I’m a little confused concerning the provenance of this data, could we have a source on the graphs?
I also put more trust in the Kaiser Family Foundation. According to them, 60 percent of the non-disabled, non-elderly adult Medicaid population already works either full- or part-time. The imposed work requirements clearly add up to an already existing problem of the poor: being employed at a job that is a poor match for them. Aren't we supposed to promote employment in a way that jobs should match people's skills and abilities? Not even talking about the elder generation that have been getting cast out by the companies that are looking to employ the younger generation. According to the article https://bit.ly/2uXEmCM, IBM was accused of shedding 20,000 workers over age 40 in America. Facebook and Amazon reportedly imposed age limits on who could see job ads. It's no surprise that those people are searching for at least any job just to get by.. and now to receive Medicaid.
3
Why? The oligarchy is an international, amorphous, fluid nation-state of its own. Population a few dozen. There is no patriotism to geographic countries.
Shouldn't the labels on the 2nd graph's axes be switched?
@Harry R. Sohl
No:
1) The U.S. has the highest poverty rate of the countries considered.
2) The U.S. has the lowest spending on benefits (safety net) as a percentage of GDP among those countries considered.
Why wasn't this obvious to you; apparently most others who have read your post also think it should be obvious. Sometimes when something is read too fast, the mind plays tricks and reverses the meaning of what has been read?
I, too, have faith in the Kaiser Family Foundation analysis of this issue, but even a casual reading of government statistics on Medicaid and food stamp recipients will lead one to the same conclusion: the vast majority of recipients are made up of children, the elderly and disabled. And, what may come as a surprise to some, there is a large working population in both groups of recipients. However, what frequently gets lost in the discussion is: 1) the availability of jobs in the communities in which benefits recipients reside (and, do they have the skills for these jobs?), 2) the wages these jobs would pay, 3) would these jobs offer paid health care benefits, and, for women 4) the availability of child care. Given that a family health care policy (not a so-called high deductible or "catastrophe" policy that offers little coverage) can cost $1,000 or more per month, a current benefits recipient would likely have to earn upwards of $50K+/yr., far beyond what too many jobs are paying these days.
Economically, adding a jobs requirement to Medicaid and SNAP may generate only modest savings at the federal and state level, all of which may be offset by increased demands on other non-governmental organizations. Socially, this is merely a continuation of the false narrative that benefits recipients are lazy, undeserving moochers of others hard earned tax dollars.
7
Just another reason to LOATHE Republicans.
2
It's awfully convenient that the people who made the below living wage no benefits, and not even a "real" employee since they are temp, contract work at a company that also gives no benefits to full-time workers, a wide spread thing across the country are the same ones demanding proof of such non-living wage job to collect benefits and are attempting to make threshold qualifications harder to prove. When will we finally throw in the towel and admit that we are now mostly a country who works under endentured servitude, only half a leg up from slavery, and that only because of the very thin fig leaf that they are not directly employed by the so called employer. With the new Kushner scandal, they even own the dangerous, infested housing low income workers work in, just like slaves.
2
Since absolutely no one has a good analysis on why Americans under 60 drop out of the work force, comparing that number against other nations’ drop out rate seems asinine. If you do not know your own drivers, how can you tell if in different nations, different conditions nothing existing elsewhere really drive results.
Republicans in general, and Donald Trump in particular, need to climb aboard a tour bus and visit the 'Remote Area Medical' event held in Virginia each year. Just up the road from the White House, they can watch as charitable organizations from other nations minister to the health care needs of the brutally poor, ignorant and mostly white denizens of the backward rural counties of the American South:
https://www.denverpost.com/2017/07/21/free-health-clinic-virginia-washin...
Poverty? Nah. Not here!
And to think, these sad and sorry people resolutely vote Republican and are faithful members of the Trump cult.
4
Actually, Ryan mispoke, it is the War on Drugs that has utterly failed.
Ryan just got his wars mixed up, that's all. It could happen to anyone.
10
Quality research focuses on whether a measurable parameter is either a cause or an effect. Also, it must consider whether correlation is evidence of causation.
Political parties and politicians are not constrained by any such considerations. This allows them to twist information to fit an agenda. The only constraint is shame and there is no evidence of that in the Republican Party and by their supporters.
Today’s news conference from Helsinki is just more proof of the intellectual dishonesty that defines all things Republican.
3
I'm just baffled by the "Poverty rate" illustrated in that graph.
0.18 of what?
The figure I found for the poverty rate in the United States is 16.7% - close enough to one in five Americans.
It might all be relative, but let's keep the number simple.
The other relevant number is the comparison with the poverty rate in the UK, where the number I found is 10.9%, more like one in ten. Still appallingly high, but obviously a relevant comparison.
There again, another relevant comparison is Canada at 14.2%, but I suppose we should give Trudeau a year or two for his policies to have an effect on that (I predict that just decriminalising marijuana will lower poverty rates significantly - going to prison is a first step towards poverty for a lot of people).
The rate in Australia is apparently about 12%.
I don't understand how the Western world became so mean - that is, I believe I understand the process, I just don't understand the meanness that underlies it. The persistence of poverty is the result of very direct and intention action taken by the political classes. It's just vindictiveness.
Anyway, the point is that high rates of monetary support for the needy are going to generate higher rates of economic activity and pay for themselves - if only through the taxation on the spending that money allows.
Poverty is just the proof of the petty jealousy of the rich that anyone else should be allowed to be comfortably idle. They believe that should only be allowed by birth.
7
"0.18 of what?"
Krugman says his charts are based on data from the OECD:
"The poverty rate is the ratio of the number of people (in a given age group) whose income falls below the poverty line; taken as half the median household income of the total population."
https://data.oecd.org/inequality/poverty-rate.htm
The definition of "the poverty line" is precise, but highly problematic, because it doesn't account for the cost of living. Krugman doesn't mention the cost of living, so his whole OpEd is on shaky ground.
1
In the US, it is all justified as the natural order of capitalism. With no viable alternative (communism failed, socialism discredited, …) and governments increasingly controlled by oligarchs, average is the new or soon to be poor in a system wherein the winners believe that they are rightly so and that the losers are discardable. In the end, it is all about greed and dehumanization.
2
@BJN Hi, thanks - I understand the graph, I just think it is misleading and contrary to the normal terms that people understand to reduce the measure of poverty to a number preceded by a decimal point. The graph would have been more accessible to ordinary people if it had been drawn in terms of an "18%" poverty rate in the US rather than the 0.18 number shown. I didn't express that well...
“...full employment...” What is that?
@Miriam
"Full employment" is usually defined as the highest level of employment where inflation does not rise above the target set by the Federal Reserve, as will happen when the need for workers leads one company to have to offer much higher wages to get a worker to leave another company.
Work is employment--but not necessarily as an employee. "Self-employed" is possible.
Self-employed associates with being your own boss--and so autonomy (self rule), personal responsibility (independence), self determination (choosing your own life plan and path) and so on, including income and wealth as a function of talent, drive being in tune with the economic times (luck).
Other-employed--employee--associates with being bossed, dependence on bosses, who determine your life path, as well as income and wealth.
We work half our waking lives (WL)--more or less. "Alienated labor" is trading half (or more) of WL to be able to enjoy the other half. In bad trades (low pay) all of life turns to mere subsistence--unless you enjoy breathing.
The original Cynics taught that even slaves could be noble--live well--the limit of self-sufficiency. But the Diogenes story makes him a slave teacher to wealthy kids and so a godsend to their parents--his owners. Does your boss think you are a godsend?
Employers (most) want labor--the cheaper the better. They care little or nothing about total quality of life time.
Civilized social safety nets set a bottom to quality of life. Even self employment is risky.
Employers must do better. They resent this. Yes--it's a disincentive to work for peanuts, sucking up to (sometimes) stupid, oppressive, harassing (sexual and otherwise), cheating bosses.
"Jobs jobs jobs" is cynical "Tuphos"--smoke--for employer welfare + employee oppression.
1
A default assumption of “laziness” is in itself lazy — and probably racist — as well as demeaning and unfair. It is the height of arrogance to demand employment without any attempt to address or even examine the barriers to it. Do these people ever visit the real world, indeed. (Obviously not.)
Michigan is one of the states that has applied for a waiver allowing it to impose work requirements on Medicaid recipients. An earlier proposal, spearheaded by the GOP, would have exempted the rural (overwhelmingly white) poor: counties where the unemployment rate was higher than 8.5%. Residents of (overwhelmingly black) cities like Detroit and Flint, with higher rates of unemployment, would have been SOL, as they say, since the counties they are in have an unemployment rate below the threshold. (Of course, transportation to those elsewhere-in-county jobs is practically nonexistent.)
The proposal passed the Senate and House before it was eventually abandoned. But not, as I heard its chief architect emphatically explain in a radio interview, because it was unfair to the city dwellers. No, it was scrapped only because record keeping would have been too onerous.
8
You don't BELIEVE, do you?
The notion that millions of able-bodied Americans are sucking the life out of our economy by choosing to sit home and collect "free stuff" instead of working, AND the notion that these Americans are going to continue to vote for Democrats who continue to give them "free stuff" (that the rest of us worked so hard to obtain, mind you!) is as deeply embedded into right wing dogma as the virgin birth is embedded into Christian dogma. And altering this paradigm is as likely as convincing Christians that there is no such thing as a virgin birth - it's true, they know it's true, and that is the end of the discussion.
Facts & figures? Scientific data? You liberals really do think you know everything, don't you?
6
Except that the overwhelming majority of “these Americans” don’t even vote! It’s certainly convenient to scape goat certain groups, and even better when you can make a logical argument for why they vote a certain way and how it is that their lazy habits are maintained by liberals, but really, you should do the research and check the data.
