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To me, this is the single biggest problem with welfare. The woman wants to work, yet cannot because she can’t guarantee how fast she will move past the “no wel

To me, this is the single biggest problem with welfare. The woman wants to work, yet cannot because she can’t guarantee how fast she will move past the “no welfare and very little money” transition until she gets promoted to full time work. Her only recourse is to stay on welfare. Now the real issue comes to her children. If she managed to really instill in them the need to never be on welfare themselves, great, they’ll join the workforce. But what if she didn’t? Maybe only tried a bit, but the years of being on welfare made her lose touch with the working world. Children now only see welfare and thus generational poverty starts.

bee_rider 2y ago
This isn’t a problem really with welfare, but a problem with implementing welfare in the dumbest way possible. In general, no policy, like none at all, should be designed to suddenly come into effect when you hit a constant. All functions should be smooth.
- DemocracyFTW2 2y ago
  Try that argument on a bean-counter, i.e. like everyone holding an elected or decisive office these days. The will think you are crazy, from Mars, an interloper, freerider, or, worse, a communist. At any rate, they will not understanhd you, but, whether they understand you or not they will ignore or silence you. THERE MUST BE LIMITS AFTER ALL!!1!
  - throwway120385 2y ago
    My elected representatives seem to understand this pretty well. The problem is that people keep electing other people who view anyone not working as leeches. Often the difference between keeping those elected officials and electing someone that represents you is a few hundred or a few thousand people deciding that their vote does matter after all and going and casting it. It's about the population of a rural village or small town. I don't know how we're going to get back to our golden age, but I know that we need to find the motivation somehow.
- Terr_ 2y ago
  > All functions should be smooth. I like to believe--or at least fantasize--that bipartisan alliances can be built around a shared commitment to Good Equations in Public Policy, even if they disagree on what those policies are. "Look Bob, I think your tax cut proposal is pure pork and regulatory capture, but that one one goddamn sexy curve."
- jewayne 2y ago
  When you really peel back the layers, you'll find that voters' instincts are that any means-tested program should come with a hefty punishment for using it. While they aren't exactly against helping, they definitely think the priorities are 1) Spending as little taxpayer dollars as possible, 2) Punishing any recipient of help enough to be a warning to others, and then, distantly, 3) Helping.
  - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
    This is not exactly voters. What really happens is more like this: There is some call for helping people, voters want it, but voters (possibly some of the same voters, possibly different ones) also want lower taxes. So the plan that passes is the one that claims to help people (appeasing the first group) while also costing the minimum amount of money (appeasing the second group). The proposal with evolutionary fitness in politics is then to create a system that helps people on paper but actually limits eligibility for the system to a minimum number of people or otherwise makes use of it more arduous to deter usage so it costs less. Extra points for making it so complicated that people don't realize what's really happening so they don't object if it doesn't really do what they wanted. But there is also a level of incompetence/inefficiency here, because the complex and overlapping systems that pass as a result often have high overhead that waste tax dollars, or create bad incentives because nobody thought them through and those incentives create deadweight economic losses adverse to the interests of even the people who want to minimize taxes. As the obvious example, if you create a system with welfare cliffs and then people have the incentive to stay on welfare instead of taking a job, you now have more government expense and lower tax revenue than a system that doesn't do this. At which point there is a Pareto-optimal improvement on the table if you can get the bill passed.
TeMPOraL 2y ago
That's how you breed shadow employment. People on welfare who can work often will find jobs that pay some, or all of the salary, under the table. The attitude this instills in children is that of having to work hard, while scheming against the taxman, to improve your life. Some people then do that way past the point they need to, and end up at risk of being caught for tax evasion.
- BobbyTables2 2y ago
  I also shudder to think what types of employers would be complicit with such a scenario.
  - vharuck 2y ago
    You're right to fear employers who want to avoid claiming employees so that they don't have to comply with, for example, safety laws. But shadow work also includes situations with "casual" business relationships, like a couple who hires a nanny to watch their kids 40 hours a week. Both parties may feel that complying with tax and labor laws is too much of a burden.
    - smileysteve 2y ago
      > Both parties may feel that complying with tax and labor laws is too much of a burden. That's - a way - to phrase: - facilitate an effective 7.5% pay cut (employer paid Social Security / Medicare / Medicaid tax) - avoid being properly compensated for overtime (assuming non exempt salary), - and make claiming unemployment, disability benefits more difficult When you refer to both, can you emphasize a specific burden the employee is subject to other than reduce tax benefits on disability / social security?
      - rembicilious 2y ago
        You may have been downvoted because you seem be ignoring the point gp post. By working under the table, the nanny or gardener or handyman can (often fraudulently) qualify for government healthcare and welfare programs as well as other low income assistance. In my opinion those programs are of a greater benefit than the ones you listed.

bee_rider 2y ago

This isn’t a problem really with welfare, but a problem with implementing welfare in the dumbest way possible. In general, no policy, like none at all, should be designed to suddenly come into effect when you hit a constant. All functions should be smooth.

