AMERICA - Welfare to Work Stagnation

"Why it’s so hard to get off welfare" PBS NewsHour 4/16/2015

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SUMMARY:  Since 1996, in order to get welfare in the U.S., you have to work.  The Clinton Welfare-to-Work program successfully got millions of families off the social safety net program.  But today's recipients face stagnant low wages and limited resources for job training, making it nearly impossible for many to gain economic mobility. Economics correspondent Paul Solman reports.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  There’s a growing push at the state level to crack down on welfare spending.  In some cases, it’s about how much is spent and for how long.  In other cases, it’s about making sure the money is spent well.

Kansas became the latest state today, when Governor Sam Brownback signed a law establishing stricter limits on eligibility and the use of benefits.  Nearly two dozen states have made some kind of change to their rules.

Our economics correspondent, Paul Solman, has been looking into welfare reform and how it’s been working before these latest moves.  It’s part of our ongoing reporting Making Sense, which airs every Thursday on the NewsHour.

ASHLEY MURPHY:  The wait is crazy there, like almost three to four hours.

PAUL SOLMAN (NewsHour):  Three to four hours?

ASHLEY MURPHY:  Minimum to just go, like, into the office.

PAUL SOLMAN:  In Boston, 24-year-old Ashley Murphy, single mother of a boy, 4, and girl, 1.  She’s been on welfare since 2013, would do anything to get off.

ASHLEY MURPHY:  I feel like they kind of look down on you in a way.

PAUL SOLMAN:  Murphy is now in a privately funded career training class, hoping to get a job in nursing and off welfare, which she’s on because she quit her last job in retail.

IMHO:  The restrictions on welfare is a sub-conscience push to keep poor people 'in their place' and it is in keeping with Republican mindset of money before people (people are not worth spending money on).

Also the mistaken belief that these people are just lazy, 'no accounts.'  "Are there no workhouses?" - "A Christmas Carol" (1843) by Charles Dickens.

HEALTH CARE - What Should Be the Government's Involvement

My answer, government at all levels has a moral responsibility to see that citizens get health care.  Look at Norway.

"What role should the government play in the health care of its citizens?" PBS Newshour 11/28/2013

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HARI SREENIVASAN (Newshour):  Now a look at some of the larger issues raised in the ongoing debate over the Affordable Care Act, questions of how deeply a government should involve itself in the personal welfare of its citizens, of individual rights and collective responsibilities, even whether the law's troubled rollout might be seen as a challenge to the viability of the liberal philosophy at its core.

The latest major setback came yesterday, when the Obama administration announced a one-year delay in launching the federal Web site for small businesses to enroll their employees with insurers.

Jeffrey Brown gets two views on these bigger issues at stake.

JEFFREY BROWN (Newshour):  And for that, we're joined by Jacob Hacker, director of the Institution for Social and Policy Studies at Yale University.  He worked on the broad blueprint of the health care law and has written a number of books about social policy in the U.S.  And Avik Roy is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and author of the new book "How Medicaid Fails the Poor."  He served as Mitt Romney's health care adviser during the 2012 presidential campaign.

WELFARE - Require Drug Tests for Recipients?

"To Receive Welfare, Should Drug Test Be Required?" PBS Newshour 3/20/2012

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JUDY WOODRUFF (Newshour): Utah passed a law this month requiring those on public assistance to take drug tests. Half of the states are considering similar measures.

Ray Suarez reports on the effort in Colorado.

COMMENT: IMHO drug testing is justified because the state has an interest in seeing that the money is going into whatever the program intends and NOT to support a drug habit.