1
It is hard to square the European employment data in the article with claims of extremely high youth unemployment in Europe that the Times frequently reports. Is it true?
The other point is that very high social spending does come at a cost to overall economic growth. With 55% more people the EU has an 8% smaller economy. They may be more equal, they do take better care of their less able, but there is no free lunch in doing so.
Americans are clear. They want to spend ever less on taxes no matter that many citizens get gored in the process. Maybe because of our diversity our commitment to each other is much lower than in Europe. Republicans have taken that knowledge to national dominance. They can use animosity towards “lazy blacks” as a constant rallying cry. Krugman has lost the battle.
Truth be told most of our welfare dollars go to Corporations.
5
It's not welfare if it goes to corporations.
Just like it's not a handout if it goes to white heartlanders (see every government policy beginning with the Homestead Act and virtually never ending since).
3
In small towns you either are related to the people that
run the businesses in town or your are not.
If you are and resonably competent you can get a job.
If you are not related, then you have to hope that your family owns a farm or a large spread for ranching or has timber rights or you can work for the county because there
is no other work. If you don't have a car, you better have a family member or a friend that does because there is no bus service. We have few colleges and the cost of taking a course On-Line at the State schools is prohibitive.
There are not too many desk jobs so if you have health problems there is not going to much work.
So there are hard workers who are out of work through
no fault of their own and certainly not through laziness.
They cannot pick up and move to where the jobs are
as they don't have the money to move.
The flowing waters of what is called Economic Prosperity
never reached them.
Do you want them to die of economic thirst ?
5
If we guaranteed health care it would encourage people to work far more than authoritarian threats.
1
Can't find a job/ support yourself in a roaring economy with >3% unemployment?
Tough to have much sympathy.
1
@There Sure, but we know from history that the good times don't last. Gutting anti-poverty programs and other stabilizers will make a future recession more painful for those unlucky.
2
Next they will declare that there are no more sick old people, no need for Medicare, and then people are no longer retiring, no more need for Social Security.
Shall we continue to speculate what comes after that?
3
Krugman's comments today are the opposite of what he states in his Economics Textbook.
@Joe dallas
I think you forgot to check the conditions under which the book's prescriptions apply compared to today's conditions.
Please go back to the drawing board.
As was pointed out in the article, Disability's Disabling Impact On The Labor Market, https://seekingalpha.com/article/3342635 historically, labor force participation has behaved cyclically in the midst of a slightly declining trend. Dubious and fraudulent disability claims have vastly increased the number of those collecting disability, with commensurate decreases in labor force participation and the unemployment rate. A segment on CBS, "60 Minutes" quoted employees of the Social Security Administration and administrative law judges who asserted that lawyers are recruiting millions of people to make fraudulent disability claims. One such judge said, "if the American public knew what was going on in our system, half would be outraged and the other half would apply for benefits."
As to why this rebound in the labor force may be finally occurring, I suggest that some reforms of the disability system that were included in the 2015 budget agreement may be now having an impact. The surge in number of those collecting disability required a bailout of the disability trust fund that entailed shifting $300 billion from the social security trust fund disability trust fund. As part of the 2015 budget deal, in return for the disability trust fund bailout that many Republicans opposed, the Obama administration agreed to phase in reforms to the disability system..." https://seekingalpha.com/article/4157404
2
I suspect that the "fraud rate" on SSDI claims is computed by finding that any claim that is denied is fraudulent. Perhaps some claimants know that they are capable of substantial gainful activity, that there is a job available in the national economy (not necessarily where they live) they are (mentally and physically) capable of performing, but they apply anyway. Ofttimes the subjective determination is made by an administrative law judge (ALJ) appointed vocational consultant that such a job exists, e.g. self-service gas station attendant, and the application is denied. Sometimes an ALJ will deny a claim based on past work that the claimant was then able to "gut it out" and perform, but can no longer. Some ALJs rarely if ever approve SSDI claims unless told to do so by a U.S. District Court Judge. So excuse me if I do not give much credence to so-called fraud rates on SSDI claims.
3
This is simple. Krugman and those like him deal only in fake news and manufactured data, so we can ignore him. I only have to listen to Trump and his stalwarts at Fox News, that makes it much easier.
Hmm....This logic sounds familiar...the ‘let’s declare victory and end the program’ argument. Isn’t this the reasoning conservatives and the SCOTUS used to dismantle the Voting Rights Act?
3
If racism is rampant in the GOP why are so many poor folks moving to red states. hint.. low cost living, you don't need a $100 000 job to get in a nice house.
Leftist commentators here sound like and speak the same language as Hugo Chavez in his early years. Full of anger blaming somebody else in vitriolic terms eager to punish "others'.
Ask a leftist about Venezuela and they act as they never heard of it...
1
No, ask a leftist about Venezuela and they'll ask you why, every time they suggest adopting policies that exist in Germany or Norway, you people can't stop talking about Venezuela. Nobody's suggesting importing policies from Venezuela.
6
While this article makes sense tome, it will not persuade any Republicans. Why? Becase social welfare programs mean (to them) that black people will get the benefits.
As JD Vance shows in his "Hillbilly" autobiography, lower income white people believe the Republicans party will support their racist views. So any reference to those racially homogeneous European socialist countries can be dismissed as irrelevant to conditions here in the US.
5
What about the war on poverty for the rich? You know, the one that keeps showering tax cuts and tax subsidies on them. The rich are richer than ever, so the war on rich poverty as succeeded. Which means it's time to repeal all the tax cuts and tax subsidies for the rich. They've worked!
4
Republican economic policy has two goals.
One, allow an ever higher percentage of wealth to flow to the top, so that the few rich and powerful can become even more rich and powerful.
Two, make those who are struggling (with poverty, illness etc.) suffer, because it is their moral unfitness that made them that way, and unlike decent wealthy people, they deserve it.
Is it perverse, immoral and even sick? Yes. Welcome to the GOP in 2018.
1
Poverty is, in large measure, a choice. It results from making a baby out of wedlock, committing a crime, dropping out of our hideously expensive public schools, or abusing substances.
If you’re poor, the very last thing on your to-do list ought to be cranking out a kid. And, yet, about 40% of all births are covered by Medicaid. That’s spectacularly irresponsible. It’s a virtual guarantee of poverty. So, why do it?
Simple: a kid qualifies you for lots of welfare benefits. It’s perfectly rational. Like an illegal bringing a child to act like a human shield against deportation or incarceration: kids trigger special treatment for adults. That’s a huge moral hazard and people respond to incentives. We create huge incentives to bear children you can’t afford or put them in harm’s way; people act accordingly.
It’s not that these programs discourage people from working, although they do -- even leftists admit that, arguing for the ACA that it would free people from the tyranny of working for their benefits -- it’s that they reward irresponsibility.
Policy ought to be designed to encourage responsibility, not reward folly. Ours does the opposite. Is it any wonder that 3/4ths of all Black babies are born out of wedlock, with “whites” rapidly making up the gap? OF COURSE people should have to work for money; but, more broadly, they should not be rewarded for doing truly stupid things.
3
A few years ago there was a comprehensive review of the SNAP/Food Stamp program because of a huge gap between projected eligibility -- the working poor but mostly children, seniors and people with disabilities -- and actual participation.
The review found that shame and stigma prevented many from using food stamps. For them the supermarket checkout was a gauntlet of humiliation.
The SNAP review also found widespread public prejudice and misinformation, often exacerbated by cynical political calculation. Few were aware that SNAP allocates an average of $4 per person per day to be spent on restricted basic food items -- no prepared food, alcohol, tobacco, caviar or filet mignon, etc. Food stamps pay for rice, flour, beans, milk, peanut butter, bread.
Food stamps can't buy Big Macs but without food stamps McDonald's can't sell Big Macs. Because so many of their employees earn so little they depend on food stamps to get by each month. Taxpayers effectively spend $1.2 billion a year feeding McDonald's workers because they get paid so little. Quadruple that for Walmart.
Food stamps as corporate welfare isn't the half of it. There's other also giant agribiz, which produces huge surpluses of everything, which demands a huge food market. Food stamps brought 40 million Americans to the farmer's table last year, over 14% of the US food market.
Ironic that food stamps are viewed as welfare for the undeserving when in fact it's welfare for the big and rich.
16
The Republican idea is that cutting taxes on the wealthy or on wealthy businesses is the path to economic growth. To respond to that, take an analogy to a basketball team. Offense is all about options. (Defense is all about cutting back on options.) A team that relies on 10 capable players to score will do better than a team that relies on 2 superstars. We will do better if we invest in the population generally. We are better off with increased taxes on the wealthy to accomplish that.
5
The only outcome of GOP policies is that any reductions in federal spending will get funneled into the 1 percent at the top.
Perhaps we should have poor houses where the able bodied poor could peddle electric generators and contribute to the production of clean energy. A McDonald $1 burger, yum, could get dangled in front of them and after an hour it would drop into a tray along with a plastic reusable cub chained to the tray.
Technology could monitor the contribution to the grid.
The poor would get exercise and food
The money generated could then go into affordable health care.
The poor would learn the dignity of honest manual labor, something Paul Ryan who has mooched off the federal
9
We do have poor houses; we call them jail. And private industry is making a killing (in more ways than one) off them.
4
You are absolutely correct except the poor have to pay to stay in those poor houses not the other way around.
This policy was created as dog-whistle for the base of the GOP. It's to let the base know the GOP, particularly Trump, are watching out for our tax dollars and that 'those' people are gonna work before they get any handouts from us hard working taxpayers. That's really what this is all about and it's a sad state of affairs that seems to flower best when there are Republicans in charge.
