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Have you every received some form government assistance?

Have you ever received governmrnt assistance?

  • Yes

    Votes: 43 65.2%

  • No

    Votes: 19 28.8%

  • My parents did on my behalf when I was a kid

    Votes: 4 6.1%
  • Total voters
    66
I've received a Pell Grant and the Smart Grant (a special grant for science majors who had high GPAs and qualified for Pell). Both helped me out until the reforms eliminated the Smart Grant and shrank my Pell grant by about 75% with no change in my income.

Now that I'm in graduate school I can't qualify anyway :lol: Instead, the government will receive my assistance with the $60,000 of interest I'll pay over the course of my student loan repayment plan.
 
Financial aid has done me so much good in paying for college.

Pell Grant ftw.
 
Cephus said:
No matter liberalism is so screwed up.

No, I just expect people to be responsible. You don't.
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Then you don't understand my argument. I expect people to be responsible when they are in a situation where they are capable of doing so. Social spending, the majority of the time, given that the majority of people on welfare are only on it temporarily, use it as a hand up. There is nothing wrong with that and its something that makes me proud of in this country.
 
ttwtt78640 said:
The intent of public assistance should be to break the "cycle of poverty" not to simply make it more comfortable to loaf along requiring that the taxpayer (productive?) forever support the non-productive.
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I would agree with this with three caveats

1. this is the proper intent of all assistance, private, public, whathaveyou
2. the government is atrocious at this, as it is at most things involving case-by-case discernment
3. the government is often unwilling to do this as it does not align with individual political incentives


That's why I more and more like Friedman's idea of the NIT - you get the aid to those that need, while removing or heavily mitigating incentives to engage in self-destructive behavior.
 
megaprogman said:
Then you don't understand my argument. I expect people to be responsible when they are in a situation where they are capable of doing so. Social spending, the majority of the time, given that the majority of people on welfare are only on it temporarily, use it as a hand up. There is nothing wrong with that and its something that makes me proud of in this country.
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and again I am afraid you are projecting. with the probable exception of Pell Grants - the surest sign that one will end up on welfare is whether or not ones mother was on welfare.
 
Yup, twice. I receive a Pell Grant for college.

I was also on state medical care in Minnesota for about 2 months. I wouldn't have signed up for it at my age and health status, but I got injured at a very bad time between jobs and while moving, and it was either something very serious, or something not so serious. Risking it could have had major consequences. So I signed up for state insurance and got off it as soon as it was confirmed to not be serious.

In Minnesota, state insurance works 3 months retroactively. So, I was able to go the ER immediately and have that bill covered.
 
Certainly. All throughout my life.
 
megaprogman said:
Then you don't understand my argument. I expect people to be responsible when they are in a situation where they are capable of doing so. Social spending, the majority of the time, given that the majority of people on welfare are only on it temporarily, use it as a hand up. There is nothing wrong with that and its something that makes me proud of in this country.
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Everyone is capable of being responsible in *ALL* situations. You are right, there may be times when, due to circumstances beyond one's control, they find themselves in a temporary position where they need help and I'm entirely fine with that. However, in so many cases, it's not beyond one's control, it's because people acted irresponsibly in the first place that they get into those situations. That's what I oppose.
 
Cephus said:
Everyone is capable of being responsible in *ALL* situations. You are right, there may be times when, due to circumstances beyond one's control, they find themselves in a temporary position where they need help and I'm entirely fine with that. However, in so many cases, it's not beyond one's control, it's because people acted irresponsibly in the first place that they get into those situations. That's what I oppose.
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Nice fairy tale you live in there.
 
cpwill said:
and again I am afraid you are projecting. with the probable exception of Pell Grants - the surest sign that one will end up on welfare is whether or not ones mother was on welfare.
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My mother was on welfare at one time and now she is quite wealthy :shrug:
 
megaprogman said:
Nice fairy tale you live in there.
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not a fairy tale at all. Most folks who are and remain poor do so because of their own bad decision-making; especially in the realm of family-formation.
 
cpwill said:
and this demonstrates.......?
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That people on welfare aren't always lazy, or want to remain on welfare, or want to be a burden to others, or are not motivated, etc etc.
 
cpwill said:
not a fairy tale at all. Most folks who are and remain poor do so because of their own bad decision-making; especially in the realm of family-formation.
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And how would you know how people come to be on welfare?
 
zstep18 said:
And how would you know how people come to be on welfare?
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Pew Research did a study a while back on what causes people to fall out of the middle class and into poverty. Their "Top Five" were:

1. Divorce
2. Failure to Marry (as in, the parent of your children)
3. Heroin or other 'hard drug' usage
4. Failure to graduate high school (compared to high school graduates)
5. Failure to graduate high school (compared to college graduates)


Generally speaking, the evidence repeatedly demonstrates that if you:

1. Graduate high school
2. Wait until you are married to have children
3. Stay married and
4. Work full time

you are statistically very unlikely to fall into (or, if you ever do, remain in) poverty.

