Grime 1
Carys Grime
Professor Youngpeter
Composition 2
April 21, 2015
Ending the Assistance of Substance Abusers The United States of America is a great nation, with many great opportunities for our country’s vastly diverse citizens. One of these opportunities is the provision of welfare for those citizens that need that little bit of extra help to keep going. However, this welfare is also a cause of great discontent among some of the other citizens of our country. These citizens opposing welfare may sound like they may be cruel or unsympathetic people, but they may have a solid basis for their disagreeing attitude. Some of the recipients of this welfare are not citizens unable to do work and provide for themselves. and many taxpayers do
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They come in the form of child support, medical benefits, utility benefits and numerous other benefits as well (US Welfare System). Although the regulations and restrictions vary between states, there are some basic guidelines for becoming eligible for and continuing to receive this welfare money. These guidelines include that the children of the receivers attend school for full days, five days a week, the recipients must be 18 years of age or older and a citizen of the United States, the head(s) of the household must make a commitment to become self-sufficient within a certain time frame, and making all monetary resources known to the government are all examples of basic requirements of becoming eligible for welfare (US Welfare System). The overall goal of these programs is to help the participants work towards becoming self-sufficient within in set amount of time. Despite the goal of these programs, to aid those with financial need and assist them in raising their quality of life, more and more people are taking advantage of the good nature of these programs. Many of the people receiving these benefits are people that are legitimately in need of government assistance in order to be able to live their life. However, others are people that are abusing drugs, alcohol and other narcotics on a daily basis and are unwilling to
In 1996, the United States came up with the welfare to work law, which is now known as the Welfare to Work program (Hill). The purpose of this program was to encourage Americans on welfare to go back to work and not just stay at home and do nothing (Hill). The main goal was to reduce welfare by increasing the income of people on welfare (Greenberg). The program required people to get in an education program, get some type of training, or try to find a job (Greenberg). These requirements were intended to eventually get welfare recipients to get a job and not depend on welfare (Greenberg). Like
In our society today, we face many problems such as racism, police brutality, and government issues. One problem that I feel is being over looked is the abuse of the welfare system. Coming from a very low income county, I see how the system is abused, and I also see how it helps those in need. People who are capable of working and supporting their family on their own take advantage of the system to get free money. In 2013, the Census Bureau said that there were fewer full time working Americans than were on welfare. It is absolutely astonishing that there are more people on welfare, who supposedly are unable to work, than capable working people. Americans who truly are unable to work or support their family should have every right to be on
America spends an annual amount of 131.9 billion dollars on welfare alone (Department of Commerce). So many facts about welfare are overwhelming, such that over 12,800,000 Americans are on the welfare system. The entire social welfare system is in desperate need of a complete reform. In order for a proper reform to ensue, the people of America must combine efforts with the U.S. government to revitalize the current welfare system. This reform would involve answering two important questions. First, how has today’s welfare system strayed from its original state and secondly, how is the system abused by welfare holders in today’s economy?
Most of these families and individuals now are in programs like Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, also known as welfare(National Coalition,2009), Medicaid and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. These programs provide cash, health care benefits and food for these families and most individuals helping the individuals or families to get back on their feet although some will get denied for such help.
The welfare systems are based on the principle of public responsibility on equitable wealth distribution and equality of opportunities to citizens who are unable to afford minimal levels of quality and good life, through provision of universal education programs, health care and subsidised housing. In most of the states, welfare systems are not used in the right manner they are intended to. Although the systems are meant to reduce the poverty level and at least assists individuals to get decent jobs, many recipients develops news ways every year to prolong their dependency in the system. Statistics show that women easily abuse the welfare system by simply having more children each year since this means that more money will come in their mails. Most of the recipients on welfare are able to work
The social welfare system in the United States can be a controversial topic especially now with the new presidential elect. For this paper I was assigned to look into two different peoples perceptions and attitudes on the social welfare system. I looked into how they perceived the system and whom they believed benefits from this system. Throughout this paper the identities of the two people I interviewed will not be revealed. I will simply refer to them in pronouns. My goal during this interview was not to educate my two interviewees so some of the information contained in this paper may not be accurate. Throughout this paper the two interviewees opinions will be stated and their opinions will then be compared and discussed. Although the whole population of the United States is experiencing the same welfare system each individual perceives and has different beliefs about the system.
