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I would hope not but I've heard of welfare types buying cheap soft drinks because the food stamps pays for the can or bottle deposit, then they pour out the drinks to get the cash refunds on the cans. Then they can buy cigarettes or beer.
Any system that allows people to choose never to work but lay around expecting free money and free stuff is going to be abused.
I have never heard of people doing this. Sounds like a lot of work to me.
You seem to be under the assumption that NOBODY who gets food stamps is working. That's not true. Most people on food stamps ARE working and just not making enough to fully support their families. Some can only find part time jobs and some are working minimum wage, etc.. They don't need to buy stuff, empty and turn in the empties for money.
IF employers would pay living wages, welfare would be restricted to those who can no longer help themselves, be it by old or truly disabled. Until then stop wondering at this, what do you expect?
I'm curious...just exactly what IS a "living wage". Is it $10 hour? Is it $30?? I dunno. I keep seeing people talk about it but nobody ever gives any numbers. Seems to me it would be based on individual needs rather than an across the board thing. I don't make a lot per hour and only work part time but I'm able to live pretty well. I do, of course, have my small SS check which helps but that is chunked into savings. So my case is a little different than it would be for a family. I don't envy families these days, at all. Fortunately my kids and grkids are doing pretty well too and not one of them has ever needed welfare/food stamps. But if they did they would be responsible with it.
[quote=markg91359;27040217]Walmart notes returns and you only get to do a couple without a receipt. After that the computer tells them this is your third return or whatever in a year and they become much more questioning and treat what you're doing with a bit of suspicion. Based on what I've seen, I think your story is BS.
Years ago, some of my legal practice involved collections law. Some of the poor, used to write bad checks and that was a problem. You know what? They can't do it anymore. Few merchants will take checks. Abuses that poor people commit are being dealt with.
Like some others here, I do think some people are unduly fixated on the poor. Well-to-do people abuse this system in far worse ways. No one ever seems to argue that the well-to-do ought to be "means-tested" before they claim Medicare benefits. A certain presidential candidate receives 48% of the popular vote after bragging about paying a meager 14% tax rate on $10 million of income in one year. We have wealthy farmers and agri-business who receive huge subsidies NOT to grow crops every year. We even give subsidies to tobacco farmers. Than there are the "banksters" who got billions of dollars in loans from this country to keep their institutions on their feet after making hordes of bad financial decisions.
Many people abuse this system. Please don't just "cherry pick" and stereotype the ones you don't like.[/quote]
Good advice! There are so many types of abuse in the world but people DO "cherry pick" and most don't even know the truth/whole story.
We had an incident at our store not long ago. We had an ex employee and her 'little gang' coming into the store late at night, just walking out with stuff and returning it the next week or so. That's what happens when they take people off the doors! Anyway, after a couple of transactions at customer service the antenna went up and they got busted.
What I can't figure out is if the many people who rant about other people being the recipients of various types of public assistance think that it is such a great gig they don't just quit their jobs and go on the dole themselves.
Are they saying that huge numbers undeserving people are smart enough to scam the system but they are not?
I may be operating under a false belief here but isn't the EBT card the same as "food stamps"?
The carts of returned or refused merchandise that I see at Walmart usually consist of clothing, household goods, toys etc. I don't believe I've ever seen a return cart piled high with food items. And purchasing a food item and running over to Customer Service to return it would certainly raise some questions, wouldn't you think?
For the record, I'm not on welfare and believe it or not, I have never noticed what the people ahead of me in the check-out line are using to pay for their items. I'm too busy hoping I have enough money to pay for my own!
I worked all my life. My sons are all employed as are their wives. I feel sorry for people who have to live on public assistance through no fault of their own. I also feel sorry for the Judgie McJudgers who seem to take personal offense in the presence of the indigent.
I may be operating under a false belief here but isn't the EBT card the same as "food stamps"?
The carts of returned or refused merchandise that I see at Walmart usually consist of clothing, household goods, toys etc. I don't believe I've ever seen a return cart piled high with food items. And purchasing a food item and running over to Customer Service to return it would certainly raise some questions, wouldn't you think?
For the record, I'm not on welfare and believe it or not, I have never noticed what the people ahead of me in the check-out line are using to pay for their items. I'm too busy hoping I have enough money to pay for my own!
I worked all my life. My sons are all employed as are their wives. I feel sorry for people who have to live on public assistance through no fault of their own. I also feel sorry for the Judgie McJudgers who seem to take personal offense in the presence of the indigent.
^^^ Nailed it, food items ONLY can be purchased with food stamps or EBT cards.
My wife’s elderly aunt (93yrs old) is living by herself in a home she owns. Her only source of income is SSA and a small pension check of $100 bucks from when she worked in a meat packing company. A social worker visits her every month to do a checkup on her condition. The social worker said, “You’re income is too low” and you should be getting food stamps. She applied for this government entitlement for the aunt who is now getting $16 a month ~ YES $16 a month in food stamps. I sure hope these entitlements are not busting the government. $16 a month = a loaf of bread a carton of milk, and a can of spam each month. Could this be welfare fraud?
Look at the job fields that are the worst paid, and where workers put in the most amount of work (usually physical). Retail, Food industries are the worst paid IMO; then you have to consider say graphic designers who have 4 years of college, and instead of making over $30k which is listed as minimum in most states, they are offered less than $15/Hr, and usually $10 an hour in Florida. Why should a graphic designer make $9 in Florida and $50 in NYC to do the same job???
