>'Whereas the American one seems incapable of delivering anything with less than a 6-month waiting list..'
My family was on a wait list for housing assistance from the time I was a child until I dropped out of school and started working, making us ineligible. The list is currently closed and was last open over half a decade ago, for less than two weeks - like something out of a fantasy novel.
>...with an extremely bureaucratic and unfriendly process almost always serving as the gatekeeper.'
Well, there's a popular notion in the US that the process should be as difficult and unfriendly as possible - that people seeking public assistance are not just lazy, but living well. The 'welfare queen' [1] still haunts the system 40 years later.
The problem is that while there are a great many deserving people who wouldn't abuse the system, there are also plenty who would.
Worse is that if you overhear one person on the bus (like I did when I was in college) talking about having another child so she could get a larger welfare check, it has a way of getting to you. It's an anecdote so it doesn't really count from a scientific perspective. But emotionally, that's HUGE.
When I use my brain I realize that it would be far more effective to cut the military budget by 10% than the welfare budget by 10% in terms of reducing taxes. But somehow I still feel some kind of moral outrage about the person who considered a welfare payment her divine right for existing rather than a temporary thing that well-intentioned people created for the sake of trying to help lift less fortunate folks out of poverty.
Emotionally I feel less bad about the military because at least something's getting done as a result. People have jobs (even if they're not the most efficient) and technology is advanced (even at a cost greater than a private company might capable of) and actual tangible things happen. In some ways that's easier to justify, even if that justification is completely wrong given the graft and corruption that's rampant in the military-industrial complex.
It also is very upsetting from a felt-justice perspective. Here I am working hard end paying my taxes so that (in a very, very small way $ or % wise) I'm empowering someone else to just sit around and get paid to do nothing but pop out babies and raise them poorly.
Thinking critically I realize that I have no actual idea what my opinion of acceptable false positives and false negatives is, or how the system actually performs irrespective of my judgement. But as human beings we're wired to reject "unjust" gains for others even at our own expense. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultimatum_game
"Well, there's a popular notion in the US that the process should be as difficult and unfriendly as possible - that people seeking public assistance are not just lazy, but living well. The 'welfare queen' [1] still haunts the system 40 years later."
Again, I realize that it's ENTIRELY possible that the subjects of this article are the exception rather than the rule. But it's hard to use your brain rather than react to your emotions when this kind of thing gets written up.
Ultimately the problem is that not everyone can think critically all the time about everything and then react appropriately.
I used to think similar to this, even though I was and grew up poor. But after working with a few NGOs I've found the system is designed to screen out the people that need the help. At the same time the people that know how to work the system get the most aid.
Most welfare requires that you report 0 income, so instead of searching for work working welfare becomes the job. Showing up every day to the local office, wait in line, fill in papers, come back tomorrow, and repeat.
A few years ago I had a friend quit her job as a social worker because she was expecting a baby and her company didn't provide health insurance. She was able to get Medicaid by going on unemployment as a single mother with child. Then she had to stay unemployed because the cost of daycare was more than her income. Social welfare in the US is so screwed up because you have to be backed into a corner to get it and then have to stay there because your time becomes devoted to keeping track of all the paperwork.
>'...the cost of daycare was more than her income.'
Covering the gap when coming off of assistance is a major problem.
The sharp cutoffs and various criteria for violations turn leaving assistance into a leap of faith.
A small raise becomes a big problem when the increase adds up to far less than the food benefit you'll lose all at once for exceeding the income limit. Likewise, you can't build a basic emergency fund when two thousand dollars in the bank will kill your SSI.
The SSI one also tends to discourage disabled people from doing any work, because any ability to earn income, even a small amount intermittently, is taken as evidence that you aren't really permanently disabled. I have an American uncle with MS, who can't work at all now, but in earlier stages of the disease he probably could have worked some of the time (not a steady job, because he'd be relatively better for a few months then relatively worse again, but a part-time job for part of the year would probably have been ok). But he was advised that SSI disability just isn't set up for that: you can't be completely disabled some months a year and work part-time other months. You are either permanently disabled and get a monthly benefit, or you aren't disabled and get nothing. Since he wouldn't be able to work regularly enough to support himself through work, he went on SSI disability and didn't work at all, which was probably not ideal for either the economy or him.
