The direct payments increasing, which they have done includes Social Security whereas the Baby Boomers started retiring early in GWB's first term and continue to escalate through Obama's term. Eight million have retired and were added to Social Security in the last ten years.
Social Security Online
Social Security (United States) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)
Another direct payment is the Unemployment Benefits and the unemployment rate speaks for itself, it should be noted that for every job opening there are 4.2 unemployed workers, now that's an improvement from 6.1 unemployed per job opening in June of 2009 but a far cry when it was 1.8 unemployed per job opening just before the recession of 2007 took hold.
Also, I think it's very easy to assume that if there were more jobs available, the numbers on Food Stamps would drop. But it isn't exactly so. Wages have been flat for decades and in most cases have not kept up with inflation. As the income needed to qualify for Food Stamps is adjusted for inflation and as wages have not kept up with inflation, more and more people are becoming eligible for Food Stamps and they are working for a living.
Te best solution for the huge dependence on unemployment and Food Stamps is the creation of jobs. Who creates jobs? In the last few years, corporations have seen huge and record profits, yet they aren't hiring. They are sitting on trillions of dollars of capital. The job creator class hasn't seen such low Capital Gains tax rates in decades, yet there is no job creation, at least domestically to speak off.
Is it because of regulations, yes and no. Is it because of the low cost of hiring offshore? That certainly plays into the game. Is it the US tax rate for corporations, again yes and no. Many type "C" corporations don't pat taxes or pay very little in taxes and type "S" corporations pass the tax responsibility onto the shareholders who pay at 15%.
Two Thirds of US Corporations Don't Pay Federal Income Tax: True But Horribly Misleading - Forbes
Is it government who is responsible for creating jobs or is it the private sector? It's a combination of both. Government policy dictates the private sector in many ways, such as regulations. Yet when the US had a very business friendly administration, the concept of off-shoring jobs hit it's stride, almost as many jobs were created offshore as were created domestically.
I surmise, based on history that's it's the private sectors obsession with the bottom-line that has created the overwhelming amount of people who are reliant on government. If a business can cut their most expensive cost of doing business (payroll) and still see record profits, why would they hire more wage earners?