[boriscleto]

New Pew Survey: Only 40% of Republicans Support Safety Net Programs | Crooks and Liars

Now, if you hear anyone lazily wondering why "the parties can't get together" -- just refer them to these numbers. We're not talking about people who want to "reform" Social Security or who are "worried about the debt." We're talking about people who don't think providing food for hungry children is a legitimate function of government.

These are people who not only think the Great Society and New Deal were a mistake -- they've convinced themselves that the country went off the rails during the Progressive Era, and would be perfectly happy if children could go back to working in factories and old people were left to die hungry and in squalor.

The party of Eisenhower, Nixon and even Reagan is dead. This is truly the party of Ayn Rand.

[normhead]

The funny thing is, a more social contract type of person would say, well, just opt out. You don't have to accept the benefits of the social safety net. Make yourself an example of how this can work. However, Republicans can take everything available to them, while bad mouthing the system. The simple fact is Republicans want to use the road system, but they want others to pay for it, they want to use airports, but they don't want to pay for them. They want cheap labour , so they have someone to mow their lawn, but they don't want to keep that labour alive during the times they aren't using them. They want a world where everything is about them having what they need, all the time, without having to pay for it. The worst thing that could happen to Republicans is, their dreams come true. The basic concept of Republican system is for them personally to have every cent they ever earned and to in essence to be grossly over paid for every thing they do, so they can use it to force others to do everything for them, for nothing. It's imply not a sustainable system.

[SteveM]

Ignoring the whole societal aspect of social programs and their benefit, there doesn't seem to be any thought to cost or "then what".

"At year-end 2007 the United States had less than 5% of the world's population[28] and 23.4% of the world's prison and jail population (adult inmates)."

How much is this costing? How does the social aspect of the US contribute to this?

The pendulum swing back and forth so to speak. I have a feeling Romney will get in and people will get a taste of their own blind ideology. Then it will (eventually) swing back to the center once again.

[GeneV]

New Pew Survey: Only 40% of Republicans Support Safety Net Programs | Crooks and Liars

It is fascinating that the support for social nets is half what it was in Reagan's time. The GOP has moved way to the right of its positions at the time of its Godfather.

[eddie1960]

It is fascinating that the support for social nets is half what it was in Reagan's time. The GOP has moved way to the right of its positions at the time of its Godfather.

Astonishing isn't it? meanwhile Obama more closely mirror Reagan and Nixon's politics than their own party does

[Nesster]

Taking a quick look, I see Pew asked this two ways - though the 'hard' word choices were different... "It's the governments responsibility to take care of people who can't take care of themselves" - 'responsibility' is the hard word. "The government should help needy people even if it means going deeper into debt" - note 'should help' instead of 'responsibility' and a different flavor to the recipients' condition.


I would not be as harsh on the republicans who answer the way they do - usually these are not well thought out answers, and often a differnt picture emerges when the question is put ala carte - should government help wounded war vets? children so poor they don't have enough to eat? the elderly for basic living money and help with medical bills? The meta-questions such as Pew asked are usually indicative of success in sloganeering and smear campaigns.

The other thing to remember: I doubt nearly anyone wants to go back to the Gilded Age. Benefits and policies are relative to current conditions.

USA has managed to increase the pie during the last century, which has allowed give-aways in all directions. This largely ended in the 70s, I think, as since then while the economy has grown much of this growth 'feels like' it has been done with smoke and mirrors. And since 2000 this trend has grown. With a stangant pie, it becomes a zero sum game and the stakes that much higher: there's little win-win available.

Ever since "shareholder value" came into vogue, all corporations (except maybe some private ones) have two products to sell: what they produce and also themselves. Often management incentives are slanted towards the selling of the company itself (maximizing shareholder value). In this scenario, finacial ratios become more important than straight dollars: low margin businesses go elsewhere, and the jobs therefrom also. That technology also points in this direction makes this trend all the more irresistible.

The 60s and 70s utopia: that we'd have a 3 or 4 day work week etc is obviously not taking place. What corporation would go for this - they would be instant take-over bait, for one.