> Here I am working hard end paying my taxes so that (in a very, very small way $ or % wise) I'm empowering someone else to just sit around and get paid to do nothing but pop out babies and raise them poorly.
Personally, what causes me to feel moral outrage is when I encounter this sort of derogatory statements, aimed at the poor. Based on something once overheard on a bus, nonetheless.
The fact that there is a tiny percentage abusing the help is a very poor excuse for not giving help to the much, much larger percentage of people who are deeply, genuinely in need of it.
As a continuation of your realization that your opinions are probably based on irrational emotions: why is this irrational anger aimed at the part of society that is least well off? For instance, I wonder what is the percentage of actually rich people who are payed with tax dollars to do nothing of value, or even something destructive.
>> Here I am working hard end paying my taxes so that (in a very, very small way $ or % wise) I'm empowering someone else to just sit around and get paid to do nothing but pop out babies and raise them poorly.
>Personally, what causes me to feel moral outrage is when I encounter this sort of derogatory statements, aimed at the poor. Based on something once overheard on a bus, nonetheless.
The idea that I overheard it on a bus makes it less credible doesn't really hold water in my mind. It was in an informal setting and thus more likely to be true. And if someone's motivation to have another child is to collect more welfare I'm not so convinced that it's an entirely unreasonable assumption that they're not going to do the best job raising them. If this mother couldn't think through the thoughts necessary to realize that welfare shouldn't be a system that you milk for all it's worth and instead is a system designed to help you get back on your feet (at least ostensibly) then I'm not so confident she's going to do a stellar job of everything else. She might very well teach them through actions if not words, that going on welfare is preferable to real work. That's a potent recipe for dependency.
>The fact that there is a tiny percentage abusing the help is a very poor excuse for not giving help to the much, much larger percentage of people who are deeply, genuinely in need of it.
That's a big fat [citation needed]. Furthermore if you assume that those who are abusing the system know the right things to say when they're interviewed or to put down on the forms I can't really figure out how you could reasonably determine the percentage of people abusing the system. Hire a million PIs to follow folks around? It's not as though the people fill out forms and check the box that says "I am lying about my need" which first off, isn't there and second would obviously disqualify them.
Finally I think it's incredibly offensive that you assume you know how I feel about the rich based on what I've said about SOME poor folks who are abusing welfare. You might THINK you know, but that does not translate into actual knowledge.
In reality I hate all rent-seekers rich and poor alike. If you want an income you should have to work for it like everyone else. I find the idea that someone can eat, sleep and live off the hard work of others morally outrageous. It doesn't matter to me the amount of ill-gotten gains that allows people to squander their lives without doing anything useful for society.
>'But it's hard to use your brain rather than react to your emotions when this kind of thing gets written up.'
No doubt.
I've seen more than a few otherwise measured people lose it when it comes to this topic.
It's fascinating that the same people who seemingly recognize the folly of hasty generalizations about everything from brands to race or religion will vehemently defend the same with regard to income.
I wonder if it's simply lack of exposure?
Where I grew up around DC there's certainly far less personal interaction across classes than there is among different ethnicities, faiths or automobiles.
If someone's primary exposure to an entire class of people happens through the 'news' with a peppering of half heard conversations in the few instances of mixing (public transit, DMV, sometimes grade school) it's easy to see how they could end up with strongly felt yet thinly supported views.
> It's fascinating that the same people who seemingly recognize the folly of hasty generalizations about everything from brands to race or religion will vehemently defend the same with regard to income.
I guess a sort-of defense of myself (and perhaps others) is that I'm not saying that "all poor people deserve to be poor" or "all people on welfare are worthless shitbags who abuse it" or "no welfare goes to deserving people at all".
In fact, that was the VERY FIRST THING that I wrote in my first comment: "The problem is that while there are a great many deserving people who wouldn't abuse the system, there are also plenty who would."
I do understand that it's not a 100% black and white issue, not all welfare is bad! But on the flip side, not all welfare is good either.
One of the big problems is that it's incredibly difficult to know what the good/bad ratio is because the agencies who distribute the money have the wrong incentives. Because it's very difficult to really know (or measure) if someone NEEDS assistance versus WANTS assistance they instead ensure adherence to things which ARE measurable. Like correctly filling out forms. Which, all other things being equal, will tend to favor the repeat applicants, those who have friends/relatives who have already applied and successfully received assistance, and things of that nature.
