Today, the fixation on dependency and its consequences is no less acute. Following a new directive by the Trump administration, Kentucky, Arkansas, and 14 other US states have announced or introduced work requirements as a condition of eligibility for Medicaid public health insurance for the poor. But the idea that government assistance drives dependency is not unique to any country, even if all countries face unique challenges in providing safety nets for the poor.
Moreover, beliefs about dependency are not just common among the rich; one often hears similar complaints from the very people whom social programs are meant to help.
It is thus little wonder that such beliefs would translate into policy. Using the World Values Survey, my colleagues and I have assessed how much people attribute poverty to laziness, as opposed to social and economic unfairness, and how it relates to beliefs on redistribution. We find that the more people attribute poverty to a lack of willpower, the less generous the transfer system in their country will be. So, beliefs about dependency can have real and tangible implications for the poor and the protections they need.
But what if those beliefs are wrong? For example, far from creating dependency, it is possible that welfare programs actually give people the necessary tools to achieve financial independence, provided that the assistance is dependable rather than sporadic and temporary. In that case, the provision of government assistance over an extended period of time could yield high social and economic returns, not least by allowing low-income families to make longer-term investments for the future.
The program was implemented in randomly selected sub-districts, which were compared to a control group of sub-districts that did not have the program. Moreover, the program was directed at families, which were encouraged to use the benefits to invest in their children. Only households with children or a pregnant woman could enroll, and a portion of the stipend was made conditional on fulfilling various health- and education-related obligations, such as basic immunization and the completion of at least nine years of school.
As in many countries, these conditions are hard to enforce in practice, so many households received full payments despite non-compliance. One important feature of PKH is that it did not merely provide a few weeks or months of assistance between jobs or in the case of a financial shock.
Rather, it focused on the very poor, and was administered for at least six years, with the understanding that climbing out of poverty takes time and requires consistent support and stability. Given this initial success, the Indonesian government expanded the program widely over the next few years. By , it was providing assistance to about 2.
Now, however, the government was targeting specific districts, rather than following the previous random-selection process.
As a result, many of the sub-districts in the initial control group were left out, and have not received the program yet. Upon re-surveying the 14, households in the original treatment and control groups, we found several interesting outcomes.
The first concerns stunting, or impaired growth, which is one of the most serious child health problems in Indonesia.
Research has shown a correlation between stunting, lower IQs, and poorer socioeconomic outcomes later in life. At the two-year mark, PKH had no impact on child stunting.
And yet, because height is a measure of health that expresses itself cumulatively over time, it was possible that stunting would start to be reversed only after continued assistance from the program. That was precisely what happened. We found similar effects with respect to education. At the two-year mark, PKH had increased school enrollment for children aged , but not for those aged At the time, we reasoned that older children who had dropped out prior to the program would have a harder time returning to school than would their younger counterparts, even if their family resources had recently improved.
The entire welfare system and the American citizenry have become just as diseased, selfish, and corrupt as their own goddamned government. Want to talk about the national debt then start looking at corporate welfare and out of control government spending sucking off big business.
Americans, have long been robbed of their very own tax dollars, by their very own government but the citizenry is too blinded by its own goddamned demagoguery addictions to see, or care just as long as none of it goes to help the poor.
Great points! You see the entire reality. I brought the book. My Vision: No poor and no crime among us. Capitalism has been good. But it is not good enough! We keeping stuffing rich people with money. Just ask a rich person. When the scarcity principle is used within a monetary system then the human instinct is brought down to the primal instinct for survival, the scarcity principle needs to be removed from a monetary system too create a more civilised system. There is no real need for money to have any inbuilt value other than being the lubricant that helps monetary bubbles to keep flowing in a circular fashion.
Digital money should be unlimited in its creation, we should have access to money as and when needed to pay our bills and for anything we need it for, this abundance of money would change the way humans think because there would be no reason to try to amass or horde money anymore as it would be on tap so to speak.
A monetary system without scarcity would mean inflation would become non existent as why would one need to put prices up if money was on tap. If we are to have a monetary system then it needs to evolve so we can better utilise it for human evolution to a truly civilised level for all life.
We may initially be a little crazy on having the abundance of money because we are so conditioned for scarcity but I think our priorities would change as we got use to the abundance of money and new generations would not know the scarcity we had. Maybe this could be the bridge to a resource based economy as when we realise that all the things we do could be done for free then we truly evolve.
