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What Happens When the Poor Receive a Stipend?

opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com

101–110 of 163 posts

Re: What Happens When the Poor Receive a Stipend?

#101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You left out poor white people in your discussion. While white people do have a lower rate of poverty than blacks or latinos, they actually make up a very large majority (68.5% as of 2009) of the people living under the poverty line in the United States. [1] "... let's not pretend that the Cherokee are the ones we're worried about here." "Successfully repeating this experiment in poor black and latino populations a f…

Forgive me for offending your politically correct sensibilities, but it seems that I'm going to have to be even more blunt: if you want to convince white people in this country that doling out free money to the poor is a good idea, you're going to have to convince them that blacks and latinos aren't going to abuse that system en masse. The only way to do that is to try something similar in neighborhoods that are comp…

Shocker: You completely misread the data from that source.

Table B in the link you posted shows 31,650* white people in poverty out of a US total of 46,180. That's 68.5%.

* all numbers in thousands

Re: What Happens When the Poor Receive a Stipend?

#103
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the psychological and social difference between receiving money from a source which a population would consider to be 'theirs' cannot be overstated It can be overstated; you've overstated it. In contrast to the careful research described in the article, you've just made a bunch of stuff up. Your rush to assume race as the dominant factor is another example.

Do you know what the Swedes didn't have a problem with a decade ago? Welfare abuse. All of a sudden, they have a problem with it now. Do you know who are the ones abusing the system? Hint: it's not the Swedes. Every other country which has accepted middle eastern immigrants in the last decade are experiencing the same problems. If a population does not respect your system, they will abuse it, period. If you can get o…

I got over myself... is it prejudice? Because I'm pretty sure it's prejudicial interpretation of whatever data or anecdote you're making vague reference to.

Re: What Happens When the Poor Receive a Stipend?

#104

The researcher supposed that the reduced stressors in poor parents' lives allowed them to be more nurturing, resulting in reduced problems with their children. Seems like a no-brainer to do, considering this analysis: "Bearing that in mind, Randall Akee, an economist at the University of California, Los Angeles, and a collaborator of Professor Costello’s, argues that the supplements actually save money in the long ru…

Correction: this is what happens when poor Cherokee receive a stipend, but let's not pretend that the Cherokee are the ones we're worried about here. There are differences between the subcultures, and those differences almost certainly extend to how they treat money. Furthermore, the psychological and social difference between receiving money from a source which a population would consider to be 'theirs' cannot be ov…

As an alternative example to what happens when you give the poor a stipend, have a look at the government grant system employed in South Africa, and the absolute misuse and abuse that system is under.

I believe the South African example is a closer approximation to what a society would look like with a basic guaranteed income.

Re: What Happens When the Poor Receive a Stipend?

#105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The healthcare isn't free no matter how many times you people say that. But you're also wrong about Australia being "a very similar society to the US". Maybe at one time, but Australia has some very authoritarian laws these days - from gun control to internet filters, etc..

Only in the distorted, leftist mindset are things free because they just happened to be paid with taxes.

Only a distorted, rightist mindset interprets ``free healthcare'' as meaning ``healthcare magically appears from the sky'' rather than ``you can walk into a hospital and get treatment without having to pay a bill afterwards''.

Re: What Happens When the Poor Receive a Stipend?

#106
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the psychological and social difference between receiving money from a source which a population would consider to be 'theirs' cannot be overstated It can be overstated; you've overstated it. In contrast to the careful research described in the article, you've just made a bunch of stuff up. Your rush to assume race as the dominant factor is another example.

Do you know what the Swedes didn't have a problem with a decade ago? Welfare abuse. All of a sudden, they have a problem with it now. Do you know who are the ones abusing the system? Hint: it's not the Swedes. Every other country which has accepted middle eastern immigrants in the last decade are experiencing the same problems. If a population does not respect your system, they will abuse it, period. If you can get o…

So, let me see if I have your position right: because some people will abuse a system that will improve things for many more people, we should not implement said system? Is that right? I think it is telling that you would rather not have one "type" of person benefit unjustly in the face of all of society benefiting greatly. Says more about your feelings about "types" of people than your willingness to participate in the heterogeneous society of modern civilization.

Remember, the perfect is the enemy of the good.

Re: What Happens When the Poor Receive a Stipend?

#107
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Most staunch opponents of wealth redistribution oppose it on principle, not practical terms. You can tell them in very concrete terms that their tax dollars will benefit them more than it would hurt them and their reply will be, "Well, then you should let me distribute my money that way instead of taking it and doing it yourself."

>>> Most staunch opponents of wealth redistribution oppose it on principle, not practical terms. Actually, most people don't like it because they've seen how the government "redistributes" their money and most of the time it's wasted. This is why religious institutions tend to get so much in donations. People trust their church more than their government.

Define wasted. Was it burned? Unless you are talking about military expenditures, which have some of the lowest economic multipliers, it paid someone's salary, who in turn went and participated in the economy. Was it ideally spent? No, but read some Edward Denning: you can spend more money ensuring that only the right people get money or you can just wrote checks and accept statistical levels of error.

Re: What Happens When the Poor Receive a Stipend?

#108
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Welfare, food stamps, Social Security disability

Those three programs are, in most cases, barely enough to live on, especially not to live comfortably. Even if you make good choices, being on welfare and food stamps still provides you almost no opportunities other than getting as many minimum-wage jobs as you can. You're talking about programs designed essentially to keep people alive and nothing more; to prolong life for its own sake. Minimum income is a way of en…

>Those three programs are, in most cases, barely enough to live on, especially not to live comfortably.

So was the stipend in this story. 6k per year, then later 8k? who could live on this

Re: What Happens When the Poor Receive a Stipend?

#109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Correction: this is what happens when poor Cherokee receive a stipend, but let's not pretend that the Cherokee are the ones we're worried about here. There are differences between the subcultures, and those differences almost certainly extend to how they treat money. Furthermore, the psychological and social difference between receiving money from a source which a population would consider to be 'theirs' cannot be ov…

As an alternative example to what happens when you give the poor a stipend, have a look at the government grant system employed in South Africa, and the absolute misuse and abuse that system is under. I believe the South African example is a closer approximation to what a society would look like with a basic guaranteed income.

Do you have some links to sources?

Re: What Happens When the Poor Receive a Stipend?

#110

The researcher supposed that the reduced stressors in poor parents' lives allowed them to be more nurturing, resulting in reduced problems with their children. Seems like a no-brainer to do, considering this analysis: "Bearing that in mind, Randall Akee, an economist at the University of California, Los Angeles, and a collaborator of Professor Costello’s, argues that the supplements actually save money in the long ru…

Id be interested to see if even better effects would be realized if television was cut off from a group like this for a generation or two.

Why did the parents of these poor kids do a terrible job of parenting before the stipend? They were drunk half of the time (literally 10-12 hours per day). They drank mostly because they felt sorry for themselves. Why? they felt disadvantaged and envious, they were basically pouting. Why? because their lives were not like those they saw on television. Also because they had "learned" by watching television that they were poor and worthless and could never get a leg up in the white country they lived in. Once they started getting money and buying more worthless crap from Walmart, they felt like they were keeping up with the Jones' thus they felt less sorry for themselves and drank less. The rest is self explanatory...

Simple really.

This is the truth, Self pity is the biggest enemy of the minority. Nothing does more to promote this than The visual media. How do I know this is true? because my wife was one of the children in this story. She and her family told it to me long before I read it here today.

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