Welfare, enacted by one of the greatest presidents of the United States’s existence, Mr. Franklin D. Roosevelt, is an effective and useful means to assist American families in need. Throughout history, welfare has proven to help people get back on their feet and into society. Despite the system’s many useful benefits, like most attributes in this world, welfare has kinks in the system. In fact, welfare has yet to be perfected, even though it was established in the year of 1935 and is still in use today. The system may never be perfected, but it can be improved. There are many different thoughts and ideas pertaining to how welfare should change. Some believe it should be eliminated entirely. In doing so, many people all across the nation would be harmed in financial and mental manners. How can welfare be reformed? Is it even possible? The answer is absolutely. It must be reformed, and many would agree on the matter. It is, however, a sensitive and controversial topic to most. Political parties tend to take interest in the discussion of welfare reform, as well. The typical, left-wing Democrat wishes to give more to welfare users, while the standard right-wing Republican would like to decrease what is given to Americans. If everything has its imperfections, why should welfare be reformed? Why not leave it the way it is and let the government figure out the fine print? There are those that take this sort of stance on welfare reform, and there are some that believe differently.
When most people think of the average welfare recipient they most likely imagine someone who is a slacker; unambitious and one who is not a hard worker, someone who lazes around waiting until their welfare check comes in so that they can spend it all on whatever frivolous thing they want, and wait until the next check arrives. Sometimes people think of a mother and her children in a poor neighborhood, who wants more money to spend on expensive clothes and electronics, so she gets her welfare checks and buys the expensive yet unnecessary items without using the money to get out of a bad financial situation, contented to live this way without working towards anything better. Nobody would be in support of a system that gives undeserving people their own tax money. However, that is not what welfare looks like. Welfare looks like overworked parents who are doing the best they can, but still don’t have enough to put a meal on the table. Welfare looks like people afraid to lose their homes and willing to do almost anything to just keep living. Welfare looks like the mentally disabled, who despite trying their hardest, need more help. This is what welfare looks like; people in need who strive to live a better life. Welfare helps families in need not only by giving them money but by aiding them with every aspect of their lives such as food, shelter, and more to improve the quality of their life.
The United States recently experienced one of the greatest "booms" in our economic history. More people were working than ever before. People were buying houses at a faster rate than they have in decades. Yet there were many people still living from paycheck to paycheck, or welfare check to welfare check. The subject of welfare stirs different passions in different people. Some say that those who are on welfare should be taken off, with no hope of survival afterward. They should "support themselves," these people say. Others believe that these welfare recipients should be able to stay on the rolls indefinitely. I think that people who are on welfare, who are physically capable to work,
Welfare is intended for families or individuals that are in need of assistance with no or little income. For those who do not know, Welfare funds come from hard working individuals that are required to pay taxes. Now we wonder, are the tax payers’ hard earned money going to the right deserving recipients? Welfare fraud is on the rise in this country. Many are taking advantage of the system taking away the help that is meant for people that truly needed help to provide for their families or people that need assistance until they can stand on their own feet. Statistics clearly show that “785,000 to 1.2 million families are illegally receiving welfare benefits. At the average rate of $11,500 per year, this means taxpayers are being
As I talked about previously there are certain stereotypes of welfare recipients, some true, many not. A lot of American citizens believe all those stereotypes to be true, and therefore, a great majority of public opinion is against welfare programs. In return, this drives political officials away from helping people who rely government aid and in a lot of circumstances when officials are involved it is to reduce that aid, not give them a voice. “Policies that have determent impacts on, or are ineffective in solving important problems for, certain types of target populations may not produce citizen participation directed toward policy change because the messages received by these target populations encourage withdrawal or passivity” (Schneider,
United States Government Welfare began in the 1930’s during the Great Depression. Franklin D. Roosevelt thought of this system as an aid for low-income families whose men were off to war, or injured while at war. The welfare system proved to be beneficial early on by giving families temporary aid, just enough to help them accommodate their family’s needs. Fast forward almost 90 years, and it has become apparent that this one once helpful system, has become flawed. Welfare itself and the ideologies it stands on, contains decent fundamentals; furthermore, this system of aid needs only to be reformed to better meet the needs of today’s society.
The history of welfare reform reveals that the question of personal responsibility versus assistance to those in need has been a constant in the debate over welfare. In the 1950s and 1960s, welfare reform was limited to various states' attempts to impose residency requirements on welfare applicants and remove illegitimate children from the welfare rolls. During the 1970s advocates of welfare reform promoted the theory of
Throughout history, there have always been people willing to work for what they want, and those who expect things to be handed to them as if it was a natural-born right. While the welfare system does positively impact some families in need, many people take advantage of it. With this being a well known fact, the government still continues to use ten percent of the federal budget on welfare (“Budget” 1).
The problem that I have is with the people that abuse the effects of welfare not working on purpose or worse pretending to have a disability but are perfectly fine. In my eyes it is a disgrace to cheat the system just because you don’t want to work for your money. There are people out there with a family working their hardest struggling to put food on the table, pay bills and still try to have enough to put their kids threw school. I do have respect to the people that need it, like they got hurt on the job and can’t work for a few months that I can understand but the people that never got the job to even try go and apply for it and of course they don’t make enough money to support their family because they sit at home and not do a single