and spending all their money on crack and lobster, because they were never doing this in the first place.
So that leaves us with a small number of addicts. Are they going to become magically un-addicted because they have an extra hoop to jump a hoop? The defining quality of an addict is that they will do anything to get high. So the addicts are going to get high, and that’s not going to stop until they have appropriate treatment (which may involve years on a wait list) or end up in jail (which costs a lot more than $425 a month).
Maybe they get $25.00 worth of high every darn day. Maybe they turn to any number of illegal activities to finance binges. But then least likely outcome is that the hardcore addicts are going to say “Oh, screw it. I’ll just willpower myself clean!”
Now, if someone has evidence to back this up, I’m happy to hear it. Should be a very easy study to run-- just roll out the program to a randomly selected half of the recipients, run it for a couple years, gather data on the outcomes and run a quick regression to see if the treatment group fares better than the control. Any college psych major could run it.
The effect can be even worse for the poor due to the effect called diminishing returns. If you have only a single pair of shoes, it’s worth more to you, however crappy, than a fine pair for someone who has five pairs. An extra bowl of rice is worth more to someone going hungry than an extra steak for the well-fed.
It would be easy for the state to pay the $.85 fee. They don’t because the humiliation and punishment are intentional.
Thanks, Shodan. You natter irrelevancies from the sidelines, but when called on it, you finally make a substantive post.
No, I didn’t get that memo. The one I got said there were 967,000 layoffs, not “tens of millions” ( http://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/mls/extended_mass_layoffs2007.pdf ). Probably my butler’s fault, keeping the real information from me so I wouldn’t give him the sack once I discovered the market was flooded with newly-unemployed people who’d peel my prawns for half the price.
I’m not assuming anyone has sufficient income for anything, but something much bigger than that: that barring disability or caring for dependents, each one of us grownups is responsible for living within the means we procure. That means that if a job does not pay enough to keep you from starving or dying of exposure where you live, you make the necessary changes. Maybe you relocate, for instance. Maybe you work on getting a job that pays more. One way or another, you either get more money, spend less money, or both.
I’m not saying this is easy, that society should not help, or that people in a situation of needing help should be condemned. Far from it–I am more than happy to contribute my time, money, ideas, etc. to help efforts. I’m not saying the help should be stingy. But it should be actually helpful, both long and short term, not indefinitely propping up unsustainable choices. Making up the shortfall for people working for a wage that does not cover their basic expenses and enabling them to settle into this situation long term and barely eke by is not good for them or anyone else. When no one capable of doing a particular job can survive on what it pays, it has to pay more. When the pay is “supplemented” with other money, it doesn’t have to, so the jobs continue to pay this way.
Many people come to this country with nothing and manage to develop sufficient income to survive and then thrive. You know how immigrants are often accused of “stealing our jobs”? How exactly do they manage to live on their earnings when they generally have to work below the market rate, do you suppose? Some people rise to a challenge and take action to improve their situations instead of embracing the idea that they have no control.
That’s what I was thinking, the could have made it $39.99 9/10th and looked a lot more generous and had the same effect, Most ATM’s only do $20’s.
Also the fee has been updated to $1 per transactions PLUS additional ATM fees in the link. Which reasonably is $3 in fees for $20 withdrawal, or 15% of the welfare money now not getting to the people in need.
Now perhaps they can withdraw at a POS terminal which would get it back to $25/day.
But then we’re encouraging frequent impulse buying of small items (like a pack of gum) so that you can use the POS for cash back. Because a pack of gum is less than the service fee, even if you don’t need a pack of gum. (This is your brain on poverty.)
Most businesses charge a fee, similar to an ATM fee when withdrawing cash, to use a debit card. There really is no way around getting screwed by a bunch of fees for most people on TANF, particularly when you consider their probable difficulty getting to exactly right location(s) that will charge less in fees compared to the location(s) they can actually reasonably get to.
I guess it depends on your location. We have only one chain of stores here that I’ve run into with a fee for using your debit card. (Ironically, or maybe not, it’s a discount store, where poor people are most likely to shop.)
But, yes, if that’s the case in Kansas, then buying a pack of gum won’t get you around the fees.
It really makes me sick how some people want to humiliate the poor whenever they get assistance. As some have said, there is actually no proof let alone even attempts to prove that anything like what Kansas is proposing will make people more responsible. Statements like Representative Rick Brattin’s (Missouri) that he has seen people using food stamps to buy filet mignon are almost certainly bullshit, just like Reagan’s made up “welfare queens” example.
