Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Well, as I said, the program would be MANDATORY -- but the problem would be (as I also said at the end of my post,) what would happen to those who just blew their Social Security payout (at age 65 or whatever) and then were left with nothing? Therefore, leaving us with the same problem as we have now -- what to do with those people who are left destitute and homeless, with no family able and willing to take them in.
That, I think is the problem we have and will continue to have -- and why federal, state and local governments might be forced to either keep "throwing money" at the problem or else be faced with some very harsh choices that I think very few people would want to even consider.
And the other thing here...what if a struggling senior does have family, but the family is already strained?
I'm personally in the position of being the most stable and secure (financially) person in most of my family. I have numerous relatives who constantly want my help. For some of them, there really is not much they could be doing better to support themselves at this point. And there's no time machine to go back and change their previous decisions. My Mom gave up her big career plans to go care for her elderly parents so they would not end up in a home. She does not get much from Social Security but between that and other welfare programs, she survives in a cheap part of the country. If she didn't even have that, she'd be my problem, I guess, or I'd have to just tell her "tough crap" and let her die? And if I took on her care, it would deplete my own resources to provide for myself in my old age...could I then count on my sons to care for me? Right now they are both very dysfunctional young adults.
Like even if one person does everything they can to be responsible and get their house in order, when you have multiple other family members counting on you, like if they had no other resources to turn to, I don't have enough to provide for ALL. THESE. PEOPLE.
And yeah, some of them have no one.
So for me, government programs to help people who are in hardship...I don't see it as who deserves this or who earned that or such a strictly individualistic thing. I see it as "what kind of society do I want to live in?" Aggregated funds to provide basic survival help for those who really struggle, helps for those of us who are functional to actually try to have secure lives and not burden others in the future. ONE dysfunctional relative, let alone several, is enough to drain me far, far more than my personal tax burden to pitch in to help many. I don't need to fight for my freedom to be a cold hearted sociopath and help no one ever. And I don't much want to live in a nation where the very wealthy are walled off in compounds and the masses are starving in shack cities built out of trash, which is a thing that does exist.
And I actually believe that most people want to work, want to lead purposeful lives, and want to earn more than just basic poverty level survival. If someone who is for some reason not capable of providing the basics to survive, for themselves, gets it...whether they spent their lives paying in or not for those "entitlements"...I'm not going to be mad because I didn't get a share of "freebies," I'm going to be thankful that I've got the means and ability to provide better than just the minimum for myself. Could see it as compassion, or just as wanting to be able to live in a city that's not full of desperate people in tents on the sidewalk. Either way...I just think that we can do better for our people, and attempts by government entities to do so, don't perturb me. I DO want accountability for use of funds, though, and a serious effort to cut out grifting middlemen. That includes not just government, but also charities.
... "The report says that in 2021, federal housing assistance like Section 8 or Section 202 — which provides housing with supportive services such as cleaning, cooking and transportation for older people — was only sufficient for a little more than a third of the 5.9 million renters ages 62 and over who were eligible."
The article is from the AP, which of course is not an unbiased peer-reviewed scholarly source.
The title of the article speaks volumes:
"STUDY SAYS THE US IS ILL-PREPARED TO ENSURE HOUSING FOR THE GROWING NUMBER OF OLDER PEOPLE"
It isn't the job of the federal government to "ensure housing for the growing number of older people." Now-elderly people have had a lifetime to save & invest & accumulate sufficient assets such that they are not a burden on society in their golden years. Most elderly people successfully did so. A handful did not for any number of reasons ranging from the confluence of several supremely bad luck events to character flaws evidenced by unconstrained spending & debt accumulation - and everything in between.
We are a compassionate people with a long history of philanthropy and caring for those less fortunate than ourselves, but it is dangerous to extend that to some notion that it is the job of the federal government to care for us cradle-to-grave.
Elementary school students should have an assignment to hand write on a white board 100 times:
"It is not the job of the government to take care of me."
