Have to include the social costs of higher food prices, cost of bureaucrats employed to hand out the money and cost of illegals coming in to take the jobs that people on welfare have no incentive to take.
Well about .1% of people on welfare are caught cheating the system, but there are about 10 times as many allegations. Believe it or not, there are all sorts of systems in place to catch cheats. Some of the systems are set up to catch cheats within a month or two and there are other systems that take as long as 2 to 2 1/2 years to catch up to them. These systems flag the people and cut off their benefits and send them a letter telling them they suspect them of cheating and give them options to pay the money back, or call and explain the situation if they are innocent and there was a mistake. But for arguements sake, lets say that 100% of all allegations are cheats and they have no excuse. So I think we spent 1 trillion on social welfare programs last year so 1% is about 10 billion dollars, which would mean cheats are costing every person about $32 per year or just under $3 per month. I think $10 billion dollars is a reasonable amount to suspect because there are probably many who never get flagged because they dont file taxes(they dont make enough or they just dont file for whatever other reason) and they dont have bank accounts, trading accounts or any other accounts attached to them. So thats your answer...they are costing you approximately $2.68 per month. About enough to buy you a large french fry at McDonalds.
Now we're getting somewhere, thank you. The figure I came up is higher I think, but I came to it by another route. But to give a hint and a possible starting point for someone else's guess ...... "Safety net programs: About 14 percent of the federal budget in 2010, or $496 billion, went to support programs that provide aid (other than health insurance or Social Security benefits) to individuals and families facing hardship. These programs include: the refundable portion of the earned-income and child tax credits, which assist low- and moderate-income working families through the tax code; programs that provide cash payments to eligible individuals or households, including Supplemental Security Income for the elderly or disabled poor and unemployment insurance; various forms of in-kind assistance for low-income families and individuals, including food stamps, school meals, low-income housing assistance, child-care assistance, and assistance in meeting home energy bills; and various other programs such as those that aid abused and neglected children. "
Here is an article I found that seems to be close to our numbers. Same as us, he is just guessing, but he came at around 2% of all people on welfare are cheating. http://spritzophrenia.wordpress.com/2011/01/04/how-bad-is-welfare-fraud-in-the-usa/
Just checking around in other entitlements (just roughly getting numbers) for fraud and abuse (medicare for example)and I think you'll find the same scenarios. The budgets are so large the waste and abuse amounts to chump change. Besides, programs like welfare, even people who cheat, the money defrauded wouldn't let the cheats afford a used car. We were watching the bums beg change from cars stopped at traffic lights. They got a cup in hand (not squeeges thank god) some were sellign flowers but when they sold out, they just shook a paper cup at the cars. These people have housing, food stamps, what they need is cash money. Can't give them meaningful work to pick up a few bucks to earn cash for smokes or alcohol, they'd lose their benefits. In the end we'll always have people begging for cash no matter how large the benefits.
Yes but at least with the military we get something in return. Like the Iraq war was only 3 trillion and look at all the benefits we got.
If you count all the people on welfare that really would be working if their life actually depended on it as cheats, then probably 90% of them are cheating..
Yup, the real problem is all those women who think it's perfectly normal to have a child out of wedlock, collect food stamps, AFDC payments, Medicare, and rental subsidies as if that constituted a "job", and have a daughter who does the same thing. All perfectly legal.
And that is the real COST of the social safety net. Women living off of the government dole with 5 or 6 children, many of them without a father...some years later they are incarcerated, etc, etc... On the other hand, the working class family has enough of a problem just raising one child if they actually have to pay for his/her education, pay a mortgage/property taxes, tuitions, etc, etc... And we wonder how we've gotten to the breaking point... (I'm sure GrabASS has another insipid remark to add to his fag agenda.)