The Second Coming

[karl]

Karl, the food bank is private charity. You should approve of that.

I do.

We are involved in one here in Ola at the Methodist church.

[bonnie]

Originally Posted By: bonnie

On the food bank issue. Did some checking with our two local food shelves. While they will not refuse a family on food stamps they do discourage regular use.

Food banks pretty much kept my family alive as I was growing up. We received food stamps and they never discouraged us from coming. I cannot imagine a food bank discouraging someone on food stamps from coming.

Originally Posted By: bonnie

The food stamp allotment is 700.00 and something for a family of four.

A single mother working a full-time, minimum wage job with three school age children and paying $550 rent will be eligible for $552 of food stamps. Feeding three children with $552 is quite a challenge. Most people on welfare are not great at finances (which is one of the reasons they are on welfare in the first place) so stretching those food stamp dollars proves to be quite a difficult task. Such a mother nets $1,073. After paying rent she will have $523 left. She will have buy gas, pay car insurance, electricity, heat and telephone with that unless she receives additional public assistance. She has a job. She works 40/week.

Most in subsidized housing do not pay 550.00 a month rent. I used to pick up daycare children in the subidized housing in town. 4 units with 15 apts,townhouse per unit.The only ones working were those that had used their allotted benefit time and were in the welfare to work program. There were only a handful that had to work. The others did not.One half of the trailer court here is allotted for welfare recipients. They are not rushing out the door every morning to work either. If they opt for prostitution instead of work that has been their choice.With what is provided,right down to daycare prostitution is unnecessary

As for most not being great at finances,not my fault.Learn instead of demanding more for up to 15 years.

[Dr. Shane]

Again, most welfare mothers work. They have to. Welfare doesn't pay enough to survive on. Affordable housing costs 30% of the household income. So the single mother working full-time for minimum wage would pay $387 rent. That would leave her with $686 (depending on state income tax withholding) to buy gas, pay car insurance, electricity, heat and telephone with that unless she receives additional public assistance.

Government housing is often in poor parts of town with high crime, sexual predators and drug dealers. Not exactly the place most single mothers want to raise their children. Although it does help them out if they need to go into the prostitution business.

There is affordable housing available in some privately owned apartment buildings but it is limited. Private owners can get loans from HUD if they dedicate a certain percentage of their units to low-income housing. The low-income households that get into those units are lucky - no doubt. These are normally located in nice parts of town and only a small percentage of the neighborhood or complex residents are low income. However most welfare recipients are not lucky enough to get those units.

I am not aware of trailer courts that exist as subsidized housing although I know FEMA uses them. Depending on the market, renting a trailer house will cost more than $387. Older trailer houses are not energy efficient so the poor family will have higher energy bills. I think using trailers as subsidized housing would be a great idea. Mobile homes are affordable and the newer ones are energy efficient. They also provide residents with a little yard and individual drive way. A lot of advantages to an apartment building.

On a side note: I grew up in apartment buildings. We were on welfare but it was not government housing. I bought a mobile home during my last year in college. After moving to Texas, I bought another mobile home. I have made some improvements and am currently building on an addition/hurricane shelter. It is very affordable housing. I earn enough to buy a regular house but have different priorities.

[bonnie]

Within a 15 mile radius of where we live there are 5 small towns. 9-10,000 people. The larger town has two separate subsidized housing complexes. The others have 1 good sized complex.

This is true for most small towns of our size or bigger.We do not live in a high crime area of the cities. Most of the crime here is located in those area's.

Most are single mothers and DO NOT WORK unless they are on welfare to work.

The trailer court is not officially subsidized housing but the older trailers are priced so that it is attractive to welfare and low income. Again,much of the domestic disputes and other typical crimes take place there.

Regardless of what you may believe most to do not work.

[bonnie]

When the push to reform welfare was passed there were many that were required to work. Obama has stopped that and if that continues now welfare is open ended.

We will not be able to require them to work or utilize many of the tools already available to them.

With the tools that are freely available and only require some hard work there is no reason for a single mother to remain on welfare or opt for prostitution.

If they opt for prostitution that is their choice and I would hope they would lose their children at the very least.

Most of us to not have the advantages offered to them if they choose to work hard to get ahead

[Dr. Shane]

So now single mothers with no other option but prostitution should lose their children. Ouch! If that is not cold-hearted I guess I need to spend more time with my thesaurus.

