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Who the hell are you to determine how much someone truly needs? Damn greedy liberals. Can't handle their own financial house but think they know how to handle other peoples finances.
Voters effectively set minimum levels for how much someone truly needs. e.g. people could live on next to nothing if they could live in a tent, but we make that illegal and require that people live in 'adequate' housing which meets middle class standards and codes.
Turns out that the median renter housing cost is about equal to the median homeowner housing cost - i.e. renters need as much income as homeowners to afford housing. Government could reduce regulations and allow housing costs to be scalable to income, but protectionist NIMBY homeowners won't allow it.
We have a lot of angry people building strawmen in ths thread.
Less than 4% of the population is on welfare. If you include food stamps, welfare spending jumps to 50 million people and just over $500 billion per year (non-snap welfare is $131 billion).
So why is food stamp usage so high?
Corporations are the biggest receivers of welfare. We pity them at the expense of pay our citizens a livable wage. We have millions of folks on food stamps because they aren't earning enough to live. Corporate welfare is a far bigger problem in this country than public welfare. Create a strawman thread about that.
Also, welfare spending is on the rapid decline since 2010. Welfare spending mirrors the unemployment rate (for obvious reasons).
Food stamp eligibility is based on "excess shelter costs". Specifically, the eligibility formula is based on "after-tax income minus the sum of out of pocket shelter costs (rent/mortgage plus utilities) and out-of-pocket medical costs)".
The fact that NIMBY protectionist homeowners use local government to create shortages of housing affordable at low incomes drives high rents, which in turn drive eligibility for food stamps. A dollar spent on inflated rent cannot be spent on food, which is why food stamps exist.
Why is it considered hatred to want to encourage the poor to become more productive and self-reliant?
One great way to do that is to allow more options for property ownership. Just as middle class Americans buy starter homes and proceed to move up financially, if it were easier for the poor to get on that first rung of the property ladder, they would move up as well.
Why is it considered hatred to want to encourage the poor to become more productive and self-reliant?
Matter of perception. Some people say that tax breaks for homeowners "encourage the poor to become more productive and self-reliant". I see tax breaks for homeowners as kicking involuntary renters (those who would prefer to own a home but are financially unable to do so) when they're down.
The poverty rate according to "federal bureaucrats." These numbers seem reasonable. Not many people, even in low cost of living states/cities can live normally with these incomes below.
for additional households/families with more than 8 persons, add $4,160 for each additional person
While government poverty standards use income as a "one size fits all" metric, individuals get varying value for their consumer dollar. (What, for apparent lack of an existing term, I call 'market basket inequality'.)
For example, where I live, the official "poverty guidelines" income would not pay the cost of renting a median 1BR apartment. However, an adult burger flipper earning the same amount could live well if they could get free room and board with parents.
Precisely because 'all politics is local', NIMBY protectionist homeowners often use local government to make housing markets unfree, with 'supply and density control' (zoning) and shortages of housing affordable to low earners.
Where I live, zoning prohibits multifamily housing in 2/3 of the city - a major reason rents and real estate prices are soaring.
If it were not for the American voter, one could pitch a tent and live for next to nothing.
Just give up and move to Brazil already and live in your dream shantytown. No one in the US wants to live in your idea of paradise in a shack and definitely not near it.
Just give up and move to Brazil already and live in your dream shantytown. No one in the US wants to live in your idea of paradise in a shack and definitely not near it.
Just leave, here's what your ideas become:
Brazil's President Rousseff should have worried about the economy and jobs instead of climate change. She was impeached for corruption.
Presidents Obama and Dilma Rousseff commit to intensify collaboration between the United States and Brazil, both bilaterally and under the United Nations as our countries work to address the challenges posed by climate change. Dilma Rousseff Is Ousted as Brazil’s President in Impeachment Vote
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