Furthermore if you're trying to make a career in public service you want to always have a bigger budget and more staff so there's no incentive for management to try and prevent abuse; so long as the abuser does a good enough job on the paperwork management or staff can always plead ignorance if they are ever questioned.
The incentive for an abuser to abuse is that it's easier to not work and collect money than to work and perhaps collect less money, or the same amount of money, or perhaps only slightly more money. If you believe or figure out that your labor will never be worth more than $9/hr and that caps your income at $1440 a month before taxes and substantially less after. Even if you have less income from welfare, food stamps, housing, etc it might make sense to do because of the increased free time you would have and thus the better lifestyle. It also gives you opportunities to work under the table and make far more than you could if you had a regular hourly job if you've got some ambition.
Okay so we've established that there's motive for people to abuse and motive for those responsible for preventing it to look the other way. Why is it so hard to imagine that it does in fact happen and that it might not be a trivially small percentage? I honestly don't know what it is, might be 10% or it might be 50% but I'd need to see some large scale, serious investigation of a scientific nature with outside observers (not self-reporting) to be convinced it's only 2%.
I agree that this sentiment is a major issue for public support of welfare systems. A few (admittedly speculative) thoughts on what's different in Denmark, where such sentiment isn't absent, but I think is a bit weaker and less influential:
1. In a way, the U.S. makes for a foil that enhances the perception that the welfare state is necessary for a society we'd like to live in. People are afraid of Copenhagen ending up like San Francisco or Detroit, with homeless people everywhere, dangerous ghettos, etc., and there's a perception that the welfare system is one thing keeping that possibility at bay, and keeping Copenhagen a fairly safe and nice place to live. The "are you trying to turn us into America?" trump-card is a huge PR/positioning problem for the (smallish) free-market/libertarian parties, because a lot of people are genuinely afraid of it.
2. A decent amount of stuff that is "welfare" in the U.S. is instead just something everyone gets, so there is no issue over eligibility and whether people are gaming it. Everyone gets free healthcare, subsidized childcare, free university, paid paternity/maternity leave, etc., so there aren't debates over things like Medicaid or CHIP. Even the public-housing system is open to anyone (there are waitlists for popular buildings, but no income/wealth cutoff).
3. There's a general feeling that even people who really are up to no good are still somehow "our responsibility". It's kind of the society-level version of what southern Europeans feel on the extended-family level. To a Greek, your uncle might be a lazy jerk and/or an alcoholic, but he's still your uncle and it's seen as at least partly the family's responsibility to make sure he's not homeless or resorting to crime to eat: it'd be shameful to the family if one of theirs was not taken care of. In Denmark it's sort of the same, except it's not the individual family's responsibility, but the state's, to make sure everyone in the "extended family" is off the streets and able to eat.
4. Low-end jobs just pay a lot more. Even working as a supermarket check-out clerk, barista, or McDonald's employee, pays ~$35k-$40k if you do it full-time. So being employed makes a qualitative class difference: in the U.S., minimum-wage workers and welfare recipients are both "lower-class" or "poor", whereas in Denmark, welfare recipients are mostly "poor" while minimum-wage workers are "middle class". As a result, people tend not to feel envious of those on welfare, but more pity towards them.
5. There's a greater cultural acceptance of the idea that people can be temporarily disabled. You can be on disability or sick leave for 6 months for a physical or mental health problem, and then go back to work; it's not only for people who are permanently disabled. This is seen as relatively normal, and such sick leaves are relatively common. Since many people have either taken one themselves, or have friends/family who have, it's not seen as much as something that "other" people are doing to take your tax money, but something that many people, including your own social circle, might need.
In general, the fact that many people will use the welfare system at some point in their life, even if only briefly, means people are very interested in ensuring that it's quick and efficient. Whereas my impression is that most Americans don't have a personal interest in the welfare system being quick and friendly, because they don't expect to use it.
My family was on a wait list for housing assistance from the time I was a child until I dropped out of school and started working, making us ineligible. The list is currently closed and was last open over half a decade ago, for less than two weeks - like something out of a fantasy novel.
>...with an extremely bureaucratic and unfriendly process almost always serving as the gatekeeper.'
Well, there's a popular notion in the US that the process should be as difficult and unfriendly as possible - that people seeking public assistance are not just lazy, but living well. The 'welfare queen' [1] still haunts the system 40 years later.
1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welfare_queen