10
The work requirements are not to get recipients to work. Every study shows that number of people on means tested programs who can work but choose not to is very small. The purpose of the work requirements is to pose enough bureaucratic hurdles to obtaining benefits that large numbers of people who could qualify simply give and don't get the benefits
10
Somethiing that is almost never mentioned in discussions of means-tested assistance programs: the vast majority of recipients do not stay on the programs for continuous extended periods. I have not seen most recent data, but in the past the average time was under 3 years for the vast majority.
4
Work provides many benefits to a person's well being--physical, mental, emotional and social, among others. Everyone should work if they are physically and mentally able.
With unemployment hovering below 4%, which is roughly at full employment levels, one must ask why more able-bodied people are not working. I'd suggest two main reasons.
The Trump/GOP narrative is that they are lazy. But how do people support a family, or even themselves, if they have no real skills and their prospects are only a series of minimum wage jobs? Meanwhile, we have better paying jobs that continue to go unfilled because of lack of skilled workers. This education and training mismatch is what needs to be addressed.
A second key issue is the location of these jobs versus the location of these potential workers. An able-bodied person in rural Georgia can't take a job for which he/she is fit in Atlanta. Also, the lack of reliable mass transmit means that many workers are not mobile because they can't afford the cost of owning and operating a car. So their employment options are limited--which also limits the pool of candidates available to businesses.
Continuing to debate whether people are "lazy" and whether cutting food stamps to them and their families is not only cruel, but will not address the causes of the issue.
20
The biggest accusers of 'fake news' turn out to be the biggest purveyors of 'fake news'. Q'uelle surprise. This is only half the story. we're hooked into the mindset that the transactional relationship between Labor and Owners--already absurdly confrontational in the US--is the be all and end all of human existence, practically-lived, on planet Earth, in our little corner of the Milky Way galaxy. Instead of making humanity miserable by defining the nature of 'work' as that defined by innumerable private interests disconnected from the whole, or sum of its parts, we need to expand the definition of community to include the development of corporations as a tool, a means to an end rather than just the end, in the service of the community. To be nurtured, to be sure, but also incentivized according to informed consent as expressed by public, and representative, institutions that have interests beyond those engaged in private pursuits. There is no Public without the individual, desiring a measure of privacy. Just as there is no lasting Privacy absent the authority of public institutions of government to grant the transactional space for non-confrontational behavior between individuals, otherwise known as the corporate charter. It's long past time to take corporations off their pedestal and make them part of the community, with obligations that go beyond mere profit-making. Capitalism is a proven wealth generator, but its also a destructive force. Government has a role to play.
9
Investment in human capital is smart investment. Reducing poverty is doable. Education is a public good.
- Simple truths rejected by the people who run our country.
23
This argument of this article is specious because it is based on a false premise: republicans want to reduce poverty. They don't. It doesn't matter whether benefits help people while looking for work, if a better system could be designed modeled on European programs (DOA), or whether there are tangible public benefits to keeping people whole during difficult times.
(Interesting difference in philosophy which explains a lot: In America unemployment is considered a failure of the individual. In Europe it's a failure of the system to provide work.)
Are there people on benefits who aren’t interested in working? Sure. Some. But in my experience, that is not a widespread problem. I'm only one data point but it’s not atypical. In my most recent two year stretch of unemployment I collected unemployment and food stamps (the latter being a weekly humiliation). I also drew down IRA savings. Mandatory job training workshops were irrelevant to getting a professional job. Others there definitely wanted a job, but were unable to get anything permanent. In that time I applied for about 100 jobs. I eventually took a one-year job at *40%* of my previous salary. I also applied at places like grocery stores and garden centers. Does that look like I didn’t want to work? I think not.
A pre-condition for forcing people to work is that *the jobs have to be there* and in many cases they aren’t. That part of the republican program is deliberately and spitefully left out.
31
The GOP move to end anti-poverty programs is all based in their racist attitudes. The average Republican still has the classic image of "welfare queen" as an African-American woman with lots of kids from different men. They have not adjusted to the fact that way more White folks benefit from these anti-poverty programs. And, quite frankly, most of these folks don't even realize that they are getting these benefits. Remember the cry of "don't let the government touch my Medicare"?
I do fear that the GOP will figure out a way to gerrymander the program cuts so as to penalize urban (predominantly black) poor more than others. If they do, their racist attitudes will be even more obvious. But if the cuts penalize all, than I hope a tsunami of swing voters appears to vote out the GOP.
21
"If your precious 'underprivileged' ever get together . . . !
They're going to take what they need--not as your gift--but as their right!"
Orson Welles and Herman Mankiewicz, CITIZEN KANE, 1941
10
It's a lot easier to figure out when you realize that Republicans don't care whether anti-poverty programs work. If it costs tax money, they're against it. If the programs were free, they might be in favor of them. But basically, they don't care whether poor people get less poor.
28
Facts have no place in an issue that is all about emotion. Americans, since the earliest days of this nation, have had, and still have emotional problems with poor people.
For starters we neither like no trust poor people largely because our society considers poverty to be a moral-failure (along with substance abuse). Therefore, the poor are almost always suspect of being or becoming criminals who will steal from you including by taking benefits they don't deserve.
Americans also like to think that their success is due to their personal actions, work-ethic, determination and grit, et cetera. If/when those hard working Americans find themselves in a financial problem it is always somebody else who is at fault. However, if the person falling on hard-times isn't you - it is their own fault and they are not to be trusted.
Lets not confuse a perfectly emotional argument based in distrust, with boring "FACTS." Emotions are so much more powerful and satisfying.
20
People born blind, crippled, deaf, and mentally disabled into poverty survive on SSI and SNAP when they become adults. Most work in sheltered workshops, of some kind, which are not obligated to pay minimum wages. Republican proposals in Congress reduce their SNAP benefits if they
do not earn some minimum amount from working. But thousands of people collecting SSI work full time at jobs that pay NOTHING at all. Republicans in Congress propose to reduce SNAP benefits to encourage them to work harder.
Government law and policy do not have to be fair and do not have to be ethical. The law has to be legal. When United States citizens took land from American Indians, that was the law. Republicans in Congress want the USA to treat the least among us every bit as well as we treated American Indians.
16
Yes; thank you.
"Do these people ever visit the real world?"
Let's use but one example: Paul Ryan. He didn't just "visit" the real world, he lived it, surviving on Social Security benefits in his youth after his father died and then getting a public-funded education courtesy of the state.
Ryan is the poster child for elitist cruelty--the exact same epithets the GOP loves to smear us "coastal elites" with.
GOP and Duplicity go hand in hand. Now go vote.
37
It's kind of the flip side of the sixties' "all those New Left radicals are privileged lawyers and bankers' kids who would hate to live in an actual socialist society;" all the Randroids of our day and age have big government paychecks in their past. Doesn't even have to be welfare benefits; far more common is living off of a government paycheck. I live in the DC area and those libertarians-on-welfare are everywhere, especially in the defense sector in Northern Virginia.
1
An interesting factoid. GDP per capita in 2016 rose to the highest level in U.S. history. So why did Trump win? It wasn't the economy.
http://www.businessinsider.com/us-census-median-income-2017-9
9
Unfortunately part of the reason Trump won is due to the perception that Bill and Hillary Clinton have corrupted their version of government.
she lost to a one term Senator and now someone with absolutely experience whatsoever.
People do not trust her overall.
Didn't we, the people, ordain the constitution to promote the general welfare?
Why, then, do we think other people shouldn't be so well off?
12
We've overfunded this program for decades with no results.....
If you can't support yourself in a thriving economy with 3% unemployment, then I have no sympathy for you.
There's work and opportunity out there for those who want it.
How bad do you want it?
8
What do you mean by overfunded? What makes you say there have been no results?
Those are serious questions, and I doubt you have good answers. But, please, be so good as to tell us what level of funding is appropriate and, especially, why. Please explain how feeding people has “no” effect, not even an effect you dislike.
Before rendering a judgement based on prejudice, I recommend listening to Brooke Gladstone’s “Busted” series (https://www.wnyc.org/press/on-the-media-poverty-series/92816/). I doubt you’ll come away still convinced we spend too much on people who deserve no sympathy or help.
3
3% unemployment when many folks have three jobs. See the problem?
Editor’s note: This comment has been anonymized in accordance with applicable law(s).
2
The basic Republican voter is far different than the basic Republican politician. Although you'll never catch them talking about it in public, the bulk of Republicans in Congress and State Houses believe our progressive income tax system is immoral. They also believe the minimum wage is immoral. And finally, they certainly believe that welfare programs are immoral. But they can't say that, so they make up all kinds of other reasons for opposing taxes, raising the minimum wage and cutting welfare programs. The average Republican voter reads or listens to these reasons and agrees. Not realizing it's all 100% nonsense. On the foundation of these false narratives Trump came along with his steroid approach. He created an American reality that was so absurd you would have thought people would laugh him out of the country. Instead, 65 million of them voted for a man who wouldn't know the truth about something if his life depended on it. That's where we are in America. Democrats are scratching their heads trying to determine how to fight lies when everything they say to the contrary is labeled "fake news", rendering logic defenseless. Even as Trump and Congressional Republicans plot to take healthcare from the people who voted for Trump, support holds. I don't know where it all ends. But I do know it won't be great.
14
I’m wondering how these self assured entitled & privileged Republicans would behave if their social status and bank accounts were reversed and diminished?
May they know fear, like the fear they are forcing on the U.S. middle class and poor.
2
65 million people voted for Clinton. 62 million people voted for Trump. The basis of any productive conversation is facts. Why didn't the Editors note this inaccuracy?
1
Pounding the table Republicans not interested in facts. Regret the last race was not a face off between Trump and Sanders. Have the debate over the soul of the nation. Economic Darwinism versus every man is my brother.