DemocracyFTW2 2y ago
Try that argument on a bean-counter, i.e. like everyone holding an elected or decisive office these days. The will think you are crazy, from Mars, an interloper, freerider, or, worse, a communist. At any rate, they will not understanhd you, but, whether they understand you or not they will ignore or silence you. THERE MUST BE LIMITS AFTER ALL!!1!
- throwway120385 2y ago
  My elected representatives seem to understand this pretty well. The problem is that people keep electing other people who view anyone not working as leeches. Often the difference between keeping those elected officials and electing someone that represents you is a few hundred or a few thousand people deciding that their vote does matter after all and going and casting it. It's about the population of a rural village or small town. I don't know how we're going to get back to our golden age, but I know that we need to find the motivation somehow.
Terr_ 2y ago
> All functions should be smooth. I like to believe--or at least fantasize--that bipartisan alliances can be built around a shared commitment to Good Equations in Public Policy, even if they disagree on what those policies are. "Look Bob, I think your tax cut proposal is pure pork and regulatory capture, but that one one goddamn sexy curve."
jewayne 2y ago
When you really peel back the layers, you'll find that voters' instincts are that any means-tested program should come with a hefty punishment for using it. While they aren't exactly against helping, they definitely think the priorities are 1) Spending as little taxpayer dollars as possible, 2) Punishing any recipient of help enough to be a warning to others, and then, distantly, 3) Helping.
- AnthonyMouse 2y ago
  This is not exactly voters. What really happens is more like this: There is some call for helping people, voters want it, but voters (possibly some of the same voters, possibly different ones) also want lower taxes. So the plan that passes is the one that claims to help people (appeasing the first group) while also costing the minimum amount of money (appeasing the second group). The proposal with evolutionary fitness in politics is then to create a system that helps people on paper but actually limits eligibility for the system to a minimum number of people or otherwise makes use of it more arduous to deter usage so it costs less. Extra points for making it so complicated that people don't realize what's really happening so they don't object if it doesn't really do what they wanted. But there is also a level of incompetence/inefficiency here, because the complex and overlapping systems that pass as a result often have high overhead that waste tax dollars, or create bad incentives because nobody thought them through and those incentives create deadweight economic losses adverse to the interests of even the people who want to minimize taxes. As the obvious example, if you create a system with welfare cliffs and then people have the incentive to stay on welfare instead of taking a job, you now have more government expense and lower tax revenue than a system that doesn't do this. At which point there is a Pareto-optimal improvement on the table if you can get the bill passed.

TeMPOraL 2y ago

That's how you breed shadow employment. People on welfare who can work often will find jobs that pay some, or all of the salary, under the table. The attitude this instills in children is that of having to work hard, while scheming against the taxman, to improve your life. Some people then do that way past the point they need to, and end up at risk of being caught for tax evasion.

BobbyTables2 2y ago
I also shudder to think what types of employers would be complicit with such a scenario.
- vharuck 2y ago
  You're right to fear employers who want to avoid claiming employees so that they don't have to comply with, for example, safety laws. But shadow work also includes situations with "casual" business relationships, like a couple who hires a nanny to watch their kids 40 hours a week. Both parties may feel that complying with tax and labor laws is too much of a burden.
  - smileysteve 2y ago
    > Both parties may feel that complying with tax and labor laws is too much of a burden. That's - a way - to phrase: - facilitate an effective 7.5% pay cut (employer paid Social Security / Medicare / Medicaid tax) - avoid being properly compensated for overtime (assuming non exempt salary), - and make claiming unemployment, disability benefits more difficult When you refer to both, can you emphasize a specific burden the employee is subject to other than reduce tax benefits on disability / social security?
    - rembicilious 2y ago
      You may have been downvoted because you seem be ignoring the point gp post. By working under the table, the nanny or gardener or handyman can (often fraudulently) qualify for government healthcare and welfare programs as well as other low income assistance. In my opinion those programs are of a greater benefit than the ones you listed.