Are significant numbers of working poor getting assistance turning down better paying jobs?

[Nikia]

So they can government assistance instead of making enough money through paid work.
I have wondered if many right wingers who speak negatively of people accepting assistance and think it should be cut really think this.
The jobs that may be available in a given community are usually low paying unless they require a specific education and experience. Most of those low paying jobs are either dead end or dead end to all but a small percentage of workers who take them. Many of the people holding these jobs that qualify for assistance do not have any hope of making more money.
Do poor bashers really believe that people choose to be dependent on the government when they could actually make 2 or 3 times more money somewhere else?
The problem is that businesses want to people less than is required to live on. The right wing solution of deregulating business and lowering their taxes isn't going to help though. Do right wingers actually believe that it will raise wages enough to get people off of assistance when 30 years of Reagnomics has actually proven the opposite?

[Scuba]

1. Yeah, that's why when 50 jobs open up, only 6,500 people apply for them.

[TheMastersNemesis]

2. The Job Turn Down Is A Straw Man Argument

The jobs being turned down are not worth taking because they pay less than assistance. Most jobs now have few benefits. And more and more have NO health care. And they don't pay enough for one to even get to work.

One reason for the hold out is to keep looking for the "sustenance" pay one needs. If you are trapped in a low paying job you do not have the time to get one that pays enough. You just sink lower and lower.

It is also a racist argument in the the GOP implies that the minorities are the one sitting on their butts, when that is a small minority on assistance. BTW they include the disabled, and vets as welfare slackers.

[hedgehog]

5. "And they don't pay enough for one to even get to work."

I've worked as a supervisor at places like that. The managers never figured out the connection between the pay being so low, all their employees could afford were beaters, and chronic lateness and absenteeism! Of course, siting the plant out in green space away from bus lines didn't help, either!

[Nikia]

7. The company where I work has a few temps that drive an hour to work

To make $9/hour. They receive no benefits, not even the security that they will be needed next week. If they miss a day for almost any reason, they will not be asked back.
When I was out of work for a couple of months, I had applied through one of these employment agency. I do have skills and education for certain jobs for certain companies. I was called for one interview for a job requiring my skills and paid enough that I did not get. Of the four other jobs that I was called about, one paid minimum wage, two paid $8/hour, and one paid $9/hour. They were all in my industry so I don't know if I was called preferentially over people without experience in that industry. Regardless, these agencies have plenty of people willing to work for these jobs and if there was anything else, I don't think that many people would be willing to work under these circumstances. If I had taken one of these jobs, instead of holding out, I would have deprived someone of a job who probably would not have qualified for my better paying eventual job. With one of these jobs, I would have qualified for government aid and been one of those lazy slackers, depending on the government.

[loyalsister]

11. By the time child care, transportation and lack of benefits are factored in

There are barely any earnings. It costs money to work.

[ejpoeta]

28. that's the boat i'm in. when I was working at my last job over 10 years ago

I was pregant when I started. I started out making $7/hr. I drove at least 40 minutes to get there. After I had my daughter I continued working there and paid a sitter $100/week. By the time I left there after a year and a half, I was making $7.40/hr. My insurance had gone up a lot over the length of time I worked there. I paid daycare, for gas.... I also almost hit a few trees because I was so tired. Honestly.... we were living hand to mouth and I wasn't making enough for anything. And at this point in my life it sure would cost me to work. I am a stay at home mom with 3 kids. My husband makes almost $50k/year now. Before this job he was making $200 too much for food stamps. We were on family health plus. Bob was avoiding any overtime because we were right on the edge and the health insurance through his work was high deductible and didn't cover anything. This job still has high deductible insurance, but that's what we have. We consider ourselves lucky because others are worse off. And at least bob likes his job better than the last one and his blood pressure has gone down.

[reformist2]

3. GOP wants it both ways - they say the economy is terrible *and* accuse poor of being lazy.

The two messages are completely inconsistent.