In this scenario Clayton Christensen's disruptive technology mechanism may be at work on a national level. Basically, the scenario goes like this: in search of higher profit margins, established companies willingly abandon low-end, low-margin businesses to upstarts. The upstarts invariably produce something that isn't as 'good' as what we already have... but is much cheaper, quicker, flexible, etc. Gradually this 'junk' improves... and in order to keep growing, gnaws upward in the market until *bam* the established companies are out of market.

This is market forces at play, by the way, not government. We've been doing this on a national scale, and the income disparities are one effect. Those whose compensation is tied to 'shareholder value' - financial efficiency, financial valuation of companies - have done very well, while everyone else has stagnated at best. In this case the 'disruptive technologies' include India and China, for example. In a way, maybe Japan hit this earlier than the US?

That said...

The funny thing is, a more social contract type of person would say, well, just opt out. You don't have to accept the benefits of the social safety net.

- Excellent post and analysis, Norm! There's a funny thing with the libertarians and their worship of personal responsibility. So don't take the damn hand out! Refuse to claim your mortgage deduction! But NOOO, they want big bad Government to do something to everyone else!

[Winder]

The question is: Should the federal government be the one who handles these programs. Less than half of the money collected by the federal government for these programs actually reach the people in need. The majority of the money goes to support middle-class government workers with great benefits. So who is the biggest beneficiary of these programs? Not the poor.

Prior to the introduction of minimum wage minorities has lower unemployment than whites. Since the passage of minimum wage laws unemployment for minorities has been much higher than whites with the exception of 1949. 1949 was a recession year, and inflation was so high that the minimum wage became irrelevant. Everyone was paying more than the minimum wage because market competition for labor drove the wage up over the minimum wage. Unemployment rates minorities dropped below that of white workers. In 1950 Congress realized that they weren't screwing poor people over anymore so they adjusted the minimum wage for inflation and quickly saw a spike in unemployment for minority and unskilled workers. So from mid-1948 through mid-1950 we see increased employment and increased wages for poor unskilled workers.

Minimum wage laws prevent people with minimum skills from getting jobs by forcing them to compete with more skilled workers. Minimum wage laws contribute to the need for welfare programs by preventing people with minimum skills from ever getting an entry level job and learning the skills needed to move up and out of poverty.

The government has a horrible track record of "helping" the poor. Two thirds of the dept. of Labors budget depends on keeping a large unemployed and impoverished population. The government and politicians benefit from keeping people poor. It is not like government has made any progress on the war on poverty. Trillions of dollars spent and zero progress is hardly a good track record.

Davis-Bacon Act is another great example of the government acting to protect predominately white union workers from competing with minority construction labor that was much cheaper. Anytime you can increase the operating cost of your competitors you gain an advantage.

[normhead]

Prior to the introduction of minimum wage minorities has lower unemployment than whites. Since the passage of minimum wage laws unemployment for minorities has been much higher than whites with the exception of 1949.

Republican wealth comes in part from the exploitation of the folks who work for them, so no surprises there. If some Republican can't pay the going rate, the answer isn't "get off your fat ass and do it yourself", it's find someone desperate enough to do what you want for what you'll pay. In such a system no minimum wage makes sense. It gives the employer the right to pay next to nothing, to people who are just trying to avoid starvation.

So you're saying my grandmother, black and living in Georgia, collecting laundry in the morning , washing it in her home in the afternoon and taking it back in the evening for pennies a day, was fully employed? Ya, fully employed but barely paid. That's what Republicans want, people who are so desperate they will do anything for pennies a day. Let's go back to that.

Hey then lets make sure she can't afford health care and send her kids to inferior schools, that will ave us even more money. That was fair. My father in his first job, working for Boeing was told even if he got an education, he'd never be anything more than a janitor, that's as high as minorities could rise. let's not start holding up those days as some kind of example.

[grhazelton]

I recall chatting a few years ago with a colleague whose husband was on Medicare. She was grumbling about the work it took to keep up with it. I suggested that Tom could forego Medicare and get his own insurance. She said nothing, not then or ever again about Medicare, at least to me.

