Study: More Than Half a Trillion Dollars Spent on Welfare But Poverty Levels Unaffect

It's not wise to speak of things you know nothing about. Not a single thing you've said would read well in my economic 201 textbook, or any textbook at all for that matter. People who "can't or won't work" aren't counted in even the most broad measure of unemployment, the U6 (14.7%). It counts those actively seeking employment, the underemployed, and the "marginally attached" which means, those who have gotten discouraged and stopped looking, but still want to work. Those who have no job and are not looking for one—are counted as "not in the labor force." http://portalseven.com/employment/unemployment_rate_u6.jsp

Also, the amount of unemployment that never goes below 4.5%, in case you were curious, is generally referred to as "Frictional Unemployment", which means.. in a full employment situation, there will always be a small percentage of workers in between jobs, because of relocating, or failed business ventures.

If your looking for a number that speaks to those who "can't or won't work", you should look at the Labor Force Participation Rate. Which is currently the lowest it's been in 3 decades, at 63.6%. Which means that 36.4% of people who would normally qualify for the labor force, "can't or won't work".

It's funny you bring up "Ayn Rand" though, because actually... the mass unemployment you mentioned, and the interventions the government has made into the economy, not only fits perfectly into her world view, but she actually wrote a book depicting this very scenario over 50 years ago. (Atlas Shrugged 1957)

I highly suggest you stick to your unsophisticated insults of people's ideology, and stay away from trying to use actual facts. They clearly do not suit you.

 

I was enjoying this post until it tried to suggest Ayn Rand makes any kind of sense.

 

Hang on, all those rates seem to include U1, which is;

This is the proportion of the civilian labor force that has been unemployed for 15 weeks or longer. This unemployment rate measures workers who are chronically unemployed. During business-cycle expansions, this rate captures structural unemployment. However, during lengthy business-cycle contractions, this rate is also likely to include a significant amount of cyclical unemployment. U1 tends to be relatively small, in the range of 1-2 percent.

 

hahaha, this may or may not be true, I'm not Ayn Rand's greatest fan or anything, but it doesn't change the fact that she wrote a massive 1500 page novel about a financial crises with widespread unemployment. So to say that a financial crises with widespread unemployment doesn't fit into her "world view" is pretty absurd.

And the U1 ONLY counts people who are completely unemployed, are in the labor force, and have also been looking for 15 WEEKS OR LONGER (and are still looking). It's the most narrow way of classifying unemployment that the BLS uses, which is why it's always the lowest. the U3-U6 numbers include what the U1 does, and more... which make them more broad. Here's a table explaining each one

EDIT: Sorry, I didn't read your post properly LOL.... You said, "all those rates seem to include U1", which is true... All those rates I mentioned do include the U1, except of course the 36.4% of people not participating in the labor force (they aren't counted at all). People who are disabled, on welfare, dependent on other people, or are in prison \ the military fall into this 36.4% number

 

I'll anxiously await that.

Meaning only that the people who are ultimately providing help to those in need are are the ones most capable, rationally and reasonably, of determining what help is needed and providing it most efficiently and cost effectively. People are not 'forced' to subsist on charity, but neither should they feel 'entitled' to live on welfare or any other government program paid for by others, and most beneficial to the politicians who propose and support their creation and perpetuation.

The percentage of poverty caused by laziness is of no importance, and would be of little help in reducing poverty. What would you do with the figures if it was known? If government was providing $x in benefits each month and a job was offered paying the same amount each month, how many persons would choose the job and how many would refuse it?

 

They could always move to New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, or some other predominantly Left leaning and more compassionate city.

 

Well Atlas Shrugged is also the tale of a mystogynist wunderkind who has his magical super metal stolen by an evil coalition of scientists, philosophers and politicians so the mooching masses can sit around stealing this money, before he is saved by a super genius and given gold by a capitalist pirate.

The comparisons to our situation are limited.



You mocked Man Yellows claim that people who can't or won't work are included.

But what I'm looking at tells me that they are included, provided they've been out of work for 15 weeks+.

