My husband's thoughts about people on Welfare

[Puckishone]

To say that the "poor" or the "unemployed" should have their gonads regulated implies that Someone Somewhere has crafted such an airtight definition of both of those things that it could only be in the best interests of everyone concerned to implement it. Where, exactly, would that line be drawn? Minimum-wage earners? Anyone making less than the median income in their metro area? People with fewer than 2 cars and 1 mortgage? Someone who got laid off the job 2 weeks after finding out his wife was pregnant? Does this mean when I get laid off next month (losing my medical benefits) I have to either find a way to pay for sterilization (the only foolproof form of birth control, after all) or stop having sex until I get a new job?

And let's just say we did have solid, non-discriminatory definitions and lines drawn. So instead of concerning ourselves with things like education, economic reform or public health to solve problems, we'll have the Ob/Gyn Police scanning through income records and demanding monthly Pap smears from every woman on the list. And what to do about those "illegal" pregnancies? On the bright side, we invalidate both the pro-choice AND the pro-life arguments in one fell swoop!! Choice be damned, for it's no longer your life!

Sarcasm aside, it's really worth considering the ramifications of "solutions" like this. They might sound or feel good to say - and I know I've discussed them positively myself before - but when we're talking about actual lives here, it behooves us all to remember that public policy effects ALL of the public, one way or another. Stereotypes are one thing, real human beings quite another.

[Evandril]

To say that the "poor" or the "unemployed" should have their gonads regulated implies that Someone Somewhere has crafted such an airtight definition of both of those things that it could only be in the best interests of everyone concerned to implement it. Where, exactly, would that line be drawn? Minimum-wage earners? Anyone making less than the median income in their metro area? People with fewer than 2 cars and 1 mortgage? Someone who got laid off the job 2 weeks after finding out his wife was pregnant? Does this mean when I get laid off next month (losing my medical benefits) I have to either find a way to pay for sterilization (the only foolproof form of birth control, after all) or stop having sex until I get a new job?

The 'line' is easy...Do they want money from the government? Heck, by that standard, make the banks we have to bail out do the same thing, they obviously can't take care of themselves If it is part of a manditory program for recieving aid, the BC would be provided by the government. Personally, I'd say to use the longer term methods, and inject/insert them at the time they get their money...with a full medical checkup being done *beforehand* to minimize any complications, and alternate methods being used for those with real problems.

[Puckishone]

The 'line' is easy...Do they want money from the government?

So if an earthquake knocks my city down, and I lose my job and house, I'd best not be getting pregnant until I relocate or rebuild for fear of losing my FEMA money? What about if I'm on SSI? Food stamps/WIC to feed my existing children? Do tax refunds count? Again, where is the line drawn...and who draws it?

As I said, it sounds soothing and righteous to talk about dealing with those terrible welfare-sucking trashy poor people, but the reality is that many of us are a paycheck away from being there ourselves. And if/when that happens I'll wager all this enthusiasm for regulating sexual activity in exchange for "government money" goes right out the window.

On a more practical legal note, there have been several federal and SCOTUS cases, over several decades (I think the earliest one was from the 1940s), dealing with forced sterilization of criminals - all of which were adjudicated in favor of NOT allowing that to happen. If the highest courts in the land can't find Constitutional leeway to sterilize criminals, I think there's no choice but to accept that something like this severely compromises the fabric of that document.

[blas87]

Ya know, all I ever really wanted to be done about welfare checks was to have it become kind of like a foodstamp card. A debit card, if you will.

It cannot be used for cigarettes, alcohol, or lotto tickets. It cannot be used for getting your nails done or hair extensions.

It cannot be used for car modifications (such as lowering or raising vehicle so it's a monster truck or Fast and Furious car, body kits, putting in a manual transmission in place of an automatic, putting in a fartcan exhaust or making their engine a dual cam) or stereo systems or enormous HiDef LCD TVs. It cannot be used for expensive jewelery.

It could be used for clothing, shampoo, conditioner, soap, razors, shaving cream, towels, shoes, etc etc etc. All the kinds of toiletries and necessities that the costs add up quickly but you really do need. You'd have your foodstamp card for your groceries and your welfare card for everything that isn't food.

Edited because I'm stupid.

[Sylvia727]

In this neck of the woods we have EBT Food and EBT Cash, on the same Electronic Benefits Transfer card. People in Walmart, for example, will swipe the card once and hit "Food", and it deducts the total of all food items. Then they swipe the card again and hit "Cash", and it pays the rest. I don't know if there are exceptions to Cash, but I assume that alcohol and cigarettes are excluded from it as there are from Food. I also know that it's easier to get Food than Cash, and that usually Food money outweighs Cash money by 3 to 1. I've never seen a welfare check. I have no idea how that works, or if welfare is EBT Cash. Could be.

Although lottery tickets are a better investment than the current system....

[AFPheonix]

Something our system in the pharmacy does is keep track of Flexible Spending Account items. When someone uses their FSA card, the system automatically only bills prescriptions, otc drugs, and other FSA items to that card and leaves the rest to be paid by another form of tender.
Our registers are old as hell, and if that can be accomplished, I'm sure a FSA type card for welfare recipients can be made and instituted as well. It would cost some money and would be harder to make work for little stores that still just take card imprints, but that would be a better solution for long-term waste management than trying to do what this thread has been proposing so far.

[Seshat]

Quick side note here:

If the state takes the children away, then the state has to pay the housing and care costs of the child AND employ the guardians for the child. (Or kill the kids - and I'm not going to assume that this is anyone's motive.)

So taking the kids away is actually costing the state extra money. So the motive for this can't be to save money! At least not in the short term.


