You know, I gotta say that of all the things I could worry about, how much the government spends, thus how much of my tax dollar gets consumed by that spending, how much it spends on welfare and similar programs is very low on the list of things that disturb me. There are a few reasons why I don't really care all that much:
- Welfare is spending that returns more to the economy than it cost to provide.
- Welfare is spending that helps individual and specific human beings.
- "Corporate welfare" consumes far, far more of my tax payments and goes indirectly to support individuals who have less need for the help than do welfare recipients, if only by dint of their being employed by those corporations, if not an ownership stake.
- I really don't care whether every welfare recipient "needs" the help; I care that without welfare, the people who do truly need the help will receive less help than they do currently. I might care were welfare to consume a share of my tax payments comparable to that of "corporate welfare," but it doesn't doesn't, and I'm not going to be so heartless as to complain about the relative pittance welfare takes from my taxes, even considering whatever graft that may occur in welfare programs.
Welfare is spending that returns more to the economy than it cost to provide.
This is entirely false, by any economic measure possible. In fact, it's false by the very nature of the system, without trying to measure it. At the very fundamental level, it is logically impossible for what you claim to be true.
Welfare is spending that helps individual and specific human beings.
Depends on how you define help. While I was in college, I was forced to watch an educational video about a guy who lost his job, because of an apartment fire, where he failed to buy rental insurance, and lost all his tools. Instead of getting a job at a fast food joint, he got public housing assistance, but then was faced with the dilemma that if he got a job, he would be kicked out of the public housing. So instead he just remained unemployed. After being there for 2 years, he openly on camera admitted he was considering suicide.
There's your "help".
Compare that to the shelter I worked at, which pushed and helped people get jobs, and furnish their own apartments as soon as they earned the money to sign a lease. That's real help. Helping people to move on. Not helping them to stay in misery for life.
And let's not forget that for every dollar of taxes, the end welfare recipient gets about 20¢. That's your 'help'. Where as for every dollar given to the charities I support, the end recipient gets about 90¢. That's real help.
"Corporate welfare" consumes far, far more of my tax payments and goes indirectly to support individuals who have less need for the help than do welfare recipients, if only by dint of their being employed by those corporations, if not an ownership stake.
Total lie. Just simply not true. You have been brainwashed by liars. Pure and simple.
By the way, just for the sake of a hypothetical argument, if I had no choice, but to choose to either give money to a corporation or to a welfare recipient, which would I choose? The Corporation. How many jobs have you gotten, created by a welfare person? How many products have been made by a welfare person? How many products and jobs are created by corporations? Millions. Billions. Trillions even.
Any rational person, if they had no choice but to pick who to give money to, should pick corporations.
I really don't care whether every welfare recipient "needs" the help; I care that without welfare, the people who do truly need the help will receive less help than they do currently. I might care were welfare to consume a share of my tax payments comparable to that of "corporate welfare," but it doesn't doesn't, and I'm not going to be so heartless as to complain about the relative pittance welfare takes from my taxes, even considering whatever graft that may occur in welfare programs.
By the way, if you want people to get off welfare, and get good jobs, who are they going to those jobs from? Corporations.
(click the image to access the source)
Social Program "ROI":
Ok, there is so much BS material here, that it would take too long to answer it all. Let's focus on the first image.
First, it's impossible to know how much in taxes someone making $50,000 is paying, because it all depends on what deductions they qualify for. If people earning less than $47,000 a often paying zero in income tax, how they pretend to know how much tax they are paying at $50,000, is illogical.
Second, unemployment insurance is also paid for by states which have to levy taxes, and also through lower wages, as employers pay workers less money, to cover unemployment compensation costs. So $22.88 is no where even close to the true cost to the employee.
Third, Medicare tax rate is 2.9%. Assuming this tax payer, had zero deductions, he would pay at a minimum $1,450. And that doesn't include higher costs of health care service, caused by Medicare. Health care providers have to charge non-medicare patients a higher cost, to cover the shortfall in payment by Medicare. Again, no where even close to the $235.81. Also Medicare and Medicaid are additionally funded at the State level, which is more taxes on top of Federal taxes.