Someone else will have to provide for you. That is the nuclear and extended family. If you can work, then there should be work available … anything, whether it is private sector or government. Nobody gets by for free. Even during the great depression, families stuck together and eeked out a living.
I do believe in hiring the poor for jobs that we need performed in the areas of great need like healthcare, childcare, schools and police, firefighters, EMTs, public transit, etc. Instead of giving people money and benefits, our government could hire and train these people for these jobs that go unfilled, require a term of service, and then they can take their experience and training on to other things, or remain in their communities in that field.
The only people who should have public housing and other benefits without working are the elderly and completely disabled and their caregivers. Moving people into independence through a career is a solution everyone can support. This will be a hybrid face to face and online event. The main face-to-face event will take place in Brisbane. Call for papers: Abstracts — words due by Friday 4 February ; please click here for more information.
A Basic Income is a periodic cash payment unconditionally delivered to all on an individual basis, without means-test or work requirement. Read more. To propose a news item, please click here. Email address:. About Guest Contributor Guest has written articles. Tracie on July 6, at pm. Cammi on November 24, at pm. Charles Gernand on June 14, at pm.
Milton Friedman suggested the negative income tax 40 or more years ago. Steve Richardson on July 8, at am. DH Fabian on August 1, at am. DH Branski on August 1, at am. Scooter Hoffman on January 24, at pm. Andre Coelho on January 27, at am. Dear Scooter Hoffman, Cutting down to the real question, which would be: what would YOU do if your income was taken care of? Best regards,. Warren Mills on September 14, at am. John on January 3, at am. Do align your thinking with the people, not the corporations or the government.
Cammi on November 25, at am. Jake on December 21, at am. Michael on May 10, at pm. Philip Tuuta on January 8, at am. They also derail benefits programs that specifically target people living in poverty and help them to join the middle class.
The facts about public benefits detailed in this issue brief help shape the real debate Americans should be engaged in—how to fund and shape public benefits programs that largely serve the middle class and those living in poverty for the long haul. In , 39 percent of households had at least one person participating in at least one of these programs. See Figure 1 Within the fiscal year budget, those three programs accounted for an estimated 60 percent of the dollars going out to individuals.
See Figure 2. Within these social insurance programs, most of the participants have paid into them, through payroll taxes taken out of their own paychecks and through contributions paid on their behalf by their employers. Like private life or property insurance, everyone makes regular contributions with the expectation that when a certain event occurs in the case of public benefits, that event could be retirement, disability, or temporary job loss , they will be protected and able to collect benefits they have paid for.
These programs reflect what Americans value. Clearly our nation believes there should be programs that ensure senior citizens who work throughout their lives and contribute to these programs should have a minimum level of security and care safe from the ups and downs of the stock market. Social Security and Medicare account for 55 percent of federal benefits dollars. When we hear about how so many Americans are living off the government, this myth is often used to perpetuate a stereotype of poor adults unwilling to work.
In fact, it reflects the many Americans who have paid into programs such as Social Security and Medicare and no longer work due to age and disability.
Only about 10 percent of all federal dollars devoted to public benefits programs for low-income Americans are paid in cash. And of that 10 percent, more than two out of every three dollars are for Social Security disability benefits for individuals who have demonstrated to the government that they have a disability that interferes with their ability to work.
The remaining cash payments go to needy Americans under the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. Participation in this program is low due to changes made in the s that promoted work and created a five-year lifetime limit on participation. The bottom line: Conservative rhetoric that the federal government routinely hands out checks to people who are too lazy to work is grossly inaccurate.
Today federal cash assistance programs primarily focus on those unable to work. See Figure 3. The largest ones, Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, are entitlements meaning services are guaranteed to those who meet program criteria targeting health care and food needs.
Many Medicaid beneficiaries live in deep poverty, with 38 percent of participating children falling well below the current poverty line in many states. And low-income families receiving food stamps through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program desperately need the additional help for food purchases. Case in point: Additional food assistance provided by the Recovery Act in kept 1 million people out of poverty. Conservatives decry spending increases on these entitlement programs.
Yet upswings in Americans falling into poverty through no fault of their own during certain periods such as the Great Recession of as well as growing income inequality in the long term are at the root of more spending on basic public benefits programs.
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