As for the medium term: the kids that get taken away will be traumatised by their forced removal. So in the medium term, there's health care costs - or if health care isn't provided, there's the costs of people who have been traumatised and not treated for it.


So the only way this can possibly SAVE the government money is by inducing a cultural change. And quite frankly, there are better ways to do that.


It is well documented (from the developing world) that when a society educates women and provides families with access to safe, reliable, affordable birth control, the birth rate goes down.
Add improved medical and health conditions, such that infant and child mortality rates drop, and the birth rate goes down even further.

Add a social change that allows women to control their own fertility, and mix in either a society or a social change that decouples men's status from the number of kids their wife has, and the birth rate drops even further.

With all those social changes, the birth rate approaches the point where all children can be raised with good health care, good nutrition, and good education.


So it looks like the best way to reduce the number of welfare kids, might be:
* to ensure that the social attitudes of the social underclass mesh with 'women can control their own fertility',
* to try to remove the 'Me Tarzan, me have eight kids, me wang works, me big guy' attitude,
* to provide good health care to the welfare recipients of society,
* to educate the women (and men!) of the social underclass,
* to ensure that safe, affordable, effective birth control is readily available with no shame attached to using it.


I added that last rider ('no shame attached to using it') because there are places in the world where the affordable birth control is in clinics like family planning and planned parenthood - yet those clinics are, for whatever reason, treated as shameful places to go.
In the cases where those places have abortion protestors outside the clinic, you may as well consider them unavailable to anyone who's not REALLY brave and self-reliant.

[Evandril]

So if an earthquake knocks my city down, and I lose my job and house, I'd best not be getting pregnant until I relocate or rebuild for fear of losing my FEMA money? What about if I'm on SSI? Food stamps/WIC to feed my existing children? Do tax refunds count? Again, where is the line drawn...and who draws it?

As I said, it sounds soothing and righteous to talk about dealing with those terrible welfare-sucking trashy poor people, but the reality is that many of us are a paycheck away from being there ourselves. And if/when that happens I'll wager all this enthusiasm for regulating sexual activity in exchange for "government money" goes right out the window.

I do not believe I have ever talked about 'terrible welfare-sucking trashy poor people', and have been forced to choose what bills I'd pay a few times in my life...and in *NONE* of those times did I even think to myself 'Hey, I can't support myself, lets have a kid!'.

Lets go through your examples one by one...Earthquake knocks down my city...GREAT time to tax an already overburdened medical community with a pregnancy, to say nothing for the increased health risks the mother and baby would have due to the earthquake

You're unemployed and homeless...and you feel this would be an acceptable situation to raise a child in? Personally, I'd prefer my kids to have a roof over their heads, myself.

Any time you cannot support yourself, I do not feel you should be trying to bring a child into the equation, no. As far as tax refunds and the like, the discussion was about welfare, as in, money you are telling the government you *NEED* to survive. If you can show me an example of how it is a good or even a responsible idea to add another mouth to feed to a situation already incabable of supporting itself, please do...I cannot think of one. Heck, I'd not take in a stray animal if I couldn't feed my family first...and I'd care a heck of a lot less for an animal than a baby.

[Boozy]

An accidental pregnancy shouldn't really be compared to taking in a stray animal. Choosing to abort or give a child up for adoption can be a gut-wrenching decision. This isn't as easy as choosing not to put out a bowl of milk for some stray cat.

[Evandril]

An accidental pregnancy shouldn't really be compared to taking in a stray animal. Choosing to abort or give a child up for adoption can be a gut-wrenching decision. This isn't as easy as choosing not to put out a bowl of milk for some stray cat.

I wasn't talking accidental pregnancies, I was talking about people *wanting* to have a child in those situations. Issues with not wanting to take birth control would be a different situation, but saying that people should have the right to have kids if they want, when they cannot support themselves, strikes me as irresponsible, to say the least.

[Greenday]

I wasn't talking accidental pregnancies, I was talking about people *wanting* to have a child in those situations. Issues with not wanting to take birth control would be a different situation, but saying that people should have the right to have kids if they want, when they cannot support themselves, strikes me as irresponsible, to say the least.

Irresponsible doesn't cover it. Not even close.

[IDrinkaRum]

That's what I believe too. If you've got 2 kids, with a husband and yourself, and then you decide to have another kid, no sympathy from me if you can't provide for your family. You knew you couldn't afford 2 kids, why have a third? For more welfare payments? Yeah, right.

[Seshat]

My parents would have loved a third kid, and tried fostering kids for a while (since fostering is financially supported where we are).

But they couldn't afford one financially, other than by fostering, so they didn't. I think that was the right decision. (They loved fostering, though!)

[IDrinkaRum]

Seshat - that is responsible. And here in the state of Virginia, fostering gives you money to help out. (Actually, in the local paper, under "Help Wanted" section, Foster Parents wanted was listed).

[Lady_Foxfire]

I wasn't talking accidental pregnancies, I was talking about people *wanting* to have a child in those situations. Issues with not wanting to take birth control would be a different situation, but saying that people should have the right to have kids if they want, when they cannot support themselves, strikes me as irresponsible, to say the least.

Nobody is arguing that it's a good idea to deliberately have a kid when you're on government assistance. It goes without saying. So I don't understand why you're bringing it up.. The question in this thread is how to deal with well-meaning people who find themselves unexpectadly pregnant.

It's not fair to call them irresponsible or stupid, because once you're pregnant you don't have a lot of options. Some people might get abortions or give the kids up for adoption, but you can't force people to do that just because it'll save the government a few bucks. A

As I said in my previous post, you can't force reproductive choices on people, because it's a human rights violation. You can only make all the options available, and let them choose for themselves.