And Brother Winder: Davis-Bacon acts to protect all workers. Consider the debacle in New Orleans. With the suspension of Davis-Bacon many bottom-feeding firms rounded up workers, a large number of whom were illegals, from outside New Orleans, for the federally funded projects which were intended to rebuild the city. New Orleans had a ready labor pool, many skilled construction workers, who should have been given preferential consideration in hiring. Their employment, and the good wages assured by Davis-Bacon, would have greatly benefited the recovery of this once-great city. Instead outside firms were able to underbid all others and effectively remove monies from the local economy which otherwise would have gone for resident workers' rents, etc.

Once again Bush screwed up.

As far as minimum wage jobs, they typically don't pay enough for a single person to scrape by on. Read Barbara Erenreich's Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America for an idea of what working at minimum wage jobs is like. You'll find that such workers are one illness, one sick child, one "minor" car repair (if they can afford a car!) away from fiscal disaster.

Let's see...Herbert Hoover was a successful business man. And we had a wonderful Depression. Now we must admit that Harry Truman was a failed businessman, but he did a good job as president.

G W Bush has an MBA, and was a business man, bailed out by his father, and he brought us our current mess.

Mitt Romney is an extremely successful business man. Hmm...do we really want to go down that path again?

Remember, he suggested that college students having trouble making tuition payments borrow funds from mom and dad and dad and set up their own businesses? What's wrong with this picture? Besides the painfully obvious, that it would help to have parents as rich as the Romneys!

[mikemike]

The statement that they ask respondents to agree or disagree with is actually very vague: "It's the government's responsibility to take care of people who can't take care of themselves" or: "The government should guarantee every citizen enough to eat and a place to sleep."

But the respondent has a very concrete implementation in mind, usually something that is similar to their own definition of acceptable living conditions or what it means to take care of yourself. What kind of guaranteed food and place to sleep are we talking about? Single-family houses, ample food stamps with no controls over how they are used or barracks style living with a chow hall that serves gruel. The government taking care of people who can't take care of themselves implies to me that the government will determine my competence to take care of myself. That assessment is something that we might not all agree with and if I were the one making that determination I can tell you that I would put a huge swath of American society into receivership, cut up their credit cards, cut their cable, make them sell their cars and get something more modest or take the bus, move to a smaller place, and a lot of other life changes where people are making poor choices which are detrimental to their ability to take care of themselves.

[kswier]

The question is: Should the federal government be the one who handles these programs.

I think the government should. The problem I see with relying on charity is that there are certain groups of people that may become vulnerable (because the charity does not approve them for whatever reason), or there may not be enough money to go around. Sure, the government may not be the most efficient, but they are inclusive and systematic. And the middle class jobs add consumers to society (and the government benefits are not as good as you might think ).

The statement that they ask respondents to agree or disagree with is actually very vague: "It's the government's responsibility to take care of people who can't take care of themselves" or: "The government should guarantee every citizen enough to eat and a place to sleep."

But the respondent has a very concrete implementation in mind, usually something that is similar to their own definition of acceptable living conditions or what it means to take care of yourself. What kind of guaranteed food and place to sleep are we talking about? Single-family houses, ample food stamps with no controls over how they are used or barracks style living with a chow hall that serves gruel. The government taking care of people who can't take care of themselves implies to me that the government will determine my competence to take care of myself. That assessment is something that we might not all agree with and if I were the one making that determination I can tell you that I would put a huge swath of American society into receivership, cut up their credit cards, cut their cable, make them sell their cars and get something more modest or take the bus, move to a smaller place, and a lot of other life changes where people are making poor choices which are detrimental to their ability to take care of themselves.

I think this is the heart of the question. What standard of living to we give? Should we give people an apartment to live in or a bunk? Should we give people a substantial amount of food stamps, or should we give them staples that must be prepared? Or should it be something in between? I don't have answers to these questions. What I believe is that at a minimum people should be given access to shelter, healthy food (i.e. just bread does not cut it), healthcare, a good education system, and job training.

