Welfare
“Welfare, it is on just about everyone’s' mind, whether it is Medicare or the Aid to Families with Dependent Children, which is also called the AFDC. Some believe there is too much and others think there is too little. As the years go by, the need for welfare reform increases.”(Sara) Welfare is constantly being taken advantage of, and it needs to be reformed to solve this problem. Welfare in its current state is a tremendous drain on our economy. With reform, we can keep our economy on the rise for longer amounts of time. The main problem that Welfare causes is that it gives money to people who haven’t performed any work for it. This is bad for our economy because it devalues the money that is in circulation. Society must advocate a policy like Social Darwinism, because we cannot kill off the weak, but at the same time they must work for their keep. We should severely limit the benefits paid out through Welfare.
Welfare uses, or should we say, misuses billions of dollars per year. This money could be better spent on tax breaks, government-funded job training centers, and help for our ailing Social Security system. When it was originally conceived during a time of economic distress, the welfare program supplied aid to those in need. “When it was originally conceived during a time of economic distress, the welfare program supplied aid to those in need. Welfare aid was received primarily by widowed and divorced mothers, and it served as a cushion to break their fall into a different lifestyle, so that they could get back up on their feet and walk. However today it has come to serve as a paycheck for irresponsible and slothful Americans. Welfare is like patching a water main with duct tape; you have to consta...
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... California was able to get most (97%) of their participants a better job than they had before. These states are examples of what can happen when welfare is reformed.
In the political arena, there are a select few topics that come up in every debate, and press meeting, one of those topics is welfare. The middle class could use a tax break, and they should get it, after all they are the ones working to keep our economy strong. When they can’t get help, because someone else is getting paid to do nothing, it takes away a little more hope or faith that they had in the American government. We need to cut welfare spending, and use the money we save to get the former welfare recipients on their feet, and contributing to the economy, instead of taking away from it. Reduction of welfare spending is necessary for a stronger economy, and a stronger nation overall.
When speaking about Welfare we try to avoid it, turning welfare into an unacceptable word. In the Article “One Nation On Welfare. Living Your Life On The Dole” by Michael Grunwald, his point is to not just only show but prove to the readers that the word Welfare is not unacceptable or to avoid it but embrace it and take advantage of it. After reading this essay Americans will see the true way of effectively understanding the word welfare, by absorbing his personal experiences, Facts and Statistics, and the repetition Grunwald conveys.
Working money provides more for families than borrowed money. Money cannot continue to be distributed unfairly from productive Americans to Americans who refuse to be constructive. Americans need to concentrate on the long-term effects of welfare. People are depending on the programs available to survive. What are we teaching our future generations, to rely on someone else? According to _ over one hundred and forty million dollars were spent on SNAP/Food Stamps in February 2016 alone; however, this was only in Tennessee. Welfare recipients are taking advantage of many aid and programs that should be profiting other families or children in crisis. Growing up there were five of us in our household. I have no problem with tax dollars being used to help families in a crisis. There were three children, my dad, and step mom; however, my dad was the only source of income for our family; therefore, my dad had to pay not only his expenses, but for four other family members too. Welfare recipients must think about this on only a small spectrum of how this would affect a family
As of 2012, roughly thirty five percent of the population in the United States was living with some sort of government assistance. The Welfare Reform Act was passed into law in 1996. Many of the country’s leaders promised to end welfare with this act. (“Welfare Reform”) This act ended the legal entitlement to welfare benefits. The bill also created time limits and work requirements for participation in the program. Welfare in the United States should be reformed because reform decreases poverty, increases independence in the country’s citizens, and increases the quality of life for former welfare recipients.
The unsustainable growth of welfare is becoming a big issue in the United States. The government is spending money it does not have to support people it cannot afford. Welfare only adds more debt to our country. Welfare could be a wonderful aid if people used it with justice, but welfare only creates lazy dependent people. Welfare should only be a resource someone can turn to when you are out of all your options, and are in desperate need of help. In this day and age it has turned into a way of life for some people. Too many Americans would rather turn to government assistance than to get back on their feet themselves. Welfare is being taken advantage of.
Welfare programs are an important part of American society. Without any type of American welfare, people will starve, children will not receive the proper education, and people will not receive any medical help simply because they do not have the resources available to them. Each of the three aspects of the American welfare system are unique in their own ways because they are funded differently and the benefits are given to different people. While support for these welfare systems has declined in the more recent years, the support for it when it was created was strong.
Welfare can be defined as health, happiness, and good fortune; well-being; Prosperity; and Financial or other aid provided, especially by the government, to people in need (Merriam-Webster, 2014). It can be very beneficial to people in need of it. Tim Prenzler stated that, “Welfare systems are often seen as providing a ‘safety net’ that prevents citizens falling below a minimum standard of living (2012, p2). Everyone is able to use is if they are in need of it. People have successfully used welfare to get out of their slum, and started to support themselves. Others have decided to not try to get out of that slum, and live off that welfare. They decided that they didn’t have to try, and let the government support them. Welfare is a good tool for people to get back on their feet, but shouldn’t be that persons steady income.
...rs in the system, there will never be any hope for those on welfare to get off. The welfare program has turned into a vicious circle that traps the recipient, namely single mothers, into a cycle of poverty. But before we can change anything politically or economically about the welfare system, we must first re-evaluate our beliefs and prejudices against those who did not ask to be put in this situation is the first place.
