(07-02-2015 11:13 PM)Love and Honor Wrote: Aside from the It's Always Sunny reference, the thing about welfare is that even if it's far from easy street, our current system is not compatible with human motivational behavior. People respond to incentives, and right now we have a system which punishes work since there's a point where BOOM and you're suddenly out of benefits because you make too much. As a result people are unable to live comfortably on welfare and/or a low wage job, but unable and/or unwilling to move past welfare limits due to the enormous financial and personal investment required to make it. That creates dependency and encourages poverty traps.
This is a good point and alludes to many other things. Left leaning solutions to these issues always seem to revolve around somehow making people or companies NOT act in their own best interests... which IMO is not only not intelligent or purposeful, but actually often harmful.
There is an old adage about what you tax, you get less of... and what you subsidize, you get more of... and it is true... not of EVERY instance, but on the whole. The left on these issues needs to stop thinking like they WISH the world were, and pay attention to how the world actually is. If the government wants something done, then they need to do it... and stop trying to 'encourage' or 'coerce' others to do it for them.
I'll give you an example that happened in my hospital today. Patient lives near the FPL... at 133% of the FPL, they qualify for subsidized ACA only. At 99% of the FPL, they qualify for Medicaid only. The plans are different... and he has some choices about how to define 'income' (married, head of household, filing separately) and the FPL is different for all of those situations.... compounded by the fact that the coverage for Medicaid and the exchange plans (in terms of which doctors are in the plans) are all different...
We spoke for almost an hour about how he was offered a job that paid a little better, but that it would require him to change his plan in a few months... so he is thinking about 'not' taking it.... and he said that he can work a few more hours 'off the books' to make up for the lost income. While that is perhaps the correct solution for him in the short-term, it is more than likely a bad long-term decision.
But those are the rules.
(07-04-2015 10:44 AM)Fitbud Wrote: No one wants to live on welfare. If you don't believe me, try it.
That's not the point... and frankly, deflects from the problem and avoids creating solutions. Lots of people don't want to work 60+ hours a week to earn a living either... and some don't want to/can't work 40. If working 'whatever you can work' and taking welfare paid the same, I think we'd all make the same decision. Similarly, it would be hard to turn down the opportunity to work 10 or 20 hours doing something 'illegal' (whether simply getting paid cash or actually something illegal) and KEEP your benefits than to work 40 hours 'above board' and lose them.
THAT is the reality many people face.... and not the fantasy where someone is choosing to take 20k (total equivalent) on welfare and then perhaps work a FEW hours for 10k, rather than make 30k at a 'real' job that they have to work at for 40+ hours.
(07-04-2015 02:28 PM)RobertN Wrote: (07-02-2015 02:24 PM)Hambone10 Wrote: (07-02-2015 02:11 PM)Niner National Wrote: (07-02-2015 02:07 PM)oliveandblue Wrote: There are positions out there where people can't find anyone willing to take them. Most of those are vacant or understaffed because they're undesirable, ugly positions. These jobs are often in the fields of sanitation, corrections, utilities, oil, or turfgrass management/landscaping.
Trucking is another big one where they cannot find enough people to take the jobs. Self driving trucks will fill those jobs soon enough though 
Actually this is a good point...
These fields are areas where technology needs to replace people... and areas that perhaps the government should be 'funding research' to create the high paying research and 'technology' jobs needed to replace these jobs.
This is an outstanding idea. Lets get rid of MORE jobs that people with limited education can get. I suppose you want these people to live on welfare because there are no jobs available for them. 
Technology takes some jobs, and creates others. The difference is that while transportation (here) and farming (here) and landscaping (here) has to be done here, the technology to replace it doesn't have to be done here... So yes, I'd rather that technology be done here
and perhaps exported than to let it be done elsewhere and exported to us, where it TAKES jobs here, but creates none (here). Note that if we can EXPORT it, we could potentially create more jobs HERE than we lose HERE.
More to the point, you also argue to increase wages... which obviously only makes technology more attractive as an alternative.
You need to learn to 'follow the money' if you're going to address these issues... and simply arguing to get paid more but somehow not have companies seek to overcome that labor cost increase is just ignorant.
(07-04-2015 05:17 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote: But this highlights one of the problems. We have all of these focused programs with very specific requirements--and legions of incredibly expensive gatekeepers to administer each of them. Roll it into one program--a couple of models would be Milton Friedman's negative income tax or the Boortz-Linder prebate/prefund. You get one check a month. That and French Bismarck health care would make a very comprehensive safety net. You don't need the gatekeepers, so can them and convert the savings to some combination of benefits and budget reduction. And pay for it with a consumption tax. Now you've eliminated the "welfare trap" element of the current system. Poor people can obtain better skills, find better jobs, make more money without losing benefits on a dollar for dollar basis as they make more money.
With Bismarck you just lifted the Medicaid burden off the states. So let them pick up whichever of the specific programs they want to keep. Farm states will keep food stamps, since farmers like the extra demand. Other programs would be evaluated similarly at the state level.
These sorts of ideas are great, but they require explanations beyond the attention span of most people... and politicians are motivated by votes, not solutions. It's far too easy to categorize those things as 'something they aren't' to keep the uninformed from supporting them.
(07-04-2015 10:08 PM)RobertN Wrote: That was happening LONG before Obamacare. Look at Wal-Mart. It was their corporate philosophy for many years(and may others have followed).
If it's bad when corporations do it (implied by your comment), why would the government follow suit/encourage the practice? I find it funny that as often as you bad-mouth corporations for doing exactly what we all know and expect corporations to do, you say nothing when the government does it (with a D in office)