Instead the GOP produced the only candidate Hillary could surely beat. The Dems produced the the only candidate Trump might beat. Two deeply flawed candidates qualifies as a crying shame.
7
But, of course, failed speaker Paul Ryan never wants to get confused over facts. Remember he was the GOP "WONK" for a few years. Mr. Policy Expert, ha, can't get a bill through without the approval of the ill-named Freedom Caucus, otherwise known as Koch Industries. In once-great Wisconsin these days it's stylish to beat down the poor, step on workers' rights (teachers included, big time) and go Kansas-style-crazy. Can't wait to see him on the speakers circuit wonking over the chicken and peas.
12
Ever notice that the people slashing social programs have never actually been poor ??? They have often received some benefits at some point in the lives, but THAT doesn't count. They deserve it. THOSE People, not so much. " I've got mine, drop Dead ". Seriously.
16
"I've got mine, drop dead!" The GOP libertarian mantra. Ever meet an underprivileged libertarian ? And you never will.
3
Most of your charts don't show up on my IPad!
2
You can only cut the number of recipients so far before running into a brick wall!!! I was a case manager for a workfare program in the 90's in Wisconsin. Tommy Thompson's W-2 (welfare to work) had been slashing the dole rolls for welfare to families with children.
My target population was childless adults on General Relief (GR). Mostly single people & some couples. I found "work experience" sites for recipients who, theoretically, would acquire basic work skills, a skill & a job reference. They hadto work 20 hours a week for their monthly benefit ($110 singles or $225 couples).
Instead of giving cash, the program directly paid rent, utilities & hygiene items. Comprised mostly of single men, the rolls cleared out quickly. Those left were waiting for a decision for SS & people with addictions (mostly alcohol in WI). All had major barriers to self sufficiency. They were so disabled or addicted they couldn't keep a job. I had to terminate one woman, an alcoholic she couldn't show up for work regularly. The next winter she was found dead in a snowbank. Passed out & died one cold night from her DISEASE! Some people CAN'T work until their barriers to self sufficiency are addressed. That's where the US is now after 20 + years of welfare "deform." Republicans are playing fast & loose with the facts. Some will always need help, financial or otherwise. Who are we now? It would be more humane to require the death penalty for the disabled, addicted & those not able to work!
18
"You can only cut the number of recipients so far before running into a brick wall!!!"
Yeah, that's the thing. They've been doing this since the eighties; at this point, whatever waste and fraud does exist in the system was cut out long ago, and what's left is, in many cases, basically nothing. These people are trying to squeeze blood from a turnip.
2
Republicans have an ironclad rule: Never let facts get in the way of ideological conclusions.
26
We live in a pathetic age where this information is readily available and pretty much obvious yet we still have to debate this point because the GOP is determined to give corporations massive tax relief at the expense of the rest of America.
15
Does anyone think that the "grand old party" cares about the poor?
13
This is what I hate about liberals. They resort to facts! Next you’re going to tell me that the best way to reduce abortion is through sex education and contraception, or that gun control laws reduce gun deaths. Fox News doesn’t use facts, I’m going back to Hannity.
20
#
“What the elegant laws of supply and demand really describe are the antics of an animal which has confused excrement with aliment [nourishment] and does not know it, and which, like infantile sexuality, pursues no “real aim.” Having no real aim acquisitiveness, as Aristotle correctly said, has no limit.”
Norman O. Brown
2
'... laws of supply and demand ...'
Krugman didn't say anything about "supply and demand". And why don't you try writing your own comment instead of copying someone else's? If you are a "Verified Commenter", you need to be reminded that you are supposed to be posting "high-quality" comments.
2
If subsidies reduce the incentive for work for the poor, the same would be said of the benefits awarded to the children of the wealthy. Change the interitance tax to 100% to encourage the children of the wealthy to get of their lazy backsides lest they feel the oath of poverty. This is the way it works for,the rest of us, why shouldn’t the well heeled have the same character building opportunity?
38
Yes, another example of GOP economic hypocrisy. Their supposed over-riding policy dicta only apply in circumstances beneficial to the rich and the privileged. You would think that their claimed self-sufficiency policies would result in favoring a 100% estate tax, rather than the 0% they just hypocritically put into effect. But Paris Hilton or Donald Trump Jr are so much more deserving of the GOP free ride than an inner city single parent working a couple of minimum wage jobs. A minimum wage the GOP, surprise, surprise, wants to eliminate.
3
There is some disability fraud out there, where some folks are granted permanent disability status when it should have been temporary, then they work under the table, and their neighbors know it. Taxpayers lose twice when the disability payments continue and lose the taxes on the under the table payments. The solution as I see it is to make permanent disability harder to get, but to allow a bit more income before it is taken away, so that folks will pay taxes on what they earn part time.
I also believe that having universal health insurance not tied to employment or income, would reduce the number of folks on disability, who otherwise need to continue to be categorized as disabled to get insurance on Medicare.
17
Krugman asks:
"Do these people ever visit the real world?"
Of course many of them often do. But these visits cause no dissonance for them whatsoever, because reflexive lying, whether done indifferently or self-righteously, is a defining trait of such people. An interesting question is whether this trait is developmental or innate.
13
Much of Europe's social welfare programs are possible because the US subsidizes much of their military defense and technology development. Medical technology too.
Economy's are stagnant,growth minimal and high debt loads. Worse their culture and social capital are deteriorating. They are on the path to oblivion.. hedonism reigns in much of Europe.
This is not something to emulate.
4
Have you ever been to Europe? It sure doesn't sound like it,
I'm there often and I see no evidence of the reign of hedonism.
I'm wondering exactly what you mean by your assertion.
15
the usa subsidizes nothing in europe. this is an absolute trump myth.
have you ever been to europe or do you just watch fox news and go to epcot?
11
You’re wrong on the numbers alone.
First, just because European nations spend less on defense, that doesn’t mean the US subsidizes their other spending. It only means they have different priorities.
Second, even if — for the sake of argument — the US produces more technological innovation, that isn’t a subsidy either.
Finally, magnitude. The two percentage points of GDP you’re worrying over don’t nearly account for the welfare state in any wealthy European country. They are on par with the typical fiscal deficit. They’re a mere fraction just of healthcare spending.
Speaking of which, the United States wastes $1 trillion annually in medical expenditure because of our bloated, private, Byzantine system. That’s more than the whole defense budget. If you want to know where your money’s disappearing to, look no further.
3
According to the GOP, we need to eliminate laws that reward non-workers because they drain the treasury while discouraging people from working for their food, housing, and other necessities of life. We could begin by taking away the tax exempt status given to charity organizations (especially food banks and shelters) along with those tax deductions for their contributors. We also could end tax deductions for non-working spouses and kids who are old enough to work. Finally, we need to consider that income from investments and inheritances discourages work--perhaps such income should be highly taxed compared to wage income. For some reason I haven't seen any of these proposals coming from Republicans.
13
Maybe churches, especially those using their tax-exempt pulpits to spout conservative policies and encourage their congregations to vote Republican, should also start paying taxes for that privilege.
4
Having tried for years to find employees willing to reliably show up for work, actually work, and stay around if enough to be trained for promotion.
Also after watching hordes of employees file for workers comp benefits after filing false claims; unemployment benefits after quitting, etc. raising my insurance costs through the roof.
All empathy is gone.
If you want taxpayers’ money - work - even if it’s organizing paper clips by size and color.
5
Have you tried raising wages? Whenever business owners complain of their inability to find good help, I wonder about this. You see, what I have found is that you get what you pay for- and that people are more motivated to show to a job if it pays above market wages. No one is owed cheap labor. If you can't find quality help at the price you are willing to pay, raise what you are paying. If that doesn't help, then maybe you have a valid complaint. But it is amazing to me how many business owners I talk to have yet to try this simple strategy...... And I'm a small business owner BTW.
24
it sounds more like you drive away your employees...
do you pay a living wage?
do you give employees health insurance?
17
LOL. Oh, American employers, I love you so much. You're all capitalists, or at least you claim to be, and yet almost every one of you simply can't understand the epically simple rule that the market economy is based on: you get what you pay for.
The world doesn't owe you a quality workforce. If you want one, earn it. Either by attracting or by developing the kind of talent that your company needs to succeed. If you can't do that, then you're bad at your job, and you deserve to lose it. That's the market for you.
3
All three branches of our government are pursuing a reverse Robin Hood agenda at a time when the "have mores" have what is surely an embarrassment of riches if only they were capable of being embarrassed. In any economic downturn, absent a strong safety net, the poverty rate will explode and even in a stable economy millions of people are one illness or other bit of bad luck away from adding to the poverty ranks.
10
Love your second graph, Dr. K. It is about as good a fit for a correlation that is likely to be seen. It is clear that the smaller the GDP share of poverty alleviating transfers the greater is the poverty rate - and the greater is the implicit maldistribution of a country's income and wealth.
It is good that you have undertaken to illustrate issues other than "free trade" because I doubt that you could produce evidence as robust. With the 2020 race for POTUS entering its trial run, i.e., mid-term elections, perhaps you can begin to clarify the real differences between the likely candidates.
By "real" differences, I don't mean Hillary v. The Donald. If you recall, Hillary said she wanted Chelsea to have everything Ivanka had, by which, one surmises, she meant MONEY. (Unfortunately, now Ivanka has everything Chelsea has - a POTUS father - lol.)
In the run up to the primaries, there will be major differences between the candidates on the basis of priorities for economic policies, especially for working people and the lowest two income quintiles. Will these concerns get lost in the race for who is the true Identity Party candidate? Isn't one's income status a (if not the) major part of one's identity? Indeed, it's the only one that one can change through effort and opportunity.