My views towards welfare have somewhat changed during the process of research. When I first started researching “welfare” I only thought about all the people who cheat the system. But, then I realized how many people need and do get support from welfare. There are more people receiving help from welfare, then people hurting it. Yes, there is a group of people who scam welfare, but there is a side that relies on welfare.
Being raised in a single-parent lower class home, I realize first-hand the need for welfare and government assistance programs. I also realize that the system is very complex and can become a crutch to people who become dependent and complacent. As a liberal American I do believe that the government should provide services to the less fortunate and resources to find work. However, as able-bodied citizens we should not become complacent with collecting benefits and it is the government’s job to identify people who take advantage of the system and strip benefits from people who are not making efforts to support themselves independently. I will identify errors that exist within the welfare system and several policy recommendations to implement a change that will counteract the negative conditions that currently exist.
For some, welfare is a sign of weakness or idleness, but no one should be denied needed help. A life should not be cut short due to starvation, dehydration or sickness that can be stopped by the help of the government.
There have been numerous debates within the last decade over what needs to be done about welfare and what is the best welfare reform plan. In the mid-1990s the TANF, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, Act was proposed under the Clinton administration. This plan was not received well since it had put a five year lifetime limit on receiving welfare and did not supply the necessary accommodations to help people in poverty follow this guideline. Under the impression that people could easily have found a job and worked their way out of poverty in five years, the plan was passed in 1996 and people in poverty were immediately forced to start looking for jobs. When the TANF Act was up for renewal earlier this year, the Bush administration carefully looked at what the TANF Act had done for the poverty stricken. Bush realized that, in his opinion, the plan had been successful and should stay in effect with some minor tweaking. Bush proposed a similar plan which kept the five year welfare restriction in place but did raise the budgeted amount of money to be placed towards childcare and food stamps. Both the TANF Act and Bush's revised bill have caused a huge controversy between liberal and conservative activists. The liberals feel that it is cruel to put people in a situation where they can no longer receive help from the government since so many people can not simply go out and get a job and work their way out of poverty. They feel if finding a job was that easy, most people would have already worked their way out of poverty. The conservatives feel that the plans, such as the TANF Act, are a surefire way to lower poverty levels and unemployment rates as well as decrease the amount o...
Welfare was meant for good, to help individuals and families who are less fortunate than most get back on their feet so they may have a prosperous future. Our society has strayed away from these principles. Welfare has turned into a necessity for most. It is used as an easy way out and allows people to lose the initiative to work because they know the government will take care of them. If we continue to let this go on, the minority will be taking care of the majority and our great country, which was built on the principle of hard work, will economically fall. It is up to the American people if welfare destroys our country.
Welfare can be received for a short period or long period of time. Although there are many people who abuse the luxury of getting welfare, there are also many people who use it to their advantage and use it to help them get back on their feet, using it until they find another job and make their own money again. To receive welfare you cannot make more than about $1000 monthly. There are approximately 110,489,000 people on some sort of welfare. Annually the government spends around $131,900,000,000 on welfare, and that is not even including food stamps or unemployment (“Statistic Brain”). The government welfare system is there to help, as evidenced in the Missouri state constitution: “all constitutional government is intended to promote the general welfare of the people; that all persons have a natural right to life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness… all persons are created equal and are entitled to equal rights and opportunity under the law; that to give security to these things is the principal office of government, and that when government does not confer this security, it fails in its chief design.” Which in other words, is stating that when the government system doesn’t help you, it fails in its main purpose, to ensure people are treated equally and given the opportunities to have lives that are worth living (“US
When you hear the words “welfare” what comes to mind? To me, the word welfare has always had a very negative connotation. However, after looking further into the concept behind it all, welfare isn’t always such a bad thing. In general, welfare provides financial stability for those who are otherwise unable to do so. Welfare can be very beneficial to a multitude of people with many different ways to make life easier. Welfare in the United States refers to a federal welfare program that has been put into place to benefit unemployed people or just your average lower class person. The most common forms of welfare are Medicaid and food stamps. Believe it or not, a welfare program is not a new idea. Welfare has started long before we were born. In the early days of welfare, the British put into place something called “poor laws”. These laws distinguished who was able to work and provide for themselves and who wasn’t due to physical condition or even how old they were. This was very similar to what President Franklin D. Roosevelt did during the times known as the great depression. The Social Security Act was amended in 1939, which gave lower income people more money throughout the depression. Unemployment Compensation and Aid to Dependent Children are two welfare programs that are still out there today. Welfare programs can benefit you in areas such as health, housing, tax relief and just more money in your pocket. Welfare is not only an American idea. In the Islāmic culture the word zakat means charity. Zakat is actually one of the five pillars of faith. This money has been collected by the government since the 7th century. The taxes, however, still have the same benefit to us. The taxes were collected and used to provide income to ...
To wrap up my essay, I will simply say that people who continue to talk about welfare in ways that it should be taken away or controlled have not educated themselves enough to fully understand what it is they are talking about. I believe that everyone in the world serves a purpose. The wealthy are not the only people who should have the right to enjoy life. People on welfare, may need help but at least they are trying. To say they are all failures is wrong. The majority of women on welfare face so many problems. People make ludicrous preconceptions about these women. People should open their eyes and realize what really goes on in the world instead of living in on a cloud.