Most welfare mothers do work and rural mid-western towns are not reflective of most of America. In fact, over 50% of the population in America lives within 150 miles of the coastline. It would be a mistake to assume low-income housing in small-town America is reflective of what most welfare moms must live in.

Of course most welfare moms work. Welfare doesn't pay them enough not to. Those that don't work have family helping them or are shacking up with some man (which is itself a form of prostitution).

[bonnie]

So now single mothers with no other option but prostitution should lose their children. Ouch! If that is not cold-hearted I guess I need to spend more time with my thesaurus.

[karl]

We haven't told her yet that being poor and having to be frugal in everything she does means stupid and helpless and having to prostitute herself in order to have a shot at a better life.

You have shown nothing to back your claims of prostitution except for another country.

Bonnie, Bonnie, Bonnie

Why aren't you helping Shane make this young mother into a victim? You are so outdated with your ideas of personal responsiblity. There's more money in it if she is a victim. I'm not trying to bribe her into victimhood or anything, wink wink, but think of the money she can get.

[bonnie]

Quote:

Bonnie, Bonnie, Bonnie

Why aren't you helping Shane make this young mother into a victim? You are so outdated with your ideas of personal responsiblity. There's more money in it if she is a victim. I'm not trying to bribe her into victimhood or anything, wink wink, but think of the money she can get.

This "I am poor" pity me is a little tiresome. I am enormously proud of this young woman. She does not know she is a victim or that prostitution is her only other option.She doesn't know that being young,unwed and a mother that drugs or alcohol would be a good excuse. She knows the responsibility is hers for the position she finds herself in.

She does possess a stubborn streak and does not want handouts. She wants her education and is going after it. She took advantage and enrolled in a accredited school for unwed and pregnant teen moms. With a difficult preemie baby and her senior year to finish she made it thru.Many times having to interrupt her schooling to stay at home with her baby. But she did it. She does not care to leave her baby in daycare so most of her college will be online.

She did this on her own and that was the way she wanted it.

What was available to her is available to all in her position,but the desire to do better and motivation to not play victim and to be self supporting has to be there

[karl]

Quote:

Why aren't you helping Shane make this young mother into a victim?

I am enormously proud of this young woman. ...She knows the responsibility is hers for the position she finds herself in.

She does possess a stubborn streak and does not want handouts.

I understand why you are so proud of her, Bonnie. I am, too. God bless her.

[Dr. Shane]

Quote:

You have shown nothing to back your claims of prostitution except for another country.

People are people regardless which country they are in. I have demonstrated that the prostitution rates in third world nations without safety nets are substantially higher that those in developed nations with welfare programs. I have also demonstrated that cold-hearted people in Germany would force women into prostitution rather than provide them public assistance. The human heart in Germany is the same as it is in all humans. Cold-hearted people are cold-hearted people.

I am not cold-hearted. I love people. I do not support artificial time limits on welfare benefits.

[bonnie]

Third world countries do not have housing,medical,food and education

We have a safety net.Have had for years.

[Dr. Shane]

That doesn't make much sense to me. Third world countries do have housing, medical, food and education. People do not sleep under trees and starve to death.

[lazarus]

Private welfare is all I advocate. Government welfare is virtually incapable of distinguishing between the "worthy poor" as EGW puts it, and those who are scamming the system.

Private welfare can't make that distinction either.

Quote:

Private welfare is the best protection against scamming and the most likely to insist on people at least making an attempt to support themselves and their families.

How so? give me an example of that?

Quote:

Government welfare is theft over which we have no control whatsoever. If government has the power to take $50 from you and give it to a deadbeat, it has the power to take everything you have and give it to deadbeats. It really doesn't/shouldn't have that power and I advocate people taking back the power that government has usurped.

All welfare programs have been approved by congress. The Amrican people have voted for it. What power has been usurped? No money has been stolen you just don't like what its being spent on. I don't like the fact that my takes were wasted in Iraq, It wasn't stolen. It was just wasted. IMHO.

The welfare issue truly is all or nothing with government, which is why there is no authorization in our constitution for individual welfare spending. Common welfare, yes, but it must benefit all the same. You think our founding fathers didn't have any poor people around when they wrote the constitution? They provided liberty (opportunity.) What people did with it was their part of the formula.

If government can give your money or property to the down-and-out, this is an incentive for people to be down-and-out.

The problem with libs is that they believe in the basic goodness of people. This is not a Biblical belief. Once you understand the basic depravity of humanity, you come to the right conclusions about giving men power over your life and property. They should have as little as possible.