The limits being proposed in Kansas and Missouri are questionable even without considering the double standard. Missouri wants to ban steak and seafood from purchase with food stamps because of Brattin claiming he saw someone on food stamps buying filet mignon. So no flank steak or tuna from a can, plus seafood is extremely healthy and would be a very responsible choice in some situations, for example after budgeting the whole month to have one or two nice meals with real (but inexpensive) fish.
Kansas wants to outlaw using TANF to go to a swimming pool, so now they’re trying to outlaw responsible exercise that also happens to be fun. They also want to bar going to the movies.
Maybe they should just require all TANF recipients to use stationary bikes that charge generators as the only exercise they’re allowed. Anything else is irresponsible and lets poor people actually have some enjoyment in their lives.
They purposefully took it down BECAUSE THEY CHANGED THE LAW LAST WEEK. However, the only part of the law that got changed that is relevant to this discussion is the part about the daily limit. The client handbook used to say you could take out as much as you needed. Courtesy of the new law, that’s no longer true.
If you can’t be bothered to read the law yourself, then you’ll just have to take the word of people who do find out what the law says before spouting off about it.
Exactly how many months of living expenses is “reasonable”? What happens when your employment gap lasts a couple of months longer? (In the U.S. since 2009, more than eight million jobs have gone “poof,” and many of them will never come back.) Similarly, even people who think they have as much insurance as they can afford can get surprised by situations utterly beyond their control–consider, e.g., the number of Hurricane Katrina insurance claims that were denied until the insurance companies were forced by legal action, such as that by the Mississippi Attorney General. You purchase insurance against a natural disaster, you have a natural disaster, and you have to fight the insurance company for two or three or four years to get paid–what do you think happens to somebody’s finances during those years?
(And how do the poor who are financially sensible build up a reserve anyway? That’s kind of what “poor” means–you don’t have enough income. Live frugally all you want, but there’s a certain minimum level you’ll need to pay for housing and food and utilities and medicine and so forth.)
The arrogance in this statement is simply breathtaking. Because some other people in your demographic are bad, it’s okay to discriminate against you, and that’s no big deal. Really!!?!
But we are discussing how TANF restrictions affect TANF recipients. Did you forget that?
TANF recipients aren’t allowed to hold much money. (That’s the asset test, which is an entirely different debate.)
Beyond that, cash benefits that are not spent are lost. You’re not allowed under the TANF program to accumulate the benefits over a period of six months or a year or whatever, or to save up for something. Spend it or lose it, and we’re going to make it as difficult as possible to spend it on paying bills. What do you think is going to happen?!?
I’ve cited relevant parts of Kansas law and regulation, and you’re still not paying attention.
That number was layoffs from 1999 to 2007, not 2007 onward. Did you even read your own cite?
That only works if there are actually jobs available, if you have the means to get the necessary training and education, if you can dress yourself sufficiently well to get through the interview process. It’s not enough to simply wake up in the morning and say “Hey! Think I’ll get a more lucrative job!”
It also takes time - time to apply to a job, time to get through an interview process, time to complete an education (even small training programs take weeks to months)… how the freak are people supposed to eat, cloth themselves, and maintain bodily hygiene in the meanwhile?
And, just FYI - I actually DO have a disabled dependent, my spouse. So my income has to cover two people, the other adult in the household is not able to engage in full time employment (although he still does what he can - he earned $35 yesterday which means, yay, we won’t have to eat just peanut butter sandwiches tonight for dinner. Because when my most recent raise resulted in my grossing $42 more a month our food stamps were cut by $190… because, I dunno, it would somehow “encourage” me to work harder? Last week before we get our benefits is very lean eating in my house. The stupid, it makes my stomach growl.)
Well, by THAT rationale we should immediately cut the pay of every middle class person by 50% to encourage them to “do better” and be more frugal - we wouldn’t want them to “settle”, right?
How about instead of bitching about welfare people mandate that minimum wage be a living wage for the geographic area? Wouldn’t that solve the problem? Problems, actually - the working poor wouldn’t need welfare anymore, right? And the taxpayers wouldn’t have to shell out for it, right?
And some of them don’t and live out their years in poverty or die relatively young or are deported… you can’t just look at the success stories.
Some also work in illegal conditions, or commit crimes, or pack themselves in 8 to a room in a sub-standard housing or living in the back of a van… It’s a miserable, horrible existence in many cases. That’s ignoring cases like the Dennison, Iowa skeletons of 11 intrepid, would-be hardworking/succeeding immigrants who died trying to “make a better living” for themselves. Did those people deserve your contempt? Your condemnation? Do you think they’re any different than all the other illegal immigrants gambling they could survive crossing the border?