[gollygee]

4. There aren't a lot of jobs

And beyond that, there aren't a lot of full time jobs that pay enough to live without food stamps and have benefits.

A lot of people are out of work. That's why a lot of people are on food stamps and other assistance.

[madmom]

6. My son and his family receive food stamps. He works up to

60 hours a week (this is not a standard week, but has happened) at a $9 an hour job. He has 3 kids of his own. He is currently supporting 2 other kids (his wife's from her 1st marriage) whose father is a dead beat.He doesn't HAVE to, they have no blood ties to him. So let's see supporting a family of 7 on $9 dollars an hour ( and believe me he is looking for better). How's that supposed to work?

[Nikia]

8. I am sorry for your son's situation

There are some people where I work in similiar situations. It seems like jobs pay less than they did 10-15 years ago. There just aren't good paying jobs available. This is businesses fault though. Although some really do need the cost savings to stay in business, others are taking advantage of worker's desperation while making record profits.

[madmom]

9. Yes I agree with you here. The company my son works for is a

well known manufacturer of home builder/remodel supplies. They are also in a right to work state.

[spinbaby]

10. You know what the Repub solution is, don't you?

They want to put those lazy-ass children to work.

[lumberjack_jeff]

12. I'm sure it is true in some cases.

It really is a math problem.

If I get $1000 in public assistance (food stamps, rent assistance, etc.), accepting a full-time job which pays $10/hour (assuming this renders me ineligible for assistance) nets only about $3 per hour or $475 per month.

The primary reason that many if not most people do accept these jobs instead of assistance is pride and self respect. If your kids are left unsupervised, I'm not sure it's a good thing.

[kestrel91316]

13. I know someone who has been on unemployment for over 2 years.

He was making over $50k at his job before they got bought out and moved to Outer Slobovia. The only jobs he could even find to apply for were either: 1) minimum wage entry level (for which he was always told he was overqualified therefore not eligible for hire) or 2) required a college degree (he's never been to college but is highly intelligent and has 25 years of work life experience) or 3) require heavy lifting (which he cannot do due to an old, horrific shoulder injury).

Collecting unemployment was the only thing that made any economic sense. He's not stupid.

He is one of the long-term screwed. He's 42.

[siouxsiecreamcheese]

14. I wish there were more people that "got that"

I think if people thought more deeply than just, "oh there are plenty of jobs out there you just have to take one", they would understand that, no, you can't just take "any"job. If someone was an executive making 100,000 a year and was laid off, has a mortgage, a family to maintain, etc, and unemployment pays him a certain amount of money to help maintain his lifestyle, why in the hell should he accept a job at a fast food place making minimum wage and not be able to maintain his lifestyle. He would lose everything, but hey at least he has a job! I was laid off 2x in a row during the bush administration and both were above minimum wage jobs. I also had rent to pay which I couldn't if I had accepted a minimum wage job. So, I stayed on unemployment till I found something I could get by with. It took 6 months to find a decent paying job, but I at least didn't lose my home in the process.

[HiPointDem]

15. i question why the aid system is designed as it is. you'd think if the government was trying

to encourage work, they'd design it so as to make the cut-off of benefits more tapered.

it's almost as though they're trying to create a dependent underclass.

[lumberjack_jeff]

16. The downside of that is the $50k family on food stamps.

One has to be aware of the ramifications.

Which creates the greater dependency?

Personally, I think worrying overmuch about the concept of dependency leads to bad decisions. It is in society's interest that kids are fed, educated and that adults are not desperate. Further, giving cash benefits to the poor is the most effective form of economic stimulus. Given the choice between dependent welfare recipients and gangs of ambitious, motivated, independent, uneducated hookers and muggers, I'd choose the former.

If there were enough jobs, wages would rise and people would choose to work. There aren't, so there's little to be gained by punishing them for it.

[HiPointDem]

27. If the family has 8 people, how is that a downside? But I agree, if there were more jobs and

better-paid jobs, that would be the ideal.