The soul of the Democratic Party will be on display during the next 2.5 years. The very rare opportunity is upon us to determine if any major party has any interest in those who are less fortunate.
6
"The soul of the Democratic Party will be on display during the next 2.5 years. The very rare opportunity is upon us to determine if any major party has any interest in those who are less fortunate."
Well, some of us among the less fortunate have taken notice of the fact that we can get health insurance now, which wasn't the case until the last time the Democratic Party took over. But what do we peasants know.
2
Having worked for 15 years as an anti-poverty lawyer responsible for representing the indigent in their applications to secure and maintain public subsistence benefits, ranging from federal Supplemental Security Income to Work First New Jersey General Assistance, I consider myself to be familiar enough with this topic to render an educated opinion. I actually have an opinion that would resolve America’s gross wealth and income inequality problem and obviate the need for our failed “welfare” system. The greatest disincentive to work is low wages! The indigent I have assisted over the years want to work but are often discouraged by low-wage jobs at the bottom of our socioeconomic ladder which trap them in the welfare system for extended periods of time and promote the illicit survival behavior that conservative anti-poverty program opponents naively pounce on. America, destitution has no place in our great country. Our future economic prosperity lies in living wages and a universal basic income.
50
Reduced poverty for whom?
That is, this may not be an economic issue. In America, attitude toward the poor is to at least some extent shaped by the link between class. The economic reasoning is just the excuse.
6
In the first graph, France may be an outlier.
In order to stem a precipitous drop in fertility, France has provided generous benefits that allow new parents to stay at home to nurture a new child.
This costly benefit has largely been successful, but means higher benefit costs and a lower employment rate.
2
Germany also has a system of Kindergeld, child money, to parents for each child. I believe Poland also.
2
Graphs and charts do nothing to convince social and economic Darwinists to change. Only by changing the rule makers can we change how we provide for everyone. Then we can recognize what government should be providing and that is Stability.
15
It is not from the top down--Mr. Krugman's perspective--that our political & economic crisis can be peacefully solved, but only from the bottom up.
Not until American workers can once again form Labor Unions--which have always and everywhere been the organizational bases for working class political force--will they be able to regain a measure of their former political power and reverse the shrinking of their share of the total national wealth which their labor alone produces. Nothing is won without struggle.
Following the Sanders candidacy, the Socialist lighting is out of the bottle & cannot be put back in. The victory of Ms. Octavia Cortez & the young workers interest in Socialism, the philosophy of the working class, are our hope for America's future.
6
Food stamps pay $1.32 per person in the household per day. To me that is a starvation number.
Lost in the finger pointing is work requirements in the rural areas, white, are largely waived because of travel distances and/or lack of public transportation and overall job availability while the city dwellers are granted no such waiver while being expected to work as many hours at minimum wage as is humanly possible.
10
Thanks - a small correction, for those who are unfamiliar: Food Stamps - SNAP - allots a maximum amount per day - it varies with household size, income and expenses.
In NY e.g., the MAXIMUM benefit for a family of 4 would be $640, or $160 per person - $5.33/day or $1.77 per meal for 3 meals a day. Less in months with 31 days.
Few families or individuals receive the maximum - which is the amount that is considered sufficient to cover ALL food costs. It's called something like the Thrifty Meal Plan. $640/month for 4.
The amount of food stamp benefits "awarded" is figured after looking at income and basic home expenses.
NYS Example:
A family of 4 earning a gross income of $3000/month ( just below the cap), paying $1500 a month for rent, their own utilities with no child care would merit a SNAP allotment of $131/month - that comes out to 4.37/day, an extra $.36 per person.
There's a NY based SNAP calculator at https://bplc.cssny.org/benefit_tools/snap_calculator - for those interested.
The NYS income caps are provided at: http://otda.ny.gov/programs/snap/
It is a lot of political scutwork to demonize people needing food stamps -- which after all, originally grew from a program that was concomitantly designed to sell surplus US foods.
15
@cheryl . Thanks for the correction.
@cheryl . One more opinion. I think the gov't lackey who decide the 'awards' of SNAP still appears to be 'letting' the poor eat today.
I don't understand Progressive's opposition to work requirements. Requirements should not be limited to 20 hours but should be 40 hours. Forty hours of work or school a week is far from excessive. Many Americans with commuting and second jobs taken into consideration spend over 70 hours a week at work. I don't give money to beggars on the street because I know most of them will use the money for drugs or alcohol. Sometimes I have offered to buy them healthy food. More often than not, they refuse my offer. They are not being honest when begging. If welfare roles drop when work requirements are implemented maybe that means recipients are being dishonest in the same way as the beggars. Many welfare recipients have off the book jobs which preclude them performing work requirements. For others, they have enough that it is just not worth the trouble.
7
Clearly you have no idea what poverty looks like. If you are a healthy adult with a family whose skills qualify you for a low-wage job, you can’t live on what you make. Working 70 hours a week not only is counterproductive in terms of human performance, it leaves no time for sleep or family. And imposing work requirements on those for whom travel and childcare are the primary obstacles isn’t the answer. The American myth that we rise through sheer guts and hard work is just that: a myth. The real issues are income equality, the gig economy, and the GOP preference for companies over people. “If I can do it, you can do it” doesn’t mean anyone can do it. Just means it can be done.
38
Most data has shown the majority of people taken off will be taken off due to a lack of understanding of the requirements or paperwork errors. We're falling into the common fallacy of assuming that the poor want are poor because they want to be poor, not because of unplanned children, sick relatives, illness, etc., and that the people commuting or working 2 jobs aren't the ones receiving benefits. I've talked to may of the employees at my local Walmart, most of them work 2 jobs, and it's a fair bet some of them receive benefits. Also, panhandlers are a separate issue from benefits. There are already structures in place in many locations to lift panhandlers into the working poor, that they choose not to take advantage of (in my limited experience of having had many conversations with one panhandler in particular).
17
It’s very simple: people want to work. And most people who end up with social security do so because the can’t work.
Apparently the author of the above comment does not know poverty and the circumstances. These people spend all their time fighting for survival in a hostile environment where they can’t get decent housing and can’t easily buy food due to the lack of lack transportation. Because people who qualify for Medicaid often fail to get a ride to their appointments New Hampshire now arranges for transportation. What good is insurance when you can’t get to your doctor or pick up prescriptions at the pharmacy?
Sure you can add work requirements as a condition, but it will not put people to work. It simply will add bureaucratic layers and cost. As a society we would be much better off investing in proper social programs that allow people to stay healthy, buy food, provide decent and stable housing and public transportation. Give people opportunities and spare us useless and costly work requirements.
19
Regardless of whether one supports anti-poverty programs or not, defining poverty as one-half the median national income pretty well insures that we will never win the war on poverty. If, rather, we look at material gains, it is easy to see that the standards of living, and our expectations, have risen greatly since LBJ's administration. This is a good thing, but I don't know whether it is attributable to government welfare programs, technical innovations, or work requirements for benefits. That, of course, is where political arguments arise as each political group claims a different cause for the effect.
4
And that doesn’t even take into consideration that median income in the US is considerably higher than the countries listed (e.g. French median income is approximately $37,000 vs the US median of $57,000). So someone in the US defined as poor by reference to the median is making 50% more than someone similarly defined as poor in France). This is one of Krugman’s weakest columns and his analysis clearly shows that he has abandoned any attempt at objectivity in favor of his preferred social goals.
7
Krugman is playing fast and loose with the term “reduce(s) poverty”. Does the term mean reduces the nation’s rate? Does it mean reduces the harsh edges of life at the margins whether or not the national rate declines? Does it mean reduces the next generation’s chances of staying mired at the bottom?
Precision matters. Krugman is giving a political argument in vague political jargon to advance a political view. As an economist I would think he’d do us a better service being more clear and more accurate and thus more edifying.
Americans want poverty reduced. It is not clear any of our federal efforts have succeeded much if that means reducing the rate or reducing multigenerational probabilities (stickiness), even if subsidies and supports DO and HAVE somewhat softened poverty’s harshnesses. These are not minor distinctions and Krugman totally blows the chance to make them.
By failing to be clear this piece advances little.
7
Overall, the percentage of Europeans of working age NOT in the labor force has been around 30% - in the US it has been about 21%. Is that an indication that too generous welfare benefits cause people to stay home and not work? Seems just as valid as the chart Paul pullerd out below. I'd also note that the Germans slashed possible welfare benefits for migrants in 2016 based on the same sort of reasoning that Republicans like Ryan used today. Macron in France ran on and is implementing welfare reform for French citizens. Who will liberals like Paul cite to endorse expanding the US welfare state once most European countries have clawed back their own expansive programs?
9
Chris, Krugman is trying to show that the statement "too generous welfare benefits cause people to stay home and not work."
To show a statement is false, all one has to do is give one counterexample. For example to show that "all primes are odd" is false, all one has to do is point to the number 2.
Krugman gives 5 counter examples in his chart. If you look at the Scandinavian countries, you will see two more:
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SL.TLF.CACT.ZS
BTW LFP in the EU was 58.2% in 10/2017 and 62.7% in the US and the EU includes countries in which women traditionally do not work. It would be even worse in all of Europe,
5
Gonna take a lot of "clawing" for them to get down to our level of assistance.
Your numbers are quite different from Krugman's. Why? He told us his source, you didn't. He told us the exact age range of his graph (25-54). You used the term "working age" without defining it. Methinks you're playing stupid games. Nothing "valid" about your argument.
4
i am curious in these European welfare states are there limits to the amount of time one can work and still receive benefits? for example in this country one can only work 20 hours a week if they receive a government disability check. Obviously i dont know enough people personally to make a valid median assesment on the issue, but the people i do know on disability could work more than 20 hours a week if they wanted to or needed to. However, most dont because then they would lose their government benefits.