Fourth, while the cost of Federal Employee retirement and disability, might be $43.78, that doesn't seem to include the fact that Federal employees earn significantly more than private worker, and that 7% of their much higher wage is paid into their retirement. So paying directly into Federal retirement funds, may not be that large, but we pay Federal employees nearly 50% more in wages, and 7% of that massively higher wage, goes into retirement. And both the wage, and the retirement fund, come from tax money. So that $43.78 is way under the real amount. Once again this already completely wrong number, does not include State and Local level employees, many of which are mandated at the Federal level.
Fifth, the FEMA budget is completely misleading. While FEMA may only have a budget of $10 billion dollars, that $10 Billion doesn't cover anything. It's simply for the operations of the government agency. A lot of people don't know this. FEMA doesn't have any assets of their own. They don't own stores of food, or fuel, or equipment. FEMA coordinates the operations of other groups. For example, when FEMA delivers diesel fuel, and diesel electric generators to a location, FEMA doesn't own the generators, the fuel, or the trucks which deliver such items. Instead the local agencies, state agencies, or other Federal agencies provide, and pay for, such items. FEMA simply coordinates where they go. That's one of the reason FEMA gains so much criticism. They only have one job... and they can't even do that one job very well. Regardless, that $3.94 is a tiny.... TINY fraction of the true cost of disaster relief.
Sixth, Welfare and Food Stamps are obviously so far off the mark, that it makes me question if it's an intentional outright lie. Both Welfare and Food Stamps, are funded at all levels of government, from the Fed, State, to the local level. All which have to be paid for by taxes at each level. Even at the Federal Level alone, they must be excluding most welfare programs, to come up with such an unbelievable low number.
The Federal government spent $100 Billion on housing assistance alone. Almost $500 Billion was spent on welfare programs, just at the Federal level. Not including heating assistance and Obama Phones, and other similar programs. In fact public transportation assistance, is basically a welfare program. On top of that, you have knock off costs, like paying law enforcement agencies to investigate welfare and food stamp fraud. Here in Ohio, the Youngstown crime family is notorious for buying food stamp cars, and laundering the money.
So the claim that food stamps and welfare, only cost $45 dollars is clearly BS.
Seventh, the Military is a bit of a joke. DOD spending goes up in down every year, sometimes every month. How they can even attempt to claim that "it costs X much" when it changes month, is beyond me. Bit intellectually dishonest. But regardless, defense of the nation is the one job the Federal government is supposed to do. So I don't really care what the number is.
Lastly, the corporate welfare.
The $4,000 is completely off the deep end. It's not true, not accurate, with zero support. It's wrong. Period.
Corporate subsidies in the US Federal Budget is roughly, at most, about $100 Billion a year. That translates to about $870 per family. A person only making $50K a year, would pay a fraction of that, compared to the more wealthy. So that $4,000 is simply made up left-wing mythology and lies.
Moreover, the source for your mythological $4,000 cost, comes from the Common Dreams organization. One of the ways they make up this $4,000 subsidy, is by including tax breaks. But a tax break isn't a subsidy. For example, when you take the mortgage interest tax deduction.... is that a subsidy? It's exactly the same as a corporate tax deduction. So is everyone being subsidized? Let's end your subsidy first. Practice what you preach brother.
But what makes this even more funny, is that they actually contradict themselves in their own post.
Add It Up: The Average American Family Pays $6,000 a Year in Subsidies to Big Business
Now read what they say:
The Huffington Post article notes that without the taxpayer subsidy, those banks would not make a profit. In other words, "the profits they report are essentially transfers from taxpayers to their shareholders."
So without this tax break, they would make zero profit. Do you see the problem there? If they made no profit, they would pay zero taxes at all. Your subsidy (tax break), allows them to make a profit which is taxed. The alternative, where they make zero profit, they would pay zero tax.
In the action of making their argument, they contradict their own position. How dumb can left-wingers be.
And to finish this off, it is true that the Federal government does hand out $100 Billion in corporate subsidies... which is much lower than the $480 Billion spent on welfare.
But even then.... which side, the right wing, or the left-wing, is pushing corporate welfare? Currently the country leader in subsidies is Iberdrola, a Spanish energy company, which gained most of it's subsidies, in Wind Power generation projects. Now is green-energy grants a right-wing thing, or left-wing thing? You guys. Not us.
You are the ones pushing for Ethanol subsidies, and agri-business subsidies, and green-energy, and all the rest. Not us. You did this. Complain to yourself.