Learning early on that each of us is responsible for our own economic futures is the best way to ensure most everyone reaches their golden years well prepared.
This isn't the fault of teachers, it's parents that don't care. It's the prevailing attitude in this country that education doesn't matter, and stupid is good. Are there bad teachers? Of course, just like any other job, you have the good and the bad.
And, whether people like to think so or not, the disparities in education, just like everything else, is enormous between the haves and have nots.
There is much truth to what you say. And yes, there are terrible schools out there - the high school from which I graduated was one of them. There were 660 in my graduating class, of which 12 of us went on to college or junior college. Twelve out of 660. It was the 2nd from the bottom that year in California. In fact, I've endowed a scholarship that can be claimed by any graduate of that high school who decides to attend the college I attended. Of course, they have to earn admittance. So far, no one has claimed the scholarship.
It seems to me in reading the above posts #311 and #312 that both of you are very conflicted as to what should be done for destitute seniors (or anyone, for that matter). If I am correct in this, I can certainly understand why you are conflicted, as I share your thoughts/opinions on this.
So if you were in the position of making the decision as to whether to continue to spend billions (maybe even trillions) on the homeless or make some very harsh decisions, what would you do? And ifyour answer is to make one or more very harsh decisions, what kind of measures would you support, or at least consider supporting?
(Actually, I would ask this question of everyone who doesn't think it is the job of government to take care of the poor. And, for myself -- well, all I can say is that I am very glad that it is NOT up to me to decide!)
Last edited by katharsis; 11-30-2023 at 11:46 AM..
I think that is the main topic. It lends itself toward a more general discussion of homeless solutions, but that includes the subset of senior homeless. We have this situation, now what to do with it?
Let me digress a bit. Sorry this is a bit long.
Here is an anecdote from my undergraduate college years that bears on the problem. One math professor was extremely tough. For each of the mid-term exams and the final exam, everything was structured as follows:
A week prior to the in-class exam, the professor would hand out a take-home exam due on the day of the in-class exam. The idea was the take-home exam would help prepare you to take the in-class exam (mid-terms or final).
Each test - take home or in-class - consisted of 5 problems, one of which was a problem the student could not solve. But the student did not know which of the 5 problems was unsolvable. When you first read the problems, all of them seemed unsolvable - but 4 of the 5 could be solved by a combination of insight and work. You just didn't know ahead of time if any given problem was one of the 4 solvable or the lone unsolvable problem.
You turned in the take-home test, and then you were given the in-class exam (again, 5 problems but one of which couldn't be solved)
Routinely, students would put 80-100 hours into that take-home test. Each was brutal. I'd go the the Mathematics Library, scoop up a shelf of books and start flipping the pages looking for something - anything - to give me a clue on how to start to solve a problem. These were brutal.
The professor drilled into us that it was important to know what we couldn't solve as well as what we could solve.
The professor even gave the story of teaching gifted middle-school students at the local public school. Again, he gave them 5 take home questions, one of which they couldn't solve with their understanding of mathematics. He told us the story of one unsolvable (for them) problem: determine the volume of a solid bounded by a set of grungy equations. Of course, none of the middle school students had taken calculus, and hence none could analytically solve the problem. One particularly precocious student had done a crude approximation: he figured out how to cut a plane through the solid at 1/4 inch intervals, made a physical Paper Mache model, waterproofed it, submerged it in a tub of water to determine how much water was displaced.
You have to imagine Snidely Whiplash from the Rocky & Bullwinkle show, twirling his mustache - that is the image of this mathematics professor as he told us college students "that middle-school kid was really creative. I gave him a 'B' ".
You have to know what you problems you can solve, and more importantly, you have to know what problems you cannot solve.
"The failure for incompetence," the professor used to say, "is eternal calculation."