Sure, some do well - a lot do not.
The only time I’ve seen someone on foodstamps purchasing a high-end sort of meat/seafood is when said item is deeply, deeply discounted because it’s about to expire and has to be sold THAT DAY - basically, the store selling it at near cost just to get rid of it. Is that really a problem?
^ Yeah, see, stupidity at work. Obviously, the poor should all be forced to be vegetarians because they don’t deserve meat… :rolleyes:
I think they should be compensated in the same way they are compensated with normal customers.
The fees should be billed on a per transaction basis, payable by the recipient, without being subject to artificial withdrawal limitations imposed by the government.
That’s what the free market seems to have decided is the best way to handle these type of fees and transactions.
Now the government is implementing a new law designed to redistribute more money from one party and give it to another. A distribution that doesn’t take place when the free market is allowed to determine the norm for these transactions. The whole thing sounds kinda…I dunno…Marxist to me.
And most fees are billed on a per transaction basis, payable by the recipient, which are subject to artificial withdrawal limitations, imposed by the bank.
For example, my credit union allows 6 ATM withdrawals per month. If my benefit is $420, that would limit me to $70 per withdrawal, much more than the $25 per withdrawal under the Kansas plan.
At 6 ATM withdrawals/month, the user would pay $0.85 x 6 = $5.10 per month.
At 17 ATM withdrawals ($420 ÷ 25) per month, the user would pay $0.85 x 17 = $14.45 per month.
So my current bank deal is better than the Kansas deal, and the government shouldn’t be involved, especially when their actions are going to cost recipients more money.
But there’s a whole bunch of posters here who want to go a whole another way, and demand that the recipients not pay any fee at all. That’s where I disagree.
Does your credit union require you to use all six allowed withdrawals, or require you to take out no more than $70 per transaction? If not, your example isn’t comparable. (In other words, could you take out a single withdrawal of $420, or two transactions of $300 and $120? If so, then no, you are not limited to $70/ea.)
I don’t see any poster on here saying that recipients should pay no fee at all (although my credit union certainly allows no-fee withdrawals within their network). What we are talking about is artificially driving up the fees beneficiaries
pay, for no good reason at all.
I just looked up the max benefits for Indiana and Kansas. Indiana, for a family of 4 - $346 a month. Kansas - $454 a month. If I add the increased cost of living of Kansas (5%) to the Indiana amount, it still only comes to $363, which is far below the max benefit for a family of 4 in Kansas.
Looks like Indiana takes the fees out BEFORE applying the resultant money to recipients. Not sure that is better than fees AFTER distributing the money.
They took it down because it doesn’t apply. I don’t know what the new one will say. According to kanicbird’s post, now the fee is $1, so if that’s true, the changes must remain up in the air to some degree.
I cited quotes that imply that transfers can be made to bank accounts and I have said each time that they are implying this. You’ve offered no alternate explanation for their statements.
How much each person saves is up to them–there is no correct answer. Life is a gamble with no guarantees and sometimes, no matter how much you’ve tried to prepare, you’ve chosen wrong or it wasn’t enough. That’s hardly a reason not to try.
Failing to save money, spend it wisely, etc. does not make someone “bad,” and no one should be discriminated against.
We’re talking about allocation and distribution of unearned funds. I notice you haven’t answered the question.
If someone does not need the money, why are they taking it? There is no need to waste money, even if it’s “free” and “lost” if you don’t spend it.
I’m guessing he’s referring to a savings account but neglected to mention that fact. I’ve never heard of a checking account being limited to a certain number of ATM withdrawals per month, but it’s common with savings accounts.
Even in his example, he could simply make one withdrawal of the entire balance and only pay one .85 fee.
I’ve not seen any of these quotes that I think imply what you are trying to read into them. What SPECIFIC quote do you think implies this?
But you are saying that no matter how much you’ve tried to prepare, if your preparations are insufficient you deserve to be treated as though you never tried at all. How is that not treating you as “bad”?
I haven’t answered the question because it’s a question I’m not qualified to answer. I don’t know your daughter; I don’t know which if any parts of the story you are not telling me. (For example, when you bought her normal food at the grocery store, did she actually have enough money left to obtain and stay on a realistic payment plan?) Deciding that somebody can’t be trusted with money is a decision that should be made about individual people when necessary, not simply applied as a blanket policy to everybody who’s ever been in a bad situation. Do you not see the difference?
Ah, but they DO need the money. It’s just that once they get it, they’re prevented from spending it on the things they really need. Why should they allow money they really need to be lost?
Yeah, I have, and you’ve announced that you are not going to read them.
