Comment 65590

By Undustrial (registered) - website | Posted July 05, 2011 at 23:11:49

The article doesn't state that welfare is a miracle cure to economic ills. It simply accounts for the money that is being spent at the moment, and the impacts it's having (by standard economic measures). This is money which is being spent, and in most cases it just wouldn't be there otherwise.

You may not like many welfare recipients, but the fact is that many people rely on it to survive, and you can't easily weed out individuals who make a profession of "working the system" without cutting off a lot of "innocent" people as well. Many people on OW I know today have ended up in situations where their total benefits don't even cover their rent. In such situations, welfare "fraud" becomes a requirement of having a roof over your head.

Are there downsides to living in an area with a poverty problem? Yeah. Would cutting benefits fix the problem? Of course not. Attempting to discourage poverty by making life worse for poor people in the area is only going to make the problems associated with poverty far worse.

"Today, the notion of progress in a single line without goal or limit seems perhaps the most parochial notion of a very parochial century." — Lewis Mumford

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