I would put an emphasis education. It seems as if the schools in low income neighborhoods are often the worse. It should be the other way around.

[Nesster]

Trillions of dollars spent and zero progress is hardly a good track record.

PolitiFact | Bill O'Reilly says poverty hasn't budged since 1965 despite 'trillions' spent


Although, conservatives have a way of inverting the intent of legislation... witness the 14th amendment .. which the Supreme Court figured actually applied to corporations --so I'm not entirely surprised by this interpretation of what minimum wage laws do.

[Winder]

PolitiFact | Bill O'Reilly says poverty hasn't budged since 1965 despite 'trillions' spent


Although, conservatives have a way of inverting the intent of legislation... witness the 14th amendment .. which the Supreme Court figured actually applied to corporations --so I'm not entirely surprised by this interpretation of what minimum wage laws do.

In 1990 government anti-poverty spending equaled $184 billion.
In 1990 it would have cost only $75 billion to bring every family with an income below the poverty level up above that benchmark. Hence, government was spending two-and-a-half times what would be needed to end poverty in America. However, after that $184 billion was spent, some 30 million Americans remained below the poverty level. All told, since the early 1960s, government at all levels has spent $3.5 trillion on programs for the poor. Yet there are more poor in 1993 than there were in 1963.

Government is not winning the war on poverty any more than it is winning the war on drugs. Government is fairly incompetent and inefficient when it comes to social programs.

[Winder]

I think the government should. The problem I see with relying on charity is that there are certain groups of people that may become vulnerable (because the charity does not approve them for whatever reason), or there may not be enough money to go around. Sure, the government may not be the most efficient, but they are inclusive and systematic. And the middle class jobs add consumers to society (and the government benefits are not as good as you might think ).

I said Federal Government. The role of states and municipalities is different. They are closer to the problems, and can react in more direct ways. Not every state is experiencing poverty for the same reason. Not every state has the same underlying problems. California has close to 20% of the nations recipients of social aid, yet it has just +/-12% of the nations population. Something is wrong.

I think this is the heart of the question. What standard of living to we give? Should we give people an apartment to live in or a bunk? Should we give people a substantial amount of food stamps, or should we give them staples that must be prepared? Or should it be something in between? I don't have answers to these questions. What I believe is that at a minimum people should be given access to shelter, healthy food (i.e. just bread does not cut it), healthcare, a good education system, and job training.

I would put an emphasis education. It seems as if the schools in low income neighborhoods are often the worse. It should be the other way around.

I don't think "give" is the answer. If a city wants to run work programs where people can actually work on public projects and get paid that is one thing. People need to learn job skills, and they don't do that if you pay them to stay home.

Man who fathered 30 kids with 11 women seeks child support help - latimes.com This is what welfare programs breed.... excuse the pun. I know people who went to this kids high school. One is a OB. One has a Masters in Sociology. One is a Lawyer. One is in grad school now for a Masters in Nursing Science. These people attended the same school as the kid in the article and were exposed to the same level of public education.

Prior to the "great society" black two parent were as common as white two parent families. What changed? Before we look at education lets look at family structure. A child born into a two parent family (black or white) has a huge advantage over children born into a single parent family home. 66% of black children in America are living in a single parent home.

[kswier]

I said Federal Government. The role of states and municipalities is different. They are closer to the problems, and can react in more direct ways. Not every state is experiencing poverty for the same reason.

I completely agree with this. Though, I think the money has to come from a wide enough base. For instance, collecting money from people in Detroit for people in Detroit is not going to work out. However, I don't think the base necessarily has to be the entire nation. I also wonder what happens if a state decides not to to be socially responsible, but another state is socially responsible. Do those with low incomes and who are unemployed migrate to the state that provides a safety net (playing a bit of devils advocate here)? If so, there would be a group of states covering all welfare expenses, and a group of states avoiding the expense.

I don't think "give" is the answer. If a city wants to run work programs where people can actually work on public projects and get paid that is one thing. People need to learn job skills, and they don't do that if you pay them to stay home.

I agree with this as well. I have often wondered if programs like that could be a valid alternative to the current system.