You have a point, Cheesey. As economists point out, if you give people the opportunity to make as much doing nothing as they would in a dead-end job, you're simply guaranteeing they'll remain unemployed.
Now, in the interests of full disclosure, I should add (with much embarrassment) that I am on virtually every "assistance program" known to man. But that's because I'm married, in school, to a wife who's also in school, with kids who must (sadly) be placed in daycare during school and work hours.
I was raised to be fiercely suspicious of government handouts, so I was dead-set against taking assistance, but my wife pointed out that it was either that or teeter on bankruptcy while we are in school, which wouldn't be fair to the children. She soothed my conscience by showing me that when I get a job (I'm a premed student), I'll pay back every penny I've borrowed from the taxpayers in two or three years max. Plus I'm in Wisconsin, a state in which I have to hold down a job in order to receive any assistance whatsoever.
So that makes it a little easier to handle.
"Nonstopdrivel" wrote: