Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire 1 in 5 Americans On Welfare!

Enclosed is a link to a new census bureau revelation where it explains that more than 52,000,000 (fifty two million!) Americans are now on welfare!
This country can not exist for long borrowing money from China to pay non-producers to lounge around and "exist"!

http://freebeacon.com/issues/one-in...vernment-assistance-programs-each-month/

Sad.
I fear for the future of this country.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

its gotta be more than one in 5 around here....

1 in 5 people in the world are Muslim, I don't know which is worse...

1 in 5,,,is that all?

If the repub-low-craps have there way and we get a couple more free trade deals.
1 and 5 will go even higher.
dave

Add in those on Social Security (56M; 20%), and those incarcerated (1%), as well as the real unemployment rate of about 15%, and you come up to 56% not producing tax revenue. Now, add in the 7.5% that are governmental employees and you come to 63.5% living directly off the gov't dole. When the government contractors are added in, you quickly reach or exceed 70%.

That leaves only 30% of the population NOT working for or being paid by the government. Some percentage of that 30% are children not already counted in the totals above, so call them 10% to be safe.

The one in five number may be a better depiction of actual producers in the U.S. economy.

I kinda figured I was carrying about five of those parasites on my back all these years.

A lot of those that are counted as on welfare are working poor who get housing assistance, food stamps, etc- They are not all totally non working.figures I just looked up shows 3/4 of those welfare payments, (which includes social security, food stamps housing assistence) goes to the dialed and elderly, and 9% goes to non disabled non elderly people.
But the scarcity of actual producers in this economy is a huge factor- And, it seems the people that have managed to interject themselves into the market and skim off some of the cream are compensated much better than the plumber or policeman or car builder. The health insurance companies are one of my pet peeves- They started out as a way of spreading risk, which benefited everyone, or at least we thought it did. Now, the health insurance industry skims billions out of the health care budget, and pays it's executives lavishly.
The finance industry (credit cards, etc) now consumes 15% of the GDP, has record profits, and typical credit card rates are above what used to be banned as usury.

We subsidize single family households that produce large percentages of uneducated and unemployable children, and punish traditional households that produce large percentages of educated youth with a strong work ethics. What could go wrong with that formula.

And that 1 in 5 figure doesn't factor in all the local, state and federal employees whose jobs are to cater to those on wellfare.

I came to the conclusion some time ago that roughly 1/3 do all the work, 1/3 are pretty much useless, and 1/3 do more harm than good.

Yeah we are about to get our pants pulled down to our ankles by a trade deal created by your leader and helped thru the house by Republicans.

Clinton passed Nafta and the normalization of China trade deals..guess he was a replublocrap as well?

One is supposed to learn by life lessons and experiences of others. Idiots in our govt have seen the abject failure that the USSR and Communist china was and currently the EU and they still push in that direction.

A couple things.

First Finance does not "consume" 15% of GDP, it PRODUCES 15% of our GDP. Historically, financials are the single largest component of the S&P 500, (it's currently information technology), and make up a lot more then just credit cards. They include the large home lenders like Wells Fargo, Investment banking and brokerage, and Insurance. Every significant business in America operates with a line of credit. Without access to capital, business quickly collapse and GDP along with them.

As for health insurance companies, they DO diversify risk. Years ago it was suggested that hospitals could act as their own insurance companies, cutting out the middle man. This did not go will. It didn't take long to discover that hospital administrators did not have the proper skill sets to administer plans, and hospitals also lacked geographical diversification. In addition, hospitals could fall victim to local demographics. As a result this idea resulted it the bankruptcy of many hospitals. As for "excessive" profits in the health insurance industry, that's just a red herring. Compared to other S&P sectors, they actually have repetitively narrow profit margins. As for their "skimming", in many ways, just the opposite is true. They were the only one's with market power to keep hospital rates in check. Now through there new unholy alliance with government, the entire system is in doubt.

As for the 52 million figure, it's like you said. If someone collects a benefit for one month, they are counted. I'd be interested to see what those figures look like with adjusted for only part year participants.

"They were the only one's with market power to keep hospital rates in check"
Haven't done a very good job, have they??

It is a complex problem. A seriously sick individual is not in a very good position to negotiate with a hospital over price. The use of a insurance company creates it's own economic problems, i.e. an exchange of goods and services where neither the buyer nor seller has an incentive to control costs, because they are paid for by a third party.

In addition Oobie care hasn't helped. None of those entitlements are free.

In my county I feel safe in saying 50% are on some form of welfare. I'm not including unemployment or social security, neither of which are welfare.

Well hell, don't forget all the farms, ranches and dairy farmers on the dole, not to mention all the big corporations... or all those receiving tax-breaks just for having kids. Probably more like 99.9%


Phil

mesicans are americans too

I see you are a resident of southern Oregon. In the past, before it was illegal to engage in the lumber and wood products industry, it was almost impossible not to be employed in that area for any length of time. Wages at one time were adequate to support a family, buy a home, etc..

I suspect if there is one thing that is the root cause of all problems, corruption would be a likely candidate for that root cause. Very few of our systems work as intended, from elections, to the court system to the economy, even to the military. Sad fact, when things get bad, the first thing people want to do is trash the constitution when I think it's our best and only hope. I would hate to see this country turned into a one party dictator ship, which I think some people are longing for.