Community service for welfare

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Added on: 11/11/2010 @ 10:52:15 PM

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Community service for welfare

This thought has occurred to me before. Instead of just handing people money, make them do something mildly useful. Although my following thought has been that it would kind of be like adding lots of government jobs, which sounds like a bad thing to me in principal. But if the two options are give people tax money for doing nothing, or give people tax money for doing community service, the second option sounds much better.
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	Scott - Resident Tech Support 11/12/2010 @ 09:02:24 AM
You can't make someone work for welfare! That's called a job! Welfare is supposed to be for people that don't want to work.		Rate this comment Yours: Rated 0 times.

	Jeremy - 9475 Posts 11/12/2010 @ 09:26:41 AM
The problem with it would be that you would just change the game from "can't find work" to "can't work" which in the end could make it worse.		Rate this comment Yours: Rated 0 times.

	Jeremy - 9475 Posts 11/12/2010 @ 12:39:17 PM
That or you remove some of the stigma from taking a handout, because people could look at this as a job of sorts. (Also, I should say "A" problem, I think this is an okay idea, it's just not the slam dunk no-brainer people often talk about it as. If we have to pay more to track and punish people that hunker down even more into the free ride than these services are worth, which probably isn't much, it doesn't do us a whole lot of good.) And what do you do about the, yes, this guy was on site for the 3 hour garbage pickup he was scheduled for, but he picked up 3 things and then texted his friends for 2 hours, before complaining about how much this work sucked for the last hour, situations. You have recourse at jobs, telling these people their services will no longer be needed would be music to their ears.		Rate this comment Yours: Rated 0 times.
Jeremy messed with this at 11/12/2010 12:42:51 pm

	Scott - 6225 Posts 11/12/2010 @ 12:45:15 PM
Ha! When you get fired from your job, you may end up no welfare. Where do you end up when you get fired from welfare?		Rate this comment Yours: Rated 0 times.

	Jeremy - Pie Racist 11/12/2010 @ 12:48:45 PM
Exactly. You'd have a team of people who don't want to be there and the only thing you normally would have to hold over their heads is exactly what they're aiming for. I guess you could give them more hours, but a few shitty people there poisoning the well might do more harm then good as well.		Rate this comment Yours: Rated 0 times.

	Scott - No, I did not change your screen saver settings 11/12/2010 @ 12:57:17 PM
Since they don't have "you're fired" hanging over their heads, give this a try. "You can work, or you can sit down and watch this." I think that will get people up and picking up trash.		Rate this comment Yours: Total: Rated 1 times.

	Jeremy - 9475 Posts 11/12/2010 @ 01:03:26 PM
Perhaps the best thing would be to look at it like a job. Cut the handout in half for the able bodied, and then they earn the other half by working for it, and they can be "fired" from the program. The problem is there's really no way around people taking advantage of it, and implementing something like this might lead to just needing to address the same issues another way. (In other words, if you cut the benefits to can't live on it levels, then this guy gets canned from the work portion, what then?) Amongst the reasons to have welfare are because a society where 10% of the people are homeless would suck, and if there are kids involved, it's not their fault their mom and/or dads are worthless sacks. (Not to mention the moral dilemma of if we have an obligation to something to help the destitute in some of the richest societies the world has ever known) In the end there would just be welfare welfare.		Rate this comment Yours: Rated 0 times.
Jeremy perfected this 2 times, last at 11/12/2010 1:07:50 pm

	Jeremy - 9475 Posts 11/12/2010 @ 01:11:33 PM
There's also of course the practical matter of what to do if there are kids involved. For starters I suspect that's a huge part of the reason people do this. Why work for $280 a week, $100 of which goes to day care, when you can stay home and get handed $150? You often hear about mothers who go back to work after time off with kids who lament they have to work until Wednesday afternoon before they're even profiting from working. We'd have to solve that same problem if we made these people, especially single parents, volunteer for a few hours a week.		Rate this comment Yours: Rated 0 times.
Jeremy edited this at 11/12/2010 1:13:12 pm

	Jeremy - 9475 Posts 11/12/2010 @ 01:14:54 PM
Then again, I guess that could just be one more thing they use these people for, but I assume there's some sort of license required.		Rate this comment Yours: Rated 0 times.

	Jon - 3375 Posts 11/13/2010 @ 03:52:35 AM
Scott Wrote - Yesterday @ 12:57:17 PM Since they don't have "you're fired" hanging over their heads, give this a try. "You can work, or you can sit down and watch this." I think that will get people up and picking up trash. Scott, when did you become a hack comedian? Or did you get your browser tabs reversed and mistakenly posted that here while posting something Brett Favre related to the Joy Behar fan forum? (P.S. I love you, Scott)		Rate this comment Yours: Rated 0 times.

	Scott - 6225 Posts 11/13/2010 @ 07:50:23 AM
Full disclosure, I very much dislike Nancy Pelosi, can't stand Ed Schultz of MSNBC, don't watch Olbermann except for maybe when he simply introduces a story, I like Hardball with Chris Matthews (sometimes), I can't stand the editorial side of Fox News, Bret Baier actually isn't that bad, and the only reason I know how Joy Behar is is because Fox News always talks about her being crazy...oh, and I think Sarah Palin is an embarrassment to America. There. Now I can pick my targets in peace :)		Rate this comment Yours: Rated 0 times.