 

Hey Ma I'm broke. Just going to move to NYC, won't be an expensive process at all.

 

You say so little in so many words, it's like watching David Cameron.

Ok. They won't be forced to subsist on charity, but they won't be entitled to welfare... I'm really not sure what your argument is.

The point of the laziness comment was to point out that your ideas of 'motivating' people to get jobs by taking away the money they survive of was nonsensicle.

 

How might YOU motivate people to find jobs?

As I said, allow the people to provide charity for those in need, which I doubt seriously would result in anyone starving.

Actually most repugnant is the implication that the private sector citizenry would watch fellow citizens starve to death by withholding food or other necessities from them. I do however agree that most politicians, Democrat, Republican, and others as well are quite adept at deceiving their voter base into believing they speak truthfully and in their best interests when speaking to them.

 

U-1, persons unemployed 15 weeks or longer, as a percent of the civilian labor force;
As of September 30, 4.3% of the labor force (approximately 8,601,486 individuals*) have been unemployed for more than 15 weeks.

U-2, job losers and persons who completed temporary jobs, as a percent of the civilian labor force;
As of September 30, 4.2% of the labor force (approximately 8,401,451 individuals) have lost jobs within the last quarter.

U-3, total unemployed, as a percent of the civilian labor force (this is the definition used for the official unemployment rate);
As of September 30, 7.8% of the labor force (approximately 15,602,695 individuals) are unemployed and actively seeking work.

U-4, total unemployed plus discouraged workers, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus discouraged workers;
As of September 30, 0.5% of the labor force (approximately 1,000,173 individuals) are considered discouraged, which is the same as last quarter.

U-5, total unemployed, plus discouraged workers, plus all other marginally attached workers, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus all marginally attached workers;
As of September 30, 1.0% of the labor force (approximately 2,000,346 individuals) are considered marginally attached, which is the same as last quarter.

U-6, total unemployed, plus all marginally attached workers, plus total employed part time for economic reasons, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus all marginally attached workers.
As of September 30, 5.4% of the labor force (approximately 10,801,866 individuals) are considered underemployed.

If the labor force participation rate were the same as when President Obama entered office, true unemployment this quarter would be 9.8% instead of 7.8%. Similarly, the real rate of U6 adjusted for LFP would be 16.7%, which is the same as last quarter.

 

More likely you simply don't like to read the words I write.

No, they wouldn't be forced to live on charity, but they would be entitled to receive charitable assistance. How do you rationalize welfare as being an entitlement?

It's even more nonsensical to focus on laziness rather than poverty which you appear to recognize as caused by a lack of money, and is more effectively reduced, both in number of cases AND the cost of, by employing the unemployed and NOT by taxing the employed.

 

Let me make sure I understand your position first; you want to motivate people to get jobs by taking away welfare assistance? Is that the case?

 

My post #661
"The only way I see possible would be to gradually reduce and eventually eliminate government entitlement programs which should never have been taken from society created, operated and funded charitable organizations."

Did I say I wanted to motivate people to get jobs by taking away welfare assistance? Try reading out of what is posted rather than reading into what has been posted.

 

That's not a fair description of the book AT ALL. Like i said, im not her biggest fan, but im at least capable of intellectual honesty. The "magical metal" is actually just an invention? The "coalition of evil scientists, philosophers, and politicans" isn't actually a coalition at all, but politicians and businesses, working closely together and paying scientists to doctor data to further their agendas (you don't think that happens today?). It sounds like you read cliff notes off the huffingtonpost and not the actual novel. But regardless, I wouldn't care if it was also about pink elephants fighting aliens, my point still stands. It's about a financial crises with widespread unemployment.

And I'd encourage you to look again. Like I said originally, any unemployment measure (u1-u6) only includes those actively participating in the labor force... Which means either working, looking for work, or want to work. Those who "cant or won't" work, are not counted in the labor force.. Which includes welfare recipients, the disabled, etc. There's absolutely no way you can paint what was said as being even remotely accurate.