:shrug: but if mega wants to play the anecdote game, I've got a couple from my family as well.
 
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zstep18 said:
That people on welfare aren't always lazy, or want to remain on welfare, or want to be a burden to others, or are not motivated, etc etc.
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no it doesn't. It claims (though mega is an honorable man and I believe him) that a single woman got off welfare and later did well for herself. anecdotal evidence is only useful when it provides depth to statistical demonstration - absent the stats (which are damming), mega's claim is no more or less pertinent to this debate than Ronald Reagan's welfare queen.
 
My mother. through no fault of her own found herself in a financial crisis with three children at the age of 26. She did what she had to do and applied for government assistance. Not content with being a career welfare recipient, she also enrolled in college full-time and got her 4 year degree in 3 years. She recently retired after decades of service as a public school teacher. One former student went on to become Lt. Governor.
 
There are a lot of sucess stories about people who have received government aid. President Rooselvelt's job programs have paid huge dividends to America. The Hoover dam is only one example. There are many others.

Unfortunately, some people have tried to stigmatize these programs for political gains.

Who can not remember "welfare Cadillac?
 
I have medicare but I have paid more for it than I have received. I am talking about the $100+ per month that they deduct from my social security check.

I have always been blessed with god health.
 
cpwill said:
Pew Research did a study a while back on what causes people to fall out of the middle class and into poverty. Their "Top Five" were: 1. Divorce 2. Failure to Marry (as in, the parent of your children) 3. Heroin or other 'hard drug' usage 4. Failure to graduate high school (compared to high school graduates) 5. Failure to graduate high school (compared to college graduates) Generally speaking, the evidence repeatedly demonstrates that if you: 1. Graduate high school 2. Wait until you are married to have children 3. Stay married and 4. Work full time you are statistically very unlikely to fall into (or, if you ever do, remain in) poverty. :shrug: but if mega wants to play the anecdote game, I've got a couple from my family as well.
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I'm sure all of that is true, no question. #4 is getting more and more difficult to accomplish in today's America, unfortunately. That is the one that needs to be made more readily available. The others are lifestyle choices. People who make those choices need to live with the results.
 
Smeagol said:
Yeah, but SS and and Medicare are different IMHO because its specifically for something we're our retirement days. That's unlike the others where not everybody gets paid back in a specific form.
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Today, most will get more than they paid into it.

Now, when my father left, leaving my mother in quite a perdiciment, she did go on welfare until she learned a skill and got a job. After that, there was no more.
 
Boo Radley said:
Today, most will get more than they paid into it.

Now, when my father left, leaving my mother in quite a perdiciment, she did go on welfare until she learned a skill and got a job. After that, there was no more.
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A great argument for private investment accounts. In the world of investing, the amount put in over time would have grown due to compounding rates of return that would have been automatically reinvented into the account. In a generation we could have a nation of millionaires but democrats scare the heck out of the elderly making them think they'll be forsaken keeping a system on the path to failure in place.
 
Dittohead not! said:
I'm sure all of that is true, no question. #4 is getting more and more difficult to accomplish in today's America, unfortunately. That is the one that needs to be made more readily available. The others are lifestyle choices. People who make those choices need to live with the results.
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You think it's getting more and more difficult to graduate from high school? Seems to me like they just give out diplomas like toilet paper nowadays, to kids who can't even pass basic competency tests, or... read. And how is not graduating from high school not a lifestyle choice?
 
NitroHangover said:
You think it's getting more and more difficult to graduate from high school? Seems to me like they just give out diplomas like toilet paper nowadays, to kids who can't even pass basic competency tests, or... read. And how is not graduating from high school not a lifestyle choice?
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How can anyone fail hs in the age of computers. When I was a hs student I would do library research that took hours that now takes only minutes? It's scary to me what we might become in this great nation.
 
megaprogman said:
Nice fairy tale you live in there.
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Yet it's the reality I, and many others live. We didn't drop out of school, we didn't get on drugs, we didn't breed out of wedlock, in fact, we didn't breed until we were married and financially well off enough to handle it, we didn't breed more than we could afford, we never lived beyond our means and we saved a ton of money. Even when times were bad, we had enough reserves to ride it out.

That's being responsible. Sorry so few people are able to do it.
 
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