As I stated in my earlier post, I have no problem with welfare or disability if it’s used properly. I see some people work harder at trying to get free assistance than they ever worked at a job. Some people are so good at working the system, they could actually go into business of showing other people how to get around all the red tape. (not that there is much red tape for some people)

Example. My brother has been drawing disability for years because he has a bad back. He didn’t work enough to draw it in the first place, but he gets it. Our father worked for years with the same back problems and never drew a dime of disability, even when he had to have surgery. I also have back problems, but I have a desk job so I’m sure I couldn’t get it if I tried, even though sitting in front of a computer all day adds to the pain. Our mother worked at a plant while she put herself through nursing school and then worked as a RN for several years before she developed breast cancer. She fought it for 5 years and worked 4 1/2 of those 5 years. She ended up in a wheel chair with an oxigen tank. She finally applied for disability because she could not work. Two weeks after my mother died, my father received a letter in the mail stating that her disability claim was rejected. Their doctors did not see my mothers illness as being sever enough to prevent her from working. Try to make sense of that!

The point I am trying to make is that those that need it can’t get it, or are too proud to try, and those that don’t need it, or don’t deserve it, can get all they want with no problem. There has to be a way to investigate welfare and disability claims so that only those that really qualify can get it.

Remember my brother with the bad back? He hurts himself more doing yard work than he would if he actually went to work.

I got into a difficult situation once, when I was younger. (back in the 70’s) People kept telling me to get on food stamps, so I finally went and applied. I was told I paid too much for rent ($35 on a run down trailer) and they figured the gas allotment on the paper route, which was all I could find for work at that time, as income. (route was over 100 miles long, no way I could have rode a bike) No food stamps for me. So I went to the grocery with $5 I bummed from a relative, and as I stood in line with my pinto beans and cornbread fixings, I watched the couple in front of me pay for their colas, candy, chips dip and other party items with food stamps. They were dressed to the nines, and both looked perfectly healthy. They got into their sharp new car and drove away. I learned a lot that day about how the welfare system works, and although I believe there are people who need it, I feel like the majority of folks who have it are riding the system.

As an aside, I wasn’t the only one disgusted about their purchase that day. The cashier rolled her eyes and shook her head after they walked away.

yes there are always exceptions to the rule, but you go look at the majority of welfare mothers, they are
very large (ie well fed via my money) have a brood of kids following them, and have a total air of entitlement, that they deserve their welfare no matter at whos cost.
If a mother wants to go on welfare for her children, there should be a time limit, during that time she has to prove herself at an effort to better her situation, school, job hunt, whatever. and she should submit to a doctors anual exam and given internal birth control method (IUD, the shot what ever that is long term and cannot be forgotten, thus resulting in another “whoopsie baby” in the system that has to be supported. If she refuses then the welfare should be denied, thus ending the trail of more children being born into the welfare system without a hope of a good future,
I do not believe I should pay for these women to sit home, watch tv all day and get fat.

I am a single mother with 1 daughter.  I agree that it has not been easy to provide for us, but thankfully through hard work and determination, I have been able to provide her needs and most of her wants.  I live comfortably.  I said all of that, to say this.....I do not agree that someone who is able-bodied and has the mental capacity to work a job should be allowed to apply for welfare.  But to say that the majority of welfare mothers are LARGE is such an ignorant statement.  I do not see the correlation between the two subjects at all.  (BEING ON WELFARE = OBESITY) Please have a valid argument when discussing issues like this.  It seems that you are going strictly on what you see instead of facts.  I do not believe there have been any studies conducted that shows this as being fact.

mobilegirl,

I am posting your figures on another forum-child molested at school- to prove a point. What people will do to get a check, and why. Hope you don’t mind. rmseek1234