OT: The Dole Brings Out the Worst in People (Introduction)

by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Saturday, August 13, 2011, 16:34 (4851 days ago) @ David Turell

Living off the dole brings out the worst in people. Tough love is the only way. Help the desperate (only) to find a way to self-help:
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> http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904006104576502301564142090.html?KEYWORDS... 
> A version of what went wrong in the UK on the dole.-Of course I know nothing the UK's social welfare system aside from what little propaganda comes down to us here during US political debates, but here's my take. -I don't know what kind of welfare system we had in the U.S. when I was a kid, but my mom was a single parent. My mother was raped in 1979, and it happened in the small town where she grew up. Of course I don't have full ownership of all the details, but there's an 'ol boys club in every small town. My mom's rape allegation was laughed out of court. (She was after all, a pageant girl!) The best she could get was $50/month child support, and child support in N. Dak is a joke. It has the worst policy of enforcement of all 50 states. She only got 3 checks from my "dad." To top it off, the local Catholic church had some old crotchety jackass who told my mom that I couldn't be baptized because I would be born out of wedlock. -So, my mom had to quit her job and flee to California to move in with sympathetic relatives, where I was born. My mother stayed there and helped around the house, but could find no work. So, my great aunt and uncle took care of her and me while my mom's savings dwindled. (She was always a saver.) -My grandfather was diagnosed with bladder cancer in 1983, and it took him three years to die. Though, that last bit of information was unknown at that time. So, fearing that my grandfather would die, she moved back to N. Dak, and the small town that she ran from just 4 years earlier. She couldn't get a job anywhere. So what choice was there? Only "going out on the dole." For the next three years we lived on food stamps and gov't cheese. (Which isn't really, all that bad. Not good for you, but I thought it was tasty!)-Her allotment was $300/month and subsidized housing. I can only guess that she paid for the housing from savings as well because I KNOW she had no job. In early '86 my mom moved to Bismarck ND looking for work. She got a couple of clerical jobs, but still had to use foodstamps because North Dakota was hit EXTREMELY hard during Reaganomics. (Much of that had to do with its own archaisms as well: They still had Sunday Closing laws on the books until the late 90's.) -In the case of the American system, I really don't think that we have it that bad. The "dole" as it were was extremely meager in the case of my mother and I think it's just enough to keep life and limb—it's almost a joke. Which is exactly the kind of 'tough love' thing that I think David is drilling at. Could any of you imagine feeding a kid on $300usd/month? -Anyway, to finish the narrative, in '88 my mom, after having worked two temp contracts for Indian Health, finally convinced her mother to let us move in with her for a year. (My grandmother and mother DID NOT get along.) She was underemployed for a year as she worked as a waitress at a Pizza Hut, saving all her tip money until she had a big enough nest egg saved up in order to move us to Omaha. Once here, she got hired within 2 weeks, and the rest as they say is history...-All that is to build up to this position: State welfare is necessary. I'm not advocating we give people enough money to live like kings, but especially when you consider that my mother's own church was unwilling to do anything for her, and it took nearly 10 years before my mother's own mother would help her... Homelessness was JUST around the corner. David sometimes seems amazed at how well-read I am—it began here. While my mom was working as a secretary, she slowly bought a complete set of encyclopedias, over the course of about a year, starting in about 2nd grade. Which, I read cover to cover—and I'm NOT joking about that. (They also came with a dictionary, for when I came across a tough word, and then there was always my mother.) I have no special genius, I just learned to read early, and was always enthusiastic about learning, as long as it was something new... -Digression over: Had I not received state help, I would never got to where I am today, which is a 31yr old programmer helping to make millions for the insurance industry, studying for his Master's in Computer Science. So I contend the opposite: In some cases, "the Dole" brings out the best in people.

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\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"

\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"