THEN.....Take into account families...families with both parents working, and families with one parent working cause the other can't find a job that pays enough to JUSTIFY going to work in the first place, because at $7 an hour I can't afford gas, food, daycare and supplies, clothes and shoes and toilet paper.....
See the problem, the way I see it, is that employers don't look at prices much these days...so they don't know what it is like to afford milk at $4 a gallon when paid $7, 8, 9, 10 an hour...or $5,69 for lactose free which some of us are doomed too........they pay the employees for supposedly "what they're worth" to them personally, and NOT based on the persons qualifications be it customer service, or Photoshop, or TurboTax, which is insulting because ALL 4 year degree'd graphic designers learned the same thing...and end up paying them wages with disregard to what THINGS COST! Of course if I was a freshly graduated person living at home with my parents, I could care less about my wages, but this mind set needs to change, because someone that is a recent graduate has acquired a SKILL SET, that skill set needs to be paid accordingly and not whatever "X" employer feels like because "X" employer thinks he can buy Photoshop and do it himself", if that were the case, then do it, and don't be insulting to MY education and what I am qualified to do. They say how a bachelor/master degree is an investment, but in fact it isn't because we never get our money back in the work world. Not even close. People have to post pone buying homes, and having families BECAUSE they can't get rid of loans fast enough at these ridiculous insulting wages.
Then, you might have a mom with 3 kids who recently graduated the same 4 year college with the same bachelor's in Graphic Design and she needs a job that will not only pay for food, but also pay her loans back, and save for college for her kids, or incidentals, and buy food, and pay for daycare....now if ALL employers would pay the same $25/Hr for this graphic designer job, and not choose the recent graduate that they can screw out of money under the "has no experience, he's young, blah, blah, crap", then both these categories would be able to survive without welfare. But that's not what happens now. If you post a job for something, that means you don't know how to do it yourself, and you need me, if you want me, you have to consider that I eat, drink, need a home, (buy or rent), I need gas to get to work, and clothes...if you take all that out of the account you get angry people roaming all over, and employers get a bad reputation, which today, i don't think it can get any worst...IMO.
BUT, If milk was $2 a gallon, everywhere in the "United State of A" (emphasis on the UNITED), then everyone could afford it...same goes for gas, bread, corn flakes, cars, houses and so forth...but you have a HUGE disconnect in pricing versus wages and vice versa which leads people straight to welfare!
Why should the SAME gallon of milk cost $4 in Florida and $7 in NYC! (giving an example)?
why does a Chevy Tahoe cost differently, it is the SAME CAR, same milk from the same cow.....here's a paradox..."Florida's Orange Juice" is not coming to Floridians from Florida directly as it should be, it has to go to INDIANA(God knows why) BEFORE it returns to Florida at double the price it should cost. WHY? waste gas to take it to Indiana, when you can process it here, and use a train=electric, to transport it through the state? why use tractor trailer trucks to take things all over when trains can do it without polluting this world, and are cheaper to operate as they don't depend on foreign oil?
There are a lot of things wasted here that end up increasing the cost to the consumer...stop that, and then you may make a small change...
OR: When advertising minimum wage jobs RESTRICT them to teens living at home with parents; that way that little they make can go towards their college education, and make all these retail/food chain jobs for them ONLY. They don't have families to support, so it could work for them in that circumstance, but when you have employees working at Target for 10 years and in ten years they still make $8 an hour...what do you expect? those people want a house too, and a family, and so forth...why should they be screwed out of it?
It is a catch for sure...but it all falls back to understanding the JOB itself, and its implications, and not assuming that checking items out is easier than playing around in Word all day, cause its not.
I would give employers the $7 an hour, and see how they like it!
Quote:
Originally Posted by AZDesertBrat
I'm curious...just exactly what IS a "living wage". Is it $10 hour? Is it $30?? I dunno. I keep seeing people talk about it but nobody ever gives any numbers. Seems to me it would be based on individual needs rather than an across the board thing. I don't make a lot per hour and only work part time but I'm able to live pretty well. I do, of course, have my small SS check which helps but that is chunked into savings. So my case is a little different than it would be for a family. I don't envy families these days, at all. Fortunately my kids and grkids are doing pretty well too and not one of them has ever needed welfare/food stamps. But if they did they would be responsible with it.
IF employers would pay living wages, welfare would be restricted to those who can no longer help themselves, be it by old or truly disabled. Until then stop wondering at this, what do you expect?
Don't we all wish this were true. However, if our American employers did indeed begin to pay living wages, they would then have to increase the consumer cost of the products and services they offer - and American's are cheap. We don't want to pay high prices. We demand low prices - it's why places like Walmart and CostCo and Amazon.com are the successful giants that they are. Which is why so many of our jobs have gone overseas to begin with - cheap labor=lower prices that American's are willing to pay.
And ultimately, regardless of how many jobs are available out there and how much employers are willing to pay, there will always be those who refuse to play by the rules. There will always be people looking for freebies.
I don't see a solution, really, aside from becoming better parents and taking it upon ourselves to ensure we raise good, ethically-minded, hard-working, educated human beings. As long as we have American parents raising future generations of Americans in such a way that makes them feel entitled to things for doing little to no real work for those things, we will have a broken welfare system.
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