The problem of what to do about the elderly homeless may well be unsolvable. The solution needed to have been implemented 40 years prior. By the time someone is in their 60s or 70s or 80s or 90s, it is too late to do anything at all. That person needed to have prepared for the worst when they were in their 20s and 30s and 40s and 50s.
^^ Thanks for the above. I do not think there is any good solution to what is being discussed in this thread, but maybe there will be some kind of major disaster, either natural or manmade, and then it will be more acceptable for everyone to put themselves first -- and then after the recovery and civilization has reestablished itself, maybe the people of the 22nd century will learn from the mistakes of the past centuries. (I doubt it, but at least I can hope for the sake of future generations.)
Sonic Spork, people make a big mistake when they give up working to keep parents out of a nursing home. If they can’t care for them after work they need to go to a home. People have to think about their own retirements.
I helped my mom care for my dad but I was raising my kids and going to college so it didn’t interfere. I would fly home and use my vacation and sick leave to help my mom but never considered giving up my job. Often they inherit the family paid off home but then can’t afford to maintain it. I have seen some pretty bad situations.
Sonic Spork, people make a big mistake when they give up working to keep parents out of a nursing home. If they can’t care for them after work they need to go to a home. People have to think about their own retirements.
I helped my mom care for my dad but I was raising my kids and going to college so it didn’t interfere. I would fly home and use my vacation and sick leave to help my mom but never considered giving up my job. Often they inherit the family paid off home but then can’t afford to maintain it. I have seen some pretty bad situations.
I think you should have said SOME people make a big mistake when they give up working to keep parents out of a nursing home.
I did that over 20 years ago. I know several others that did the same. We are doing fine.
Now you can't do that if you are poor or close to it or if the parents are poor and mortgaged, but typical SINGLE middle-class people are able to do it. It does take money. I spent quite a bit of money for home health aides since I wasn't about to bathe my parents.
I would have had a larger pension and SS but I'm fine without regrets.
It seems to me in reading the above posts #311 and #312 that both of you are very conflicted as to what should be done for destitute seniors (or anyone, for that matter). If I am correct in this, I can certainly understand why you are conflicted, as I share your thoughts/opinions on this.
So if you were in the position of making the decision as to whether to continue to spend billions (maybe even trillions) on the homeless or make some very harsh decisions, what would you do? And ifyour answer is to make one or more very harsh decisions, what kind of measures would you support, or at least consider supporting?
(Actually, I would ask this question of everyone who doesn't think it is the job of government to take care of the poor. And, for myself -- well, all I can say is that I am very glad that it is NOT up to me to decide!)
My thoughts on what would work best are informed by my own experience of being in poverty in my young adulthood (what I needed versus what I was able to get, and from whom) and knowing a lot of people who have a spectrum of various issues.
I do not believe that there is any call whatsoever to withhold help for people to have basic survival necessities, nor to heap shame or punishment or further hardship on them. But I want efficiency in how aid is rendered. So, as I said, first of all full independent audits and transparent reports on how money is spent, that outlines real results. No more dumping heaps of cash on contractor companies that are supposed to solve a problem and then BS'ing the public about what they are providing. People have no idea at all how horrible a lot of the "services" for the poor and destitute really are in practice, they get away with fundraising off a "mission statement" when the reality of the program is a nightmare, many of these agencies that get government funds. Less grift, more accountability.
And then the nature of the programs themselves - should be focused and targeted not only based on "need" in terms of basic qualification for a package of whatever, but the question has to be asked and answered...precisely what is the need, can it be temporary or must it be permanent? A lot of people out there do not need an entire benefits bundle, they need help with one specific thing...like transportation to medical appointments for instance...but the way things stand you either qualify for a bunch of things or for nothing at all.
I don't think that normal people need a gun to our heads to be responsible, nor that those who find themselves unprepared for what they need in old age were just lazy or "poor decision makers" who should be punished for that. And I mean, really, so what if they did make poor decisions that led to their outcome? That they "should have" seen coming, but for some reason didn't? What does punishing them now accomplish, exactly? Again, it's not like anybody can go back in time and educate their younger self or correct those past mistakes.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Teacher Terry
Sonic Spork, people make a big mistake when they give up working to keep parents out of a nursing home. If they can’t care for them after work they need to go to a home. People have to think about their own retirements.
