Beg to differ, lindajoy, but the infamous welfare queen does not exist. The lazy, shiftless, scheming welfare queen seen in line at the grocery store buying filet mignon and lobster with food stamps, with countless jobless men drifting in and out of her bed was an image conjured up by Reagan i n 1976.
Work requirements for the long-term SNAP recipients who do not have children have been in place since 1996.
Trumpy and repulsives want to make in order to receive about $150 to $185 a month in benefits, SNAP participants between the ages of 18 and 59 would have to prove they are working least 20 hours a week or participating in an equivalent job training program. Those who are disabled or raising a child younger than 6 would be exempt.
What’s wrong with that, you might ask? Nothing, if you assume that the only people who don’t have jobs are the ones who don’t want them.
Who are these people, anyway?
Reagan, the repulsives’ king of welfare reform, introduced us to the “welfare queen” during a campaign rally in 1976.
“In Chicago, they found a woman who holds the record,” he said. “She used 80 names, 30 addresses, 15 telephone numbers to collect food stamps, Social Security, veterans’ benefits for four nonexistent deceased veteran husbands, as well as welfare. Her tax-free cash income alone has been running $150,000 a year.”
That never happened. But her legend lives on.
The truth is that the average food stamp recipient isn’t an urban black woman at all. She is a white woman.
Contrary to what Loki alleges, of the 44 million SNAP recipients, 36% are white, 25% are African-American, 17% are Hispanic, 3% are Asian and 1% are Native American, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Contrary to what some might think, people living in this country illegally are not eligible.
The bottom line is that the real beneficiaries of SNAP, independent of race, are children. 44% of participants are younger than 18, an additional 12% are age 60 or older and 9% are disabled adults, according to federal government statistics.
And the assumption that people who receive food assistance don’t work? It’s a lie.
Nearly one-third of all SNAP households — and nearly half of those with children — report an income. Many families rely on SNAP only when they are between jobs or because they are among millions of American’s working poor. The problem is that most of the jobs they can get are low-paying and often are temporary.
That elusive "welfare queen"? She's just a figment of those repulsives’ uninformed imaginations.
http://psmag.com/economics/erasing-welfare-mythsBeg to differ, lindajoy, but the infamous welfare ... (