Opinion on Welfare...

First of all please don't minus me for my opinion. I am 23 years old, and I consider myself a woman. Yes, there are many people on welfare who live in subsidized housing, have nice cars, and have a nice weave and their nails done. I would say that I am the exception to that. I honestly don't know how they afford it. I have two kids, I have received assistance on and off for the past 3 years, due to an abusive relationship. Sometimes I couldn't have a job because I had to go to a shelter far away. I lost a good job because of that once. I am on welfare, and in the past 6 months, I think I have bought myself 1 new shirt, and that was from Walmart. Otherwise the last time I shopped was when income taxes came in and that was at the Salvation Army.I lost my job and went back on assistance this month, but for August I will no longer receive it because I got a job at Burger King. I am willing to work anywhere so that I can be on welfare. Also welfare has new rules so people can't stay on it long, and people will get sanctioned if they don't follow the rules or give all the neccessary documentation whenever it is asked for. So yes, there are many people who get welfare and abuse it. I am not one of those people, and know many people who truly need it. I don't make a lot of money so yes I get foodstamps, medical insurance, and help with daycare, but I am a survivor of domestic violence trying to get back on my feet. Thanks for the great topic!

First off, with WIC you don't have a choice on what you buy. From what I remember, all that is on the allowed list is name branded items. Anyways, yes, she should be working. Odds are she barely has an education, so she can't afford to get a good job to put the kids in daycare. I'd bet even if she could, the daycare would cost more than she made per week (average seems to be about $120/week so *4...yeah) and if she was working, we would be paying for that too. It is a no win situation. They should make her get her tubers tied.

I'm with you. I don't have a problem at all in helping someone in need but the system needs some vamping over. There are too many loopholes for people to take advantage of. Years ago, I found myself in a bad spot with 3 kids to raise..single and no child support coming in and i'd lost my job. I had no choice but to apply for welfare..hardest thing i'd ever done. I was honest and played by the rules. In doing so...there was no way I could get ahead. we lived very poorly for that short time. If I were to blow my money alotted on name brand things, then we'd have been starving at the end of the month. We lived very frugally and my goal was to get a job and get off it asap...and I did. What I see is that women can have boyfriends live with them and if the boyfriend is not the father of any of their children then his income is not considered. That boyfriend pays the bills and they use the welfare for extras. They take food stamps or ebt cards and get people to swap them cash for groceries. sometimes they will give like 70.00 worth of ebt for 60.00 worth of cash. I get very angry at the abuse of the system and angrier at the systems lack of fixing it. it has been going on for years. you can report it and nothing seems to change.

blogging 2 for every one you see like that woman, there are amany more who shop just like you only thry no fault of their own haved had to turn to welfare, and it hurts their very soul. these peope will get off it as soon as they get their feet under them, so dont judge everyone by the one person you saw, i hate people coming on here and judging all of any class by one person they saw when they are doing big injustices to allthe other non cheating people on welfare.welfare for alotof people helps them to get back on their feet, find jobs and yes pay the damned taxes everyone is complaining about. I was wo rking in my local library one day when a very rude patron shoved right in frontof me where i was shelving books and I asked her politely to wait untilI had sheleved these five books, and she snapped at me,no you wait for me my taxes pay your wages.I looked at her and snapped back, then you must not pay much tax by the size of my wages. I weent on shelving and she shut up.I pay taxes too if it was anyof her damned business.

Calm down. Yes, there are some people who abuse the sytem. But.. First, as someone else pointed out, WIC is different than welfare. We want children to have the best start they can have, don't we? Secondly, judging someone because their nails are painted doesn't make sense to me. That reminds me of something that happened to me when I was a single mom, had been injured at work, had the worker's comp people telling me that I had reached "maximum medicall improvement" so they couldn't pay me anymore...but doctors who were telling me they could not and WOULD NOT release me to work yet. When I applied for assistance, there was nothing. I applied for Social Security disability, but have still not received that - after over 5 years of waiting!!! I did get my county's medical care, which included seeing a "teledoctor" for things that were not serious. You know...we had to "say ahhh" in front of a web cam. For more serious medical concerns, we had to go 45 miles to another county because that's what our county contracted for. I had to ask my church for gas money to get to my first appointment. Then when I got there, the doctor refused to see me. Why? Because my clothes were ironed!!!! What?!?!?!!?!? Sure, it seems that some people believe that "poor people don't iron their clothes." With so many people living on the edge of poverty and homelessness, it's hard to judge, don't you think? When I moved to another state (and my son moved to even another state to live with friends and got 2 jobs to try to support himself), I did receive the state disability. $284 a month. Try living on that. I also got $129 in food stamps. And you know what? I bought healthy foods - lots of fresh fruits and veggies. I WAS NOT going to be caught in the trap of eating cheap mac and cheese and gaining weight just to please people who watched me grocery shop. I also bought shrimp. Yessirree I did. But at the grocery where I shopped it was always 2 for the price of 1 and I got enough shrimp to eat for a week for $3.99. When I had people stare at me, I told them that very thing. That the shrimp lasted me a week and cost $3.99.