4
We have. Swedish friend and the social benefits are spread widely among society. A young family will receive 18 months paid family leave after a baby which can be split between Mom and Dad, the daycare is subsidized, healthcare is covered. Most adults seem to work . The social structure seems to make life easier.
15
Those benefits include health care. Nobody wants to lose healthcare.
2
The idea that anti-poverty programs discourage work is a myth perpetrated by neo-liberal ideologues and for which there is no evidence. This includes the idea that minimum wages discourage job creation, unemployment pay discourages job seeking; or that higher taxes discourage enterprise. In countries with high levels of welfare, economic growth and living standards are also high eg Germany, Sweden and Norway, Denmark, Finland. They are also more equal societies which might be a clue.
23
Neo liberal basis for this counterfactual policy making? Not by a long shot - this is pure conservatism as defined by Reagan in 1980. You are a bit confused.
1
When I was a kid growing up in Texas, I once asked why there were so many German towns in the state. A “grownup” in the room theorized that Germans were the “only ones ambitious enough to take advantage of the cheap Mexican labor there.” Early immigrants from Germany, like all immigrants of that time, as well as those entering the country today, were actually mostly decent, compassionate people, but that answer stuck with me and revealed the true colors of the person who said it.
Face it, progressive New York Times readers of clear conscience – many Americans can only see other people as means to their own ends, and anyone who doesn't agree with their way of thinking is just a “libtard”. Not to put too fine of a point on it, but there are probably conservatives right now searching “How to benefit from people working in poverty”, and if this article turns up in the search results, they'll dismiss Krugman as a wimp and continue searching until they find new ways to use and abuse poor people.
Immigrants are essential for economic growth, and our best hope is convincing other Americans that it's so, as Robert Reich explains: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RD-MblaUZt
As for the idea that compassion can have anything to do with it, many people may never be ready for that – just look at how they reject the very programs and politicians trying to help them.
21
Your link to the Robert Reich video does not work. I will check back later is it sounds interesting...
1
@Concerned Citizen - Ok, thanks for the heads up about that. I first saw it on Facebook, so try searching "7 Truths About Immigration (In Under 70 Seconds)" on YouTube or on Facebook and you should find it.
Going forward from here Dr. K, perhaps it would be more realistic to use comparative social welfare statistics of the U.S with Russia, rather than the UK, France & Germany? That seems to be the preferred direction of the GOP and Trump.
15
It is all so simple, yet the age old question of who gets to benefit in society (most deserving) ''trumps'' logic and of course, morality.
We could initiate a guaranteed income for all (effectively reducing the government massively with associated costs to administer social programs)
We could create a true living wage (min. $22hr) where there would be no more corporate socialist welfare where corporations rely on the government (you the taxpayer) to subsidize their profits.
We could administer and strictly adhere to a true progressive tax policy, that if you make more, then you pay more tax progressively upwards - not less.
We could change our society to reflect that having a billion dollars (or multiples thereof) for any singular individual or family is obscene, and tax 100% accordingly.
We could change our policies on government to be more inclusive such as Single Payer health care, expansion of Social Security (removing the FICA cap) and tie benefits and social spending to COLA.
We could easily do all of these things, but first you have to find people that are unwavering in promoting them (Liberals) and then actually vote enough of them into power.
So far, we have been woefully inadequate in the job.
54
Apart from their callousness, the most disheartening thing about the enduring myths about welfare, such as the asinine assertion that America's minimal level of aid to the poor reduces their incentive to work, is that virtually all such views, as Professor Krugman points out, have been widely debunked by poverty experts. Republicans' proclivity for denying research and facts is matched only by their hypocrisy: Few wealthy people can ever admit that most of their own wealth, which more often than not was inherited, gave them advantages in life that most people can never dream of.
They apparently weren't paying much attention in those psychology and sociology classes that they took either, where any reasonable person should have learned that people's most basic needs must be met in order for them to achieve higher goals, or to contribute back to society at their fullest potential. Nikki Haley was incensed by UN rapporteur on poverty in the US Phillip Alston's findings that 40 million Americans live in poverty, but as Alston rebutted in a CNN interview with Fareed Zakaria, she couldn't cite any specific inaccuracies in his report at all. Trump, Haley, and every other heartless member of the Republican Party has got to go !!
46
Like that of most other participants in this blog, my writing is far from perfect, but after reading almost anything Donald Trump says, or is quoted as saying, I feel a lot better about my comments. In this post, for example, I probably should have stated that “Trump, Haley, and every other heartless Republican have to go (rather than 'has to go')”, but when I compare my writing to that of Trump, which one person described as “the ramblings of a babbling idiot, not someone you expect to lead the free world,” I feel a lot better about myself again.
https://www.facebook.com/calltoactivism/photos/a.351436888576707.1073741...
Any boy can be president - and now we know it to be true – literally!!
3
The War on Poverty made some inroads into poverty but poverty is not over.
When one reviews your comparative analysis of the OECD data, the U.S. still has a long way to go. I don't personally believe a work requirement is a good policy response.
My observations on poverty for nearly 40 years agree with the Kaiser Family Foundation report.
Poverty stems from a complex set of factors, one dominant factor is the serious trend in income inequality. There is a good article in today's NYT by Patricia Cohen, Paychecks Lag as Profits Soar, and Prices Erode Wage Gains https://nyti.ms/2LkdKCo that underscores the complexity of income inequality and the poverty that stems from this long-term trend in inequality. Clearly, labor has been weakened and conditions are such that I doubt that labor bargaining power can be restored.
The consequences of poverty can be dire, the findings of Angus Deaton and Ann Case were shocking, https://www.brookings.edu/bpea-articles/mortality-and-morbidity-in-the-2....
Eliminating poverty should be a priority objective of our society and, for that matter, the whole world. To avoid this social responsibility is dysfunctional to the survival of our species.
The record shows that a modern welfare state and capitalism appears to be survivable and adaptable as conditions change. There are changes from technology and innovation that requires a flexible policy response based on data, NOT popular myths fabricated for political advantage.
24
it is precisely because anti poverty programs cost money that they are opposed by Republicans. They don't care about the poverty rate or the employment rate. They care about corporate profit rates and tax rates.
47
Mr. Paul Ryan is not trying to reduce poverty at all nor improve the fortunes of the poor. Ryan is attempting to serve his wealthy donors, and make them richer, while making the rest of us poorer.
Regardless of whether slashing poverty benefits causes work or not, Ryan will do so .... because he has been paid to do so.
There is something very dark about economic conservative ideology indeed that says the poor are always poor due to their own failings, rather than a failed economic system.
69
I would like to explore an idea that is being tried out in several different places around the world. A guaranteed income. I would frame it slightly differently than a straight hand out to all people. I would set a floor income level, lets say $30,000 per year. In any month that a person's income did not reach that level for any reason, it would be supplemented by the government to bring them up to that level. Those making above the minimum, would receive nothing.
What would be the effects of such a scheme? It would be expensive, we would have to make some hard choices. We would no longer be able to wage war for decades on end all over the world. If we reduced our military budget to that level required to respond to a direct threat and only that, we could almost pay for this.
Some people would stop working, I don't think it would be most. Mothers would be paid for their time and effort. That would change many households. I think businesses would get the religion of employee involvement or they would not have a workforce. People could quit a job and not starve. Imagine what it would be like to work at a place where everyone wanted to be there. I think there would be an explosion in education and the arts as well as volunteering.
Such an idea would profoundly change our culture, I think for the better. I would like to see the idea explored by more serious minds and fleshed out. It is clear that what we are doing now is not working. Would it hurt to look?
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As Milton Friedmon pointed out, it needs to be a no strings attached hand out. Otherwise it disensentives people from working.
I do not agree. Most people want to work, they find satisfaction in doing so, if they can do what they like and still make a living. A earnings floor makes sure no one starves, those who want all the goodies will work revardless.
Any way we could get this analysis with more than 5 countries? I trust your analysis and enjoy your work, but this seems like it could be a cherry picked sample.
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Commenters keep alluding to Charles Dickens. I always think of our president and the Republicans every year when I watch A Christmas Carol with my kids. Scrooge insists his taxes should be enough to care for the poor and he will not give extra at Christmas. When one of the men collecting donations tells Scrooge that many people would rather die than go to the debtor's prisons, Scrooge replies, "Then they should die, and decrease the surplus population." The poor will always be with us, unless the Republicans can find a way to "decrease the surplus population." Cutting aid is just the beginning.
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Your criticism seems terribly harsh. Except that you are right in what you say.
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At least, Dickens' novel had a happy ending. Scrooge repented his miserly ways and redeemed himself. I have no such hope for the Republican Party - at least, not until they are well and truly thrashed at election time. A crushing defeat might concentrate its collective mind.
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By coincidence, starting on the front page of this weeks Book Review, Robert Reich reviews a book that deals with exactly this topic.
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One program that definitely reduces poverty and crime is Head Start. A major controlled experiment showed major gains in education, income, marital status and crime rates. For every dollar invested in Head Start the public got $7 back. Despite these dramatic resulted the program still lsck6s funding.
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Early childhood education funding overall lacks the funding it should receive -- simply as a matter of economic self interest, it makes sense. Soem of us care a great deal about the futures of all these children - some do not - but no matter how selfishly one views programs, this ends up reducing costs long term and adding productive members of society.