I helped my mom care for my dad but I was raising my kids and going to college so it didn’t interfere. I would fly home and use my vacation and sick leave to help my mom but never considered giving up my job. Often they inherit the family paid off home but then can’t afford to maintain it. I have seen some pretty bad situations.
My grandparents refused to go into a home. My grandfather was at times abusive. My grandma was a lifelong manipulator, too. Grandma called my Mom and said, "you have to come help me, I'm at his mercy in this house!" So my Mom left her life behind and went to help them, and she thought it would only be perhaps a few years, tops. It was over a decade. And by the time it was over, she was in her 60s. With a bunch of education but no real experience in her field and too late to get it.
But she thought, at the time, that she was doing the right thing, indeed, the only thing that she could do.
Neither of her parents had dementia. She could not have had them placed in a home against their will, without a legal battle to get guardianship. It's not always so simple.
Right now I'm providing a huge amount of assistance to both of my young adult sons. Both have struggled to "launch." One has mental health issues, pretty serious ones, but there are not "programs" to take over and provide him with what he needs. On top of that, I bought my Mom a (cheap, and very old) car this year, and I've helped out one friend in a DV situation and another who was on the brink of eviction and homelessness with her family. These are friends I've known for decades. I care about people. And of course, I know that some would tut tut at me putting resources I could be investing for my future into helping others who should have done this, or should be doing that...but I cannot hold that level of self centeredness and wave off their problems as though they chose to be in these situations, or some nebulous "program" (not my problem!) would surely help them. I know better. I know how easy it is to fall into dire straits that quickly grow beyond one's own control. I've been in hardship myself, and was grateful for every little bit of help I ever got, to climb out of it. I did it...I did do the work...but I could not have done it utterly alone.
I don't believe that any of us lives in a little bubble of our own achievements, insular from the contributions of other people in the world. The United States has been for over 60 years, the wealthiest nation on the face of the earth. I think we can have a limit somewhere on how low we permit our own citizens to fall without a net. Especially when our government sure has plenty to go around when it comes to making rich people richer.
And again, this is not even wholly altruistic of me to think this way - it also relates to what I want to see in the world around me, where I live. And it's not me jabbering about spending "other people's" money because I pay a hefty tax bill every year, myself. I could donate my money to charity instead of directly helping others, but the problem with that is how much of every dollar would go to some organizations "Administrators" and overhead and waste...versus knowing when I help other people where my dollars really go?
But that last bit is kinda the kicker though. When it comes to helping others, the best way is to directly pay for exactly what they really need, not to just throw cash at them and hope they do something sensible with it, no matter what they told you. I've learned that one the hard way as well.
^^ GREAT post!! I truly think that are are in tune with how many people think. Here are the paragraphs from the above that resonate most with me:
Quote:
So, as I said, first of all full independent audits and transparent reports on how money is spent, that outlines real results. No more dumping heaps of cash on contractor companies that are supposed to solve a problem and then BS'ing the public about what they are providing. People have no idea at all how horrible a lot of the "services" for the poor and destitute really are in practice, they get away with fundraising off a "mission statement" when the reality of the program is a nightmare, many of these agencies that get government funds. Less grift, more accountability.
Quote:
but the problem with that is how much of every dollar would go to some organizations "Administrators" and overhead and waste...versus knowing when I help other people where my dollars really go?
But that last bit is kinda the kicker though. When it comes to helping others, the best way is to directly pay for exactly what they really need, not to just throw cash at them and hope they do something sensible with it, no matter what they told you.
I truly wonder how much money the government gives to poor people actually goes TO the poor? I truly think that a middle-class accountant would do better than many of those people who are in charge of agencies.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