How is the idea of "motivating people to find work by taking away the money they survive on", whether right or wrong, nonsensical? Seems pretty rational and sensical to me. Taken to its logical extreme, say a comfortable billionaire living off inheritence wakes up one day to find his bank accounts entirely empty. Wouldn't he then have more motivation to find work? Just calling something "nonsensical" doesn't make it so, and rewording what people say and trying to paint it as ridiculous doesn't disprove what was originally said.

 

In 1995 the minimum wage was $4.25/hour.
The hourly welfare payment equivalent of a 40 hour work week ranged from a low of $5.53 in Mississippi to a high of $17.50 in Hawaii,
Alaska $15.48
Massachusetts $14.66
Connecticut $14.23
Washington, D.C. $13.99
New York $13.13
New Jersey $12.74
Rhode Island $12.55
California $11.59
Virginia $11.11
Maryland $10.96
New Hampshire $10.96
Maine $10.38
Delaware $10.34
Colorado $10.05
Vermont $10.05
Minnesota $10.00

My own State was providing the equivalent of about 50% of my pretax hourly wage from 27 years of employment to welfare recipients, and still others were working earning much less than welfare recipients AND paying income taxes.

 

So I'm not clear here (your perpetual Kavka-esque ambiguity isn't a helping factor), if welfare isn't the government entitlement program you're 'gradually reducing and eventually eliminating', what is?

Protip; instead of telling me how to interpret your posts, try saying exactly what you mean, and saying it clearly.

 

Well yes, the metal is invented. It's invented by Hank Rearden, that's why it's called Rearden metal. OK technically not a coalition etc. Smooth move referencing the HuffPo, but missed your opportunity to mention me reading Marx in my hemp Che Guevara Tshirt while smoking pot and munching a vegan lasagne in a communal Anarchist sharehouse. If we're going to start with the pointless leftist cliches we might as well take it to the wall.

Now, yes Rand is about a widespread financial crisis. The problem is though, that Atlas Shrugged is a tome dedicated to promoting her world view that basically, if we allow or encourage people to be selfish assholes, everything will turn out alright, and problematically specifically applies this ideology to super powerful business leaders.

In her world there's two types of people, hard-working producers (who work hard and inevitably meet with great success) and lazy moochers (dole bludging sycophants whose poverty is a product of their laziness).

In the real world though, hard working people aren't always rewarded with success, individuals don't always have access to the skills or opportunities needed to access wealth, and encouraging wealthy people to be selfish assholes results in exploitation, not economic growth for all.

But why does it matter? Well, as I said before, people take this stuff SERIOUSLY and argue with a straight face that a book that ends with (spoilers) rich people fucking off to a tropical paradise to permit civilisation to starve and crumble because of evil gubbermint stealin' their money, represents a GOOD ECONOMIC IDEOLOGY. (both ways of reading that ending btw, endorsement or warning are built on ignorant nonsense)

Ultimately my objection to Rand is that people like Paul Ryan and other economic thinkers are building policy on the back of a 10,000 page rant about 'fuck you Soviet Union'.

 

Tackling this part seperatlely from my little rant on AS.

Your encouragement paid off, and I saw where it pointed out the way those stats worked. I wasn't asking my questions about U6 to be an antagonist, I just wanted to understand it better.

Now is it nonsensical to suggest taking peoples money encouraged them to get a job? No.

But it's also not nonsensical to suggest that throwing someone in a pool will motivate them to learn to swim.

It's just that motivation isn't enough. People need skills, education, training, resilience. Taking away money won't solve any of that. So on that approach, while I'm sure taking my ability to feed my kids for a few nights would CERTAINLY be motivating, the idea that I'll rush into a job that's not there with skills and qualifications I don't have and everything will be economically hunky dory, is nonsense.

Now I was misunderstanding U6 before, but provided I understand I now, I have another objection;

If people listed as on welfare aren't on the U6 as participating in the labor force, why do we even want to motivate them to look for jobs that the U6 data tells us don't exist even for people who DO want them?

 

Oops, posted too soon, am on Tapatalk so I can't modify the post.

Fail. Worked it out. Ignore this post.