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I'm nearly 60 years old. 5 years ago I was downsized from a good job with benefits. I was 3 months shy of my 55th birthday. I can't prove that it was age discrimination. Since then I've had two jobs both of which ended due to funding cuts. I've had phone interviews and face to face interviews that have gone well. I know my material but my age works against me. I had to move back in with my mother and brother because of the job situation. I keep on hearing how companies can't find competent people. I keep on seeing the same jobs (that I applied for and may have interviewed for) advertised.
The problem is not that people are unwilling to work. The problem is that employers are not willing to pay, train, hire, or do anything that might mean spending money to bring anyone up to speed. They will even fire long term employees to avoid training them in a new technology.
In this reader's opinion the lack of skilled Americans is not the problem. It's an employer created problem that is forcing thousands of Americans over the age of 50 into poverty or premature retirement. And as we drain our savings sooner than we ought, we will become too poor to have any sort of decent old age. But our politicians lack the will or interest to help solve the problem. It's easier to declare the war on poverty to be over or a failure.
Message to the GOP and the Democrats: you have failed all Americans, especially those who cannot, no matter how hard they try to, find jobs.
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I feel for you but i cant justify lumping the 2 parties together - the policy proposals just do not support it - from SS, medicare, medicaid, taxes, investment, guns, reproductive care, environment, military, foreign policy all the way down the list. As long as the propaganda campaigns of the .01% political donor class keep convincing rural white bigots that they have less in common with black people than they do with rich people (thanks Bulworth) and elect their republican boot lickers, the dems can't institute the programs they keep proposing.
Reagan started capital's war on labor and America has been the loser.
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@hen3ry
You should have been smart enough to have been born Kushner or Trump or Pritzker or Koch or Gates or Buffett.
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I believe the sad fact is, although neither liberals or conservatives want to talk about it, a sizable portion of human beings are not profitably employable in the modern world.
Ask anyone who owns a business in private and they may tell you about employees that can't be trained to help their company make a profit.
An article I read in this newspaper covered German's attempt to create work for such people. Something like 10% of their population seems to be less expensive to keep on the dole than forcing them to work, although they continue to seek ways to put them to constructive use.
Talk about a politically incorrect reality. We all deserve the basic necessities of survival, but what is the long term humane strategy. Is having children a basic necessity? How many?
I'm creeping myself out- but I bet Paul Ryan has given all this considerable thought. Maybe liberals should too.
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You are correct, Alan Haigh.
As another example:
https://www.vox.com/2014/5/30/5764096/its-three-times-cheaper-to-give-ho...
From the article:
Counting the homeless is, of course, a critical element to making appropriate homelessness policy. But good policy also requires greater awareness of a discovery that research continuously confirms — it's cheaper to fix homelessness by giving homeless people homes to live in than to let the homeless live on the streets and try to deal with the subsequent problems.
The most recent report along these lines was a May Central Florida Commission on Homelessness study indicating that the region spends $31,000 a year per homeless person on "the salaries of law-enforcement officers to arrest and transport homeless individuals — largely for nonviolent offenses such as trespassing, public intoxication or sleeping in parks — as well as the cost of jail stays, emergency-room visits and hospitalization for medical and psychiatric issues."
By contrast, getting each homeless person a house and a caseworker to supervise their needs would cost about $10,000 per person.
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These statistics are not reliable in terms of how the policy affects society as a whole.
What becomes uncomfortable is when you take a longer view and consider that the stability created by providing people with homes and food when they are unable to do it themselves enables them to have children and raise them on money provided by the government.
Is there a genetic link to the ability or inability to succeed in a capitalistic economy, or is almost every human capable of flourishing when given the means?
Whether it is genetic or cultural, how much do parents pass on the tools to be successful and/or the liabilities to fail to their children.
Maybe the genetic or cultural link is too small to be significant, but when Paul Ryan thinks about capitalistic Darwinism I suspect it actually comes to this point
"Is there a genetic link to the ability or inability to succeed in a capitalistic economy, or is almost every human capable of flourishing when given the means?"
Everyone should have full access to quality medical care regardless of income level or employment status. This concept bears repeating: quality health insurance/medical care should not be tied to employment. Proper medical care for all is a basic human right and the marker of a civilized society. Beyond that non-negotiable issue, everyone should have a minimum (universal) basic income and be provided subsistence food and housing for their family. If they want more (and most will want more), then they will have to work for it. We do not throw anyone away labeled as unworthy or undeserving. Why are these ideas so difficult for us to grasp in the United States? Why are we so unwilling to take care of each other in the way so many other countries provide for their own? Where are we off to in such a hurry, and why are we so certain our ends justify our current means?
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We produce babies, often without thought. We want to produce perpetual growth, often without thought. We can have both, in moderation, but we should love people, not things. More than anything else, we need to take care of those who are already here. How can we "win?" It's about quality, not quantity, for everyone. We are simply not smart enough to know who among us will wind up "producing" (what we really need) and who will not. When will we learn this lesson?
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Embedded dividers don't neatly separate trade between nations—America is common, continuous ground, a place of responsibility, our home, a place of open hearts and minds. A place not built on lies! Or misread balance sheets!
How can you build a country if you are busy casting blame? If your fights have no goals? As your party slates teen stalkers, pedophiles, and incels for state and national office? (A party administered by persons who paid for abortions and paid for silence about non-existent sex.)
These are major character flaws! Exhibits of judgments gone wild, the forbidden tapes of a country's debauchery, the locker room, 24/7 live.
Fresh/stunning: People in Scotland, chanting. As Trump played golf on his course: “No Trump! No KKK! No Racist USA!” “No Trump! No KKK! No Racist USA!” The greatness of equality and the insanity of white supremacy were chanted as he fired iron shots, for the world to hear: “No Trump! No KKK! No Racist USA!”
The sadness of the moment is more compelling. People globally are loudly saying--to the world--that Trump is a racist. They see he has organized a racist government, with lethal and non-lethal attacks on women, children, families, immigrants, citizens and residents of color, on their lives and liberties. He plays golf. Those gathered in Scotland chant in one voice: “No Trump! No KKK! No Racist USA!”
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Professor, you are always worried about the recipients of anti poverty money and never worry about the poor people who are paying the taxes from their hard earned money. Take Trump for example, well, I guess we can't because his taxes are secret, but how about Mitt Romney. He had to pay almost $7 million in taxes for the two years before his presidential campaign. That left him only $35 million that he had to stretch over two years.
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funniest and most honest interview of "Anne Romney" https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kWdVminV7uY
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Yet another example of the GOP as the anti-science, don’t try to change my mind with facts party.
Why are virtually no Republicans standing up for truth, justice, and the American way?
If someone loses a primary because they antagonizes the “base”, there are plenty of well-paid lobbying jobs, and they get to keep their Congressional pension.
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Face it. We don't want to reduce poverty. We don't care about poverty, except those of us who live it.
We want to reduce *taxes.* That is it. All. We want more for Us and we don't care about Them until the point at which we become Them.
So, no, it isn't odd that antipoverty programs are not working and that is why we must defund them, even as antipoverty programs have worked and that is why we can now defund them. Because the truth is just that we want to defund them because we don't care about poverty and we don't want to pay for it.
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As usual, you completely miss the point of imposing work requirements on Medicaid and Food Stamps. Graphs of benefits, employment, and poverty rates, indeed, graphs in general, have nothing to do with it, and it does not matter if the welfare programs are succeeding or not. What matters is that nobody should be given anything for free, especially if they are of a different ethnicity than you are. Ryan, Trump’s economic advisors, and the rest of the GOP all understand this. Why can’t you?
The way to fight such barbarism is to make sure that the proposed work requirements are weak enough so they don’t actually prevent anyone from getting the assistance they need. Opposing them outright will just lose the next election.
Please, save your moral indignation for church.
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Keynesian cooperation and generosity create abundance. Dickensian stinginess and scrimping create penury.
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Thank you. The philosophy of scarcity seems to me based on greed and a desire to hoard, not share, resources. We live in an abundant world and people are miraculously creative if given the chance. Our politics should be based on creating opportunies, not cutting them off.
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Objective data clearly was not the tool used in the Council of Economic Advisors summation. I was taught that you get to reasonably correct answers by asking reasonable questions. So, I have a few-1. Why is there such a lack of historical knowledge or willful disconnect to how America got to this place? Poverty and economic hardships are not solely dependent upon one's will or desire to work. Opportunity, access, training and meaningful compensation all play a role.
In the 1980s I was a social science researcher looking at teen parenting. Many of these young women desired to work, but losing health benefits, child care subsidies, high transportation costs were often substantial enough to prevent work because of their low wages. What if they could maintain these non-cash benefits and continue working? Just one of many issues in how poverty could be mediated.
2. Nobody compares what subsidies businesses and corporations receive to produce or not to produce; for research and development; for exorbitant contractual service pricing, and the list goes on. And, we've not even addressed the international subsidies.
Yet, poor and vulnerable children, adults and the elderly become victims of these nefarious reports and schemes. There is so much more and so many other data sets that debunk these reports. Note that I did not even mention this year's tax bill.
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Welfare is no picnic. I still remember how happy I was back in 1997 when I got my first job and said goodbye to public assistance. But without it I wouldn't have been able to learn English and go to school for a year. I'm working for Columbia University now.
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Good for you. The Republicans, however, don't like people like you because your life story doesn't square with their bogus narrative that harps on imaginary "welfare queens" and "snorting Joes".
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"Last week the Trump Council of Economic Advisers declared not only that the War on Poverty has in fact substantially reduced poverty – which is what progressives have been saying all along – but that poverty is “largely over”. (Do these people ever visit the real world?)"
We need to frame the poverty debate in a completely different way than we have for decades. It has always been fraught with the self-interests of an increasingly corporatist political class and politicized within the economists' class, in no small part, thanks to the corruption of the education system, by the Kochs directly, through the Heritage Institute, and ALEC.
