Thank goodness for welfare, Medicaid, food stamps, and unemployment compensation. Without those 4 things, what would the country be like?
It would be awesome. All the entitlement program dead weight would be forced to either leave or get off their lazy assess and get a job.
Our tax rate would be much lower and our deficit, assuming we still had corporate welfare (ie TARP), would be much more manageable. Likely our economy would get out of this crap much sooner, although that unfortunately would mean that many welfare recipients wouldn't be able to watch Oprah and Judge Judy everyday. The biggest downside would be that your grandparents or parents would have to live with you if they were to retire.
When you speak of welfare you're talking about a strawman/red herring. Welfare programs to support actual human beings are, by far, dwarfed by welfare given to fictitious entities (corporations). Of course these types of programs are not covered in the 'news'. Corporations aren't human beings, they don't need food, water, shelter, etc. to survive. They don't need welfare, ever... yet they get it in spades, all usually, under the guise of 'trickle-down' economics. comparatively speaking, almost nothing trickles down. If you really think that human beings with real, tangible needs are the cause of our fiscal problems you need to step back and reevaluate the situation.
56.74% in 2010's budget is entitlements: <IMG SRC=http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/ce/Fy2010_spending_by_category.jpg>
Please post a source for that data/chart. I've seen alternative numbers from multiple sources. I hate social security, I'm not defending it. What I do dislike, is the idea that many people hold, which is that social programs are, by default, evil. These same people turn a blind eye when public money is spent on things/services which are, perhaps unnecessary, and easy to siphon the money to corporations. The Department of Defense is a good example. One additional note, one shouldn't attempt to discern too much from a single data point. We, far better than most people, understand how data points (charts) tell a story over time. SSI surplus expenditures used for things besides SSI are a good example. Additionally, it would be interesting to see a break down of the social programs budgets and how that money is being spent. For example, what percentage of the budget for social security is used to pay SSI benefits? What percentage is used to pay infrastructure costs? etc. ..
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_United_States_federal_budget 2007 budget had similiar numbers, although defense had a component for WoT split off (stupid budget tricks) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_United_States_federal_budget http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_United_States_federal_budget http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_United_States_federal_budget Entitlements have long been the majority of the federal budget.
Interesting...I guess you would have to look at countries that do not have those things to see what we would be like... But if I had to guess,(what else can we do?) I would say that we would definately have more crime, Young people would not be going out and partying as much as they would have to stay home and take care of their sick parents, doing nothing but working to pay for parents meds. There would be less money around for trading because pretty much everyone has a sick family member, so your money would go to them. Thats with the first 3. You would probably also have alot more starving kids. For unemployment compensation, i cant see any real benefit to society other than people do not want to work until benefits run out. Our country MIGHT be better without that.
You are confused. There is a long precedent of law of a Corporation designation as a legal person ________________________ " A legal person (sometimes referred to as a juristic person or a body corporate) is a legal entity through which the law allows a group of natural persons to act as if they were a single composite individual for certain purposes, or in some jurisdictions, for a single person to have a separate legal personality other than their own.[1] This legal fiction does not mean these entities are human beings, but rather means that the law allows them to act as persons for certain limited purposesâmost commonly lawsuits, property ownership, and contracts." ___________________________ If no corporations how can you sue it? I agree Corporations should not be receiving any advantages. No health care tax subsidies, not even a tax on its operation, it should be transparent.