Nearly Half of All Children Will Use Food Stamps by Age 20

[The_Tick]

Nope.

I was unaware unemployment was based off your previous salary.

That's weird. Do big-time CEO's on unemployment get tens of thousands a month?

I figured you were unaware. Which makes you pretty ignorant spouting off like you do.

If you read what he said...maximum payout is 450 per week. If you make 10K a week, you get 450 a week on unemployment.

If you make 4k a month...450 a week. There is a sliding scale.

Just because you currently live on <450 a week doesn't mean everyone can.

Apples to apples just isn't a board game my friend.

[JohnnyLingo]

I figured you were unaware. Which makes you pretty ignorant spouting off like you do.

If you read what he said...maximum payout is 450 per week. If you make 10K a week, you get 450 a week on unemployment.

If you make 4k a month...450 a week. There is a sliding scale.

Just because you currently live on <450 a week doesn't mean everyone can.

Apples to apples just isn't a board game my friend.

Thanks for the education.

[Pheidippides]

$450/week would barely cover food, fuel/transportation and utilities for my family of five.

[Soccermom]

Spot on. And I knew that going in.

My point is, I can live on this. It sucks, and I work a little freelance to help, but it can be done.

LOL. I dare you to try living on that in the Bay Area or Los Angeles with four kids to feed, provide insurance for, pay a mortgage, etc.

And, actually, you would fit in well in my ward here in CA. The bishop would love you.

[Hallelujah]

When it's 8pm and the landlord is asking for a check now or he's going to evict the tenant who happens to be a single mom with little kids.

Where IS the dad? Society has let them off the hook. Rappers talk about their biatches and treating women like sex objects. .....and I could go on. Society allows this crap to happen and then the taxpayer is left holding the tab. We can't teach morals but we can certainly write out checks. That's my problem.

[UtahDan]

$450/week would barely cover food, fuel/transportation and utilities for my family of five.

What a glass half empty point of view. At 6$ per stick, $450 could keep your nipples from bleeding when you run for a good ten years:

[statman]

It's both culture and opportunity.

I don't buy it - they're one and the same. It's the culture causes people to be able to recognize ans create the opportunity. in fact, the system is now set up so that those from outside the mainstream achieving culture that try to participate, are given multiple opportunites (and advantages over everyone else) to do so.

I'd say that I grew up in 'advantaged society' - my dad had a PhD and was a research chemist for a major US corporation. My mom stayed at home until their youngest was in junior high, and then, worked only for something to do outside the home.

But I am 100% a self-made man. There is nothing that I did to achieve success in today's America that is not available to everyone. Besides my freshman year at BYU, I paid my way through school. I used Pell Grants and Stafford Loans to get through school. I worked 3/4 time and went to school full-time through a BA degree and two masters degrees.

My early life of 'privelege' gave me nothing but my culture. No doors were opened for me. My parents didn't 'network' to get me into school or get me a job. I achieved based on what I did.

I do fully believe that our culture can create or cripple our success. I inherited a great culture from my parents - one where hard work & investing time & money in education are put at the forefront. Someone with my same skills who grew up in Chicago's South Side could very easily be constrained by his culture so he could never achieve. But the constraint is NOT opportunity. Our society likes nothing more than helping-out those from disadvantaged situations. If the opportunity is there for the mainstream of society, it is doubly there for those outside the normal channels. I would have LOVED the opportunities (scholarships, assistantships, admission to prestigious schools) that would have been offered to me had I been from a culture that didn't put an emphasis on these areas...

I think we just need to get the terms right in discussions like this. It's not a lack of opportunity. It's not race (the cultures that kill success cut across racial lines). It's culture.

If your culture is not in line with what is going to make you successful in America today, if you truly want to succeed, you need to dissociate from the culture that's dragging you down. Is that hard? Yeah, of course it is. And those same cultures paint an incredibly unrealistic picture of what achievement is like for the 'success cultures:' Our achievement is easy. Somehow it's just handed to us. Just being born into the right social circles ensures our achievement. That may be true for the Kennedy's or Rockefellers of the world, but it is simply untrue for the vast majority of Americans who have attained 'success.' Most successful people have WORKED for it. And the cultures that fail to realize that, are doing themselves a huge disservice...

[JohnnyLingo]

LOL. I dare you to try living on that in the Bay Area or Los Angeles with four kids to feed, provide insurance for, pay a mortgage, etc.

In America, you can live wherever you want. I've turned down job offers because they were in places with high costs of living.

And, actually, you would fit in well in my ward here in CA. The bishop would love you.

Is this a dig? It feels like one, but as I have zero information on your home ward and/or bishop, I can't tell. And a dig where your target can't tell it's a dig seems ineffective.


EDIT: 10 points to statman. Couldn't have said it better myself.

[Soccermom]

In America, you can live wherever you want. I've turned down job offers because they were in places with high costs of living.



Is this a dig? It feels like one, but as I have zero information on your home ward and/or bishop, I can't tell. And a dig where your target can't tell it's a dig seems ineffective.


EDIT: 10 points to statman. Couldn't have said it better myself.

Well, some of us who had high paying jobs in CA and did all the right things (savings, etc.) still got screwed with job losses and are struggling to get by on $450/week unemployment while watching all of our hard earned savings dwindle to nothing. But, not that I expect you to care. I'm sure you could find a way to blame me and my family somehow for our situation.

And my comment about my bishop liking you was not a dig. I was just noting for you that if you chose to take me up on my dare, there is a ward here in CA that would welcome you with open arms.

[Jarid in Cedar]

I don't buy it - they're one and the same. It's the culture causes people to be able to recognize ans create the opportunity. in fact, the system is now set up so that those from outside the mainstream achieving culture that try to participate, are given multiple opportunites (and advantages over everyone else) to do so.