Today, in terms of the safety net, there are no differences between Trump and the Kochs, in terms of agreement on what is being done and what they have yet to achieve. While we talk about Trumpian policy, it has been largely carried out by Kochs minions from day one.
We need to reevaluate how we count the unemployed. It was always deeply flawed. With the advent of the gig economy, it is even more so.
https://www.rimaregas.com/?s=how+we+count+the+unemployed
To millions of us in this social class called "precariat," the concern of our fellow Americans seems to have vanished as of 2014, when UI for the long-term unemployed was ended by agreement between Sen. Patty Murray and Paul Ryan. The consequences for millions has been dire to this day.
Most poor people work. At what wage is one poor?
---
95 Million Losers
https://wp.me/p2KJ3H-2vV
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Stating the obvious, even when well written, is still patronizing. Yeesh...
1
Rocko,
Has it ever dawned on you that being as polarized as we are stems from the fact, and it is a fact, that Americans are influenced by four main sources of information, each presenting "facts" or withholding them, depending on the point of view.
As a result, you can never assume that the persons you are speaking to know the same set of facts as you, since they have a life experience similar to yours, are even aware of anything that doesn't touch them on a daily basis.
Lastly, I don't write exclusively for you. It is rather surprising that you react as if you are who I'm here for.
3
Yes, it has "dawned" on me that many people speak (or write) to hear themselves talk. The "facts" in your comment above are your own conclusions, backed by cites to your own blog posts! Pontificate much?
Isn't the republican party's long term goal obvious now? They never say it outright because, like most of their policies it's monstrously unpopular, but it would ensure a white majority in this country and cement the power of the oligarchs for a long enough period that the memory of real democracy would (they hope) slip away. You can see the edges of it whenever the topic of "jobs Americans aren't willing to do" comes up and the needs this country has for immigrants labor. Brutally said, they want to reduce the quality of life for the bottom half of workers till they are willing to be treated as badly as immigrants and work in conditions as dangerous for pay as low. This will destabilize the remnants of the middle-class and make them more malleable and encourage even more dissension between the races. The ranks upper middle-class will be decimated. Basically, such a policy would transform our economy and country into an old world fiefdom with today's billionaires taking the place of medieval aristocratic houses. All they need is a man like Brett kavnaugh on the bench to make this a reality.
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Yeah, the ideal endpoint is something like the Jim Crow era South, only for the entire country. A racist's dream and an oligarch's paradise.
1
@Rebecca b There's an interesting article in the Atlantic about the "new American aristocracy" that basically says the upper middle class (the "9.9%") are complicit. Don't shift all the blame to the "1%" and a Congress beholden to donors. The problem is as much "us" --well, anyone reading this who is more concerned about the growth rate on the value of your property/other investments than whether you can pay all your bills next month.
No, Dr. Krugman, Not Donald Trump not people serving in the Trump Politburo nor at (non)think tanks such as The Heritage Foundation ever visit the real world. Ever. Can you imagine Donald Trump sitting on the front porch of an impoverished Kentucky family the way Bobby Kennedy did in 1968? Puh-leeze!
What the War on Poverty has been able to accomplish is making life a bit less miserable for people who have benefited from its various programs: Food stamps, Medicaid, heat subsidies, job training, whatever. But anyone who thinks the war has been "won" hasn't visited an inner city, a small town or a hard-scrabble farm lately.
So Republicans don't want to spend money on infrastructure, which would put many people to work, and wants to kill funding for anti-poverty programs which help many of those who might find meaningful, well-paying jobs on infrastructure projects. In a de facto kind of way, the GOP is admitting that its Trump Tower Tax Cut (to borrow R. Law's phrase a few comments before me) was simply to enrich the rich and deny the poor and working poor what little they already have.
November cannot come soon enough.
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Not so much wrong as incomplete. Many European countries do have serious unemployment and underemployment problems. Read the British press, especially the Guardian, for the controversy over benefits tests, as they are called over there. Other EU countries have dealt with the problem by exporting their unemployed, primarily to Germany and Britain, a strategy now failing. But the social safety net does have one advantage. Low income workers don't lose medical benefits, in contrast to the U.S., where anyone attempting to get off welfare or disability benefits promptly loses coverage and faces crushing medical costs.
26
At a 92.7% debt-to-GDP ratio, we are one the most indebted nations in the world, and our budget deficit is rising – close to $1 trillion again.
An astonishing 70 million of our people are on Medicaid. Why so much noise about a single-payer solution when over 20% of our people are on Medicaid and CHIP and another 14% are on Medicare? We’re getting there already. But, given these numbers, I don’t know that forcing work requirements on Medicaid recipients will make much of a dent in the deficit OR the debt; or, indeed, in anything. The desire to do so always struck me as the remnant of a strong Calvinist streak in America rather than any likely solution to the dependency mess we’ve gotten ourselves into. The reason so many readers are now Googling the name “Calvin” is that they suspect it doesn’t represent half the name on their underwear, but could have something to do with a fire and brimstone religious doctrine; and unless you’re Tom Cruise, religion doesn’t keep you healthy.
Yet the problem with entitlements is that once you pass and implement them, and constituencies become dependent on them, it’s impossible to get rid of them unless a generation of politicians is willing to commit political suicide. An undivided Republican government couldn’t repeal ObamaCare, and is left to incrementally strangle it of funding. But Republicans had better beware, as they’re not fooling anyone, and it‘s a chancy thing to take away from the people their “free stuff”. If you want …
13
… to repeal an entitlement safely, you need to provide the same or better benefits a different way.
If we can’t reduce general dependency because to attempt it simply would cause that Republican rascals be tossed out of office to be replaced by Democratic rascals who want to INCREASE our dependency even further, then what is left is to look for ways to make the dependency we have far less costly (and, hopefully, more effective).
Our healthcare programs need to be re-architected from the ground-up, and vouchers ain’t gonna do it. The party that finds a way to do this while spending LESS money not only will do Americans an immense service, but will remain in power for a LOOONG time.
But Dr. Krugman’s comparisons are counter-productive. Europeans LIKE being dependent. We, on the other hand, maintain this fiction about being INdependent, self-reliant and free.
4
Just a minute. The Republicans just gave corporate America and the 1% a tax gift they didn't need, raising the deficit to $1 trillion a year. The pittance for the rest is quickly evaporating with increased inflation and now the price increases resulting from the tariff war. The widening gap between the wealthy and the 60% on the bottom, and the destruction of the middle class, are moving more and more Americans into the range of poverty. The Republicans are attacking Social Security and Medicare, which will move more and more elderly into poverty as well. The notion that the disabled, elderly and poor can be kicked off the available support systems and made to work at minimum wage manual labor jobs is ludicrous, and Dr. Krugman shows the economic arguments for it are specious. We could go a long way to reduce dependency on social support systems by taxing corporations and the rich in order to create jobs building our infrastructure, educating the population so they can move into tech and other well paying jobs, and raising the minimum wage so people can make a living doing low skilled jobs. Give people a path up and they will take it. Destroy their ability to survive and we will all suffer. Republicans have the bit between their teeth, the result seems to be a vicious attack on everyone who is not in the 1%.
11
fiction it is.
what about subsidies to giant industries, like the oil depletion allowance or farm subsidies? or the tax subsidy dodge for hedge fund sharpies? or social support programs that allow major employers to so underpay their workers, or schedule them for so few working hours, that they could not survive with government help we all pay for? (hello, Walmart!) not to mention the lack of comprehensive childcare for working parents or starving public transportation to death? let's not even get into our model for medical care v the rest of the world.
Calvinism, you say? that and a streak of cheapskate a mile wide sets us apart.
and then,there's the American genetic disease of racism.
all of these factors, and more, make a comparison between the US and other advanced countries just about impossible.
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Great column, clear & concise. For me, there's also the moral issue. What kind of person would withhold medical care in order to pretend to "teach" someone, about whom they know nothing, a lesson about their economic responsibility? Not a person I would ever want to be.
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@Martin, see michael Greens comment - he is apparently a person who would do just that. After he knows what street beggars will do with the money they scrounge...
Is Dr Krugman's confidence that the US is close to full employment well justified? An employment rate lower than even the the French doesn't say 'full employment' to me.
Maybe there are fewer people counted as unemployed because it isn't worth signing up for benefits?
9
Just when we think the GOP'er gawd-awfulness can't get any worse, they somehow manage to exceed expectations (yet again) in dispensing cruelty and contorted Dickensian social views.
GOPers' Richistan cognitive dissonance of the Trump Tower Tax Cut rewards for capital vs. taxing working doctors, lawyers, and MBA's along with other hoi polloi, now reinforced with such Medicaid and food stamp requirements actually seem aimed at going back further than Dickens's times - say back to when Pharaohs were cracking the whip to erect pyramids ?
Ebeneezer Scrooge apparently had so so many more descendants than one would normally imagine.
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Every time it is the same answer. We need to cut taxes on our wealthy donors so they can get a return on investment for all the campaign contributions they have made to the Republican party.
Now, what was the question?
(Should I call wealthy donors 'job creators' instead? And would it be uncivil to call 'campaign contributions' bribes? )
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@Schrodinger
Who is "we"? Who are "they"?
You should have won the merit qualifying genetic lottery like the German House of Windsor and House of Trump. Your envy and jealousy are showing.
MAGA?
1
The reference to 'failing welfare states' is amusing, proving that critics of Europe -- and especially of the northern European nations -- haven't a clue as to what constitutes 'winning' and 'losing'.
Yes indeed, Professor, in terms of equality, equal opportunity. inclusiveness, literacy, longevity, health, infrastructure, the democratic process, crime and incarceration there is only one 'failed state': No need to rub it in any further.
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