It's not dependency per se I worry about, it's the ghettoizing effects of dependency -- which means loss of skills & removal from the mainstream. I've experienced it personally & it's very real.

[leftstreet]

17. Rightwing talking point there. Employment Insurance is NOT welfare

What 'aid system?' There is no 'aid system' left. There's minimal help for impoverished people with children, and even less assistance (token food subsidies) for people without.

There is no 'dependent' underclass, because there's no longer anything to depend on

[HiPointDem]

23. nope, there's an aid system, however stunted, with multiple pieces. and it cuts off e.g.

medical if you do things like attend college or make over $X at a job. there's no transition, just a dividing line.

it doesn't encourage work (& i'm not saying encouragement of all work is necessarily a great thing) though supposedly this punishing mode is designed to encourage work.

[treestar]

22. It's an all or nothing system

It was just in hopes people would just get jobs eventually. But the economy was not like this when it was designed.

I would think Obamacare will solve some of it - it used to seem silly that if you were on welfare, you were on Medicaid, but then could lose both getting a job that didn't have health insurance. For crying out loud, allow medicaid to cover people who don't have health insurance at their jobs.

[renie408]

18. I don't know about 'regular' public assistance, but in the case of unemployment...

I personally know at least three people who took unemployment checks for as long as they could get them and never made any serious effort to get a job. All three were employed withing about 30 days of their unemployment benefits running out. That probably isn't the norm, I know.

[YoungDemCA]

19. No one is denying that abuse exists

But the Right's alternative-to let people suffer and die in poverty-is far worse.

[treestar]

21. My state requires some evidence they are looking

Even in eras of high unemployment.

[HiPointDem]

24. you can't *get* UE without making some effort -- they monitor & you get cut off if you don't.

must be "actively looking for work"

[treestar]

20. right wingers don't believe it is ever impossible to get a job

they just don't believe the unemployment rate, when high, means some people can't find jobs. They will quote it to bash the Democrats for not fixing the economy while at the same time blaming the individuals who aren't working as if they could work.

[mick063]

25. labor unions have been neutered

Occupations like postman used to be a standard for worker pay and benefits. The new standard is WalMart.

WalMart's employee benefits are designed to take advantage of government assistance. After everything is in place, the next move is to pull that government assistance.

It is called serfdom and it is a preconceived plan by the wealthy aristocrats.

[orpupilofnature57]

26. Does that outweigh the outsourcing and embezzlement

we will pay for the rest of our lives ?

[Cleita]

29. Chris Hayes had a good segment on this on his program this morning

which pretty much blows up RWing talking points about this. Maybe there will be videos on line soon. He also had a woman on who is on public assistance of various types because of her family losing their jobs. She pretty much said that she had worked for seventeen years and paid into the programs she is now using as a safety net. When she and her husband get back to work, she and he will be paying into the system again and whatever they have used will probably be paid back. It makes sense to me.

[hfojvt]

30. some of them do

significant numbers?

I am not sure why dead end jobs are any excuse.

Most of the "poor bashers" make the point that the safety net is too generous.

Having been at the bottom, I can see that point. If I am working hard myself at a part time job or even a full time minimum wage job, then I am, like I was, making $12,000 to $14,000 a year - BEFORE taxes. So, one turns a jaundiced eye even to people who seem to be making $10,000 without doing one stitch of work. Moneywise, they seem to be doing no worse than I am, but they have the advantage of not having to work at my stupid job. So yeah, I would kinda like to trade places.

Some of our systems seemed designed to make work not pay. Take social security.

Here is an annual report I got in 2007, when I was a younger man of only 45 years. It says if I work until I am 62 - another 17 stinking years, then I can collect a whole $656 a month. If, on the other hand, I became disabled right now, then I could collect $806 a month. So 17 years of work nets me $150 a month LESS in benefits. 17 years of work leaves me economically worse off than somebody who is disabled. And the one person pays $46,376 in taxes while the other collects $164,424 in benefits.