The debate over public benefits almost always treats "welfare" and "work" as counterparts to each other. There are people who get public benefits and people who work for their paychecks.
But it turns out a lot of those people overlap: a majority of public benefits go to working families, a new analysis from two Berkeley economists finds . Their work shows that $152 billion in public programs like Medicaid and welfare 56 percent of overall spending goes toward supporting low-wage workers.
As the chart shows, the federal Earned Income Tax Credit goes overwhelmingly to working families they're about three-quarters of enrollees, and they get 81 percent of the $67 billion the program hands out. Working families are 61 percent of the enrollees on public insurance plans Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program. Two other public programs Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and food stamps (SNAP) don't go as heavily to workers, but workers still account for 27 and 38 percent, respectively, of the money the programs give out.
The Berkeley analysis defines a "working family" as one where at least one person works at least 27 weeks a year for at least 10 hours a week. That does leave open the possibility that some of these families might only be receiving benefits during the time when no one in the family is working. It's also worth noting that the public assistance program that overwhelmingly goes to working families the Earned Income Tax Credit is designed specifically for low-income workers.
The Berkeley economists argue that this data should cause Americans to think about welfare in a different way: not as taxpayers subsidizing people who don't want to work, but as taxpayers subsidizing companies that don't want to pay workers enough money to live. It's definitely an illustration that welfare and work go hand in hand as two of the ways people at the bottom of the income distribution cobble together a living.
http://www.vox.com/2015/4/14/8411221/welfare-work-benefits
Just because someone's applying for welfare doesn't mean she doesn't also have a job.
Interesting study and results.
Good post Nona.
Thanks Kav! I thought it was interesting also...glad you liked it.
My main objection is when people stereotype people on welfare. Granted, here are some that play the system, but there are MANY that legitimately need the help.
My philosophy is help those who can't help themselves and help those who can do so.
I agree completely. Raise the national minimum wage to $15 an hour and it'll pay back the over all economy in spades. We are a consumer driven economy, but in order for it to work we need consumers who have money to spend. They'll have money to spend and they'll spend it which helps ever business it their neighborhood and more jobs and more jobs. It starts a cycle that multiplies that across the nation. Plus it'll lower the number of people on public assistance. Let the multimillion corporation pay their workers a living wage, instead of expecting the tax payer to pick their slack.
EITC is not welfare. At least it never has been considered such by any democrat against myriad attacks by republicans that is was until this wage argument recently has surfaced. now they want to flip it 180 degrees and use it to their advantage?
I don't buy it. Just more political manipulation to justify the cause.
Nona, I'm more than willing to discuss this study but not here on the front page. Open it up in Moderate and Balanced and be happy to go over it with you. we probably will have a better more in depth discussion there. Since the last discussion over a report done two years ago saying the same thing quickly devolved into name calling when brain dead couldn't refute the analysis I did of their posted "Study"
See you there if you want to post it there.
Update: I just followed the link, and drilled down to the study from the links on the page. It is the same study, just updated to more recent data and fails by the same faults built into the other study.
Their methodology is utter garbage, all it does is manipulate data to press a certain outcome. an outcome paid for by the democrat party people and liberal supporters of this drive to raise the minimum wage.
My comments on the previous study are just as valid for the updated one. they changed nothing about their manipulation of data or exclusion of over half the low wage workers in the work force to make an invalid claim.
therefore my opinions and analysis does not change.
It's a worthless political study to justify a political argument. It's not scientific at all.