Once many years ago I felt the same way you did when someone handed me their Medicaid card at the hospital I worked at. I was very irritated. Now, more than 20 years later I think of things differently. Maybe because now its me needing help. WIC is (as many here have said) alot different than welfare. But be it WIC or be it Welfare we are not the ones to judge others on appearances. I've learned may younger ones these days don't have a clue how to shop wisely and spend less. And as many have said she may not have had an option in what she was buying. As for her nails - maybe she does them herself? I know I do my own. And as for getting a job - can you imagine trying to make ends meet and pay for a sitter for four kids? Maybe she does have a job, but still needs WIC to get by. We never know what situation someone is in simply by judging their shopping cart. Maybe she recently got fired, maybe she has gone thru a divorce. Or, she could be like my stepsister - who is raising not only HER children but her daughter's as well. She works, but has 5 kids to support and needs help. I'd hate to think someone would judge her this way....

While I think the welfare program is a good program when it is used to help people that are down due to being laid off, or sickness, or mother's that are single and going to school to better there lives. There are also the ones that you speak of. That see a free ride as long as they are having kids. And yes it has been proven that a woman with 4 or 5 kids have an income higher than someone that works a 40 hour week. I see then in the store all the time, and they are buying steaks with the food stamps, something at 6.99 a pound I can't afford. I like you buy at Aldi's where you have to bag your own groceries and buy the sacks to put them in, just to get some items cheaper, they can afford to buy the best. I think it time that they redo the system and anyone on it have to go to work, if they have small children then they can put them in day care, welfares pays for everything else, let it pay for day care so that the moms can work or go to school and if they dont' want to do that then cut them off. i heard a welfare worker say once that they can't do that cause then the kids don't eat, well if you can't feed your kids then you don't need them. No matter what the government does to try to help the elderly or handicapped or the sick, there is always a bunch that learns to work the system. I think if you have to be on welfare then after you have the second kid, they should tie your tubes. yes they had to pay for the baby too. Some where you have to put a stop to it.

I can understand where you are comming from, and being a single parent most of my kids lives, I feel I can have some insight here. There has been a LOT of welfare refom that has been put into place, now you can only be on assistance for a specific period of time and only have so much that you can get lifetime. I do work and I recieve foodstamps for my daughter. $168 a month does not go far. For a special occasion I will splurge for her and get some brand name items, but it does not happen often. I also go through Angel Food ministries and get a lot of my gorceries through them. There are people that do abuse the system, and with the regualtions in place they have made it harder to do so. Of course there are people that still go around the system. All in all most people that are on assistance are on it becasue they need it and it is not a long period of time and they are working. The ones that don't appear to need it are the ones that stick out. People who are on it because they need the help are more discreet about it and are much less noticable. One of the things that got to me is that for my job I have to dress in busines clothes, so that I look professional. I went into the store after work one day to pick up a few things and the girl behind the counter gave me a dirty look when I used my EBT card. She had started a conversation with the girl that was bagging groceries about this very topic and I knew it was directed torwards me. Just because I looked professional, she didn't think I needed it. People need to look beyond the "apperiences" of others and not judge by what they see. Like you I also get upset at the people that abuse the system, yet there are people that are being judged harshly by the actions of what is actually a select few.

I think you need to educate yourself about WIC. It isn't just the dirt poor that qualify for it. You can work and still be eligible. It is not the same as welfare.

WIC is just plain corn flakes, slice cheese, milk, and baby products stuff like that. Anyways, what does WIC have to do with her clothes....I think you may be thinking of CHILD SUPPORT because I know exactly what you mean, plenty of young girls getting pregnant for a check and its despicable but I guess when your poor and can only afford a 6/minimum job a check looks for appealing.

Hello blogging2, I do agree with you there it is just as bad here in the U.K i see people on welfare with flash cars you name it they got and also they can go on their annual holiday, but i can't so how do they do it? Tamarafireheart.

Yes it makes me mad too! I get tired of seeing people milk the system. However....I feel that there are times when people really do need a little assistance, and they should receive. For a short time. I think there should be a limit, say six months. When that time is up, if they haven't been able to come up with a way to better their situation, then they should either be cut off or receive a deduction in benefits. Depending on the situation. I work with a girl who has a nice house w/ inground pool, she drives a Mustang, she's always taking vacations, she & her husband both drive a Harley, and she received medical assistance for both her kids!!!!! WHAT IN THE HELL???? It's just not right.

uhh i hate it in a way because it is taken adavantage of really badlyand while she seemsas if she was taking advantage of it with name brand etc while we have to work for it and others that have welfare get it easy i think they should change their rules a bit

I poersonaly dont agree with welfare myself. My thing is I have to go to work everyday and work my butt off just so other people on welfare get to live and eat for free. I believe that if you dont work then you dont eat. Thats just me. I know that times are ruff and it is hard to find a job but everyone is going through it I am. I am working a full time job makeing decent money and still have trouble sometimes makeing bills meet. Sometimes I do without for a while. I makes me mad big time when I and everyone else have to go and work for a living just to make it ourselfs.

100% agree here. I have actually started writing a story I hope to get published somewhere on this very thought. We have Senior citizens who are on Medicare, and most of them worked all of their lives to get that who have to pay big time for Medical, food, etc. and most just barely get by, and then we have the people on Welfare, etc. who they just hand everything too, and never expect anything back from them as well. Personally, why do some States continue to help out young Single moms with $$, etc. and never help out those who work with kids? I will admit I struggle sometimes financially without kids with things with 2 people working, but nothing like those of you with kids. I personally would rather see my $$ helping out people with kids who are working, or trying to work, and keep from getting benefits more than those who never want to work, and just want to live off the system. Personally the reason the US is having a lot of the problems like they are, is they offer help only if you have nothing, and then never require anything more of you from there. No wonder they have it better than most of us that work.