I'd say that I grew up in 'advantaged society' - my dad had a PhD and was a research chemist for a major US corporation. My mom stayed at home until their youngest was in junior high, and then, worked only for something to do outside the home.

But I am 100% a self-made man. There is nothing that I did to achieve success in today's America that is not available to everyone. Besides my freshman year at BYU, I paid my way through school. I used Pell Grants and Stafford Loans to get through school. I worked 3/4 time and went to school full-time through a BA degree and two masters degrees.

My early life of 'privelege' gave me nothing but my culture. No doors were opened for me. My parents didn't 'network' to get me into school or get me a job. I achieved based on what I did.

I do fully believe that our culture can create or cripple our success. I inherited a great culture from my parents - one where hard work & investing time & money in education are put at the forefront. Someone with my same skills who grew up in Chicago's South Side could very easily be constrained by his culture so he could never achieve. But the constraint is NOT opportunity. Our society likes nothing more than helping-out those from disadvantaged situations. If the opportunity is there for the mainstream of society, it is doubly there for those outside the normal channels. I would have LOVED the opportunities (scholarships, assistantships, admission to prestigious schools) that would have been offered to me had I been from a culture that didn't put an emphasis on these areas...

I think we just need to get the terms right in discussions like this. It's not a lack of opportunity. It's not race (the cultures that kill success cut across racial lines). It's culture.

If your culture is not in line with what is going to make you successful in America today, if you truly want to succeed, you need to dissociate from the culture that's dragging you down. Is that hard? Yeah, of course it is. And those same cultures paint an incredibly unrealistic picture of what achievement is like for the 'success cultures:' Our achievement is easy. Somehow it's just handed to us. Just being born into the right social circles ensures our achievement. That may be true for the Kennedy's or Rockefellers of the world, but it is simply untrue for the vast majority of Americans who have attained 'success.' Most successful people have WORKED for it. And the cultures that fail to realize that, are doing themselves a huge disservice...

Unless the rules have changed, Pell Grants are a need based grant(you don't need to pay back) that are completely subsidised with tax revenues, as are "subsidized" student loans(I am assuming that you have/had a few of them). So despite your protestations, you have reaped the rewards of sucking on the government teet just like the rest of us.

Welcome to the club!

[Pheidippides]

What a glass half empty point of view. At 6$ per stick, $450 could keep your nipples from bleeding when you run for a good ten years:

Lol, unfortunately, I have a bum wheel and am limited to local trips only for the next week or so.

In America, you can live wherever you want. I've turned down job offers because they were in places with high costs of living.

What does location or job have anything to do with unemployment benefits? What you've just said implies free movement in the case of job loss (or that living anywhere other than Backwoods, Idaho is wrong). You don't move somewhere because you have lost a job - moving is expensive and that would be a dumb idea, unless you are moving for a job you have found. You are where you are when you are unemployed, which is better than where you'd likely be if you hadn't followed a good job away from the sticks in the first place.

[mUUser]

Off topic observation: I don't get the kneejerk jackassery of this board whenever certain posters dare to espouse an opinion -- Hallelluah or Lingo come to mind. Happened on Utefans too, and over time the place went to hell.

Let me have it. Whatever.

[Pheidippides]

Unless the rules have changed, Pell Grants are a need based grant(you don't need to pay back) that are completely subsidised with tax revenues, as are "subsidized" student loans(I am assuming that you have/had a few of them). So despite your protestations, you have reaped the rewards of sucking on the government teet just like the rest of us.

Welcome to the club!

They are indeed. And even unsubsidized loans are government aid as well - you could never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever get an unsecured loan for that good of an interest rate without the government guarantee. I don't have time to go into lending 101, but don't think I need to.

I used Pell Grants, subsidized and unsubsidized Stafford loans, WIC and Medicaid while in college/law school. I worked as much as possible during college (there are limitations to how much you can work in law school). I feel no remorse for doing so (otherwise I probably wouldn't have made it through) and I will definitely be paying my fair share back and then some. So it's a good investment for the government as well.

Nothing to see here. Move along.

[statman]

Unless the rules have changed, Pell Grants are a need based grant(you don't need to pay back) that are completely subsidised with tax revenues, as are "subsidized" student loans(I am assuming that you have/had a few of them). So despite your protestations, you have reaped the rewards of sucking on the government teet just like the rest of us.

Welcome to the club!

I'm not discussing the taking of government benefits - in fact I didn't even mention it in my post, let alone display any 'protestations' about it. I guess there weren't many "the main topic of this paragraph was..." questions in medical school. ;-)

I'm talking about the barriers to success. And opportunity isn't one of them. Opportunity is there for everyone - ESPECIALLY becasue of things like Pell grants and GSLs. I fully support these governemnt programs as valuable expenditures that will have a positive effect on individuals and on the country (and its tax revenues) in the future. But outcomes are a completely different matter from opportunities.

Four decades of Affirmative Action has proven that the problem is not one of opportunity...

[JohnnyLingo]

Well, some of us who had high paying jobs in CA and did all the right things (savings, etc.) still got screwed with job losses and are struggling to get by on $450/week unemployment while watching all of our hard earned savings dwindle to nothing. But, not that I expect you to care. I'm sure you could find a way to blame me and my family somehow for our situation.

This seems a little personal. I'll leave it alone.

And my comment about my bishop liking you was not a dig. I was just noting for you that if you chose to take me up on my dare, there is a ward here in CA that would welcome you with open arms.

See, there's that edge again. An insult is lurking in there somewhere.

I'll stand with Wuap on this one. It might be racist but it is true. Not true in every instance, but true in many.

How'd I miss this one? Racism is fine as long as it's true?

I'll be using that card from now on.