War On Philanthropy? No, It's More A War On Gov't Social Services To Justify A Pitiful "Charity" Substitute

In the latest iteration of the Right's boner for "private charity" to replace government social spending, we have as 'exhibit A', the WSJ piece  'The War On Philanthropy' (January 9, p. A17) by Karl Zinsmeister.   Again, as with previous efforts of PR con men, the claim is made that private charitable giving can be an adequate replacement for government social programs, like Medicaid, food stamps and even Social Security.

For example, as recently as 2016 I castigated then House leader Paul Ryan for his statement that it was feasible to "scale down federal assistance in favor of much more charity" -  citing the House of Help City of Hope in D.C. and Catholic Charities in Janesville, Wisconsin.

But as I pointed out (Jan. 11, 2016 post):

"Ryan here is obviously looking  at the fact there are now 40 million on food stamps,  up 53%  from 2008 and 54 million on Medicaid, up 21% over the same interval. But what escapes him is that the amount of charity that would be needed to leave government out of the picture is actually some twenty five times more than the actual volume of charitable giving!

For example, to make charity ends meet and fill the gap in the absence of government assistance, those rich Catholic and other lobbyists in DC would need to give about 14.9% of their income, not the usually cited 7.7% Similarly, all the other alleged generous conservo states would need to at least double up on their giving."

Contrary to Zinsmeister's twaddle, the situation has arguably gotten much worse not better, so private charity is even less able to cover the costs needed for the typical American family to survive.  The Federal Reserve working paper from last year is germane here, indicating the average middle class family does not even have enough reserve cash on hand to cover a $400 emergency.  Meanwhile, too many are bamboozled  by the monthly jobs report numbers, unaware most of those jobs are low pay - or at least not enough to (singly) cover exploding health, housing, food expenses.  I.e. if you work two or three jobs you might, I say might, make it.  (Let's also bear in mind that  average wages have remained stagnant for at least 40 years, factoring in inflation.)

 In Denver, for example, the average monthly rent has now reached $1680 -  way more than most of the current residents can afford.  Many  dwellers in originally low rent apartments are often issued notices they have to leave for "renovations" then are invited back after but with a 50% rent increase- which is way beyond their means.

In some apartments a formal eviction notice isn't needed, only the notice of rent increase, say from $575 /month to $975/month. That amounts to what one enraged resident said is a "quiet movement":   Can Zinsmeister's private charity cover such rent increases, far less the cost now to get a mortgage in Denver? I doubt it. (It is estimated a middle class family now needs a down payment of $68,000 for a typical Denver home just to be able to manage a $969/ month mortgage payment.  And that presumes a job earning at least $90,000- 94,000 a year.)

Compounding this, we learned  yesterday: 

Aiming at Wealthy Renters, Developers Build
More Luxury Apartments Than They Have in ...

(WSJ, p. A2) that developers are planning to add more rental units (371,000) this year than at any other period since the 1980s.  The problem? Most will be aimed at the wealthy in many major cities.  Why?

"Property developers say the costs associated with land acquisition and construction have become so steep that catering to affluent renters presents the best way to make a profit."

Add to that the fact that "the construction of single family homes for sale is well below historic norms"  and you have an affordable housing problem of epic proportions.   Given the enormous cost of a single family home in most major cities now, it's no surprise that people are caught in a money bind (too costly homes, too costly rentals ) and one which simple charitable donations isn't enough to correct.

The minimal affordable housing stock  nationwide also puts the kibosh on the claim that "an increase in luxury housing might  encourage more economically mobile renters to move up."  But not when such renters are only earning $20.75 /hr. as they are here in the Springs, on average.  So they can barely afford an apartment for $650/month using Section 8 subsidy, far less the $1385 for a regular single bedroom apartment.

Most newcomers to our state, for instance,  have nowhere near the earning power  to afford a single family home in Denver, or the Springs. Add in a family calamity like a child's illness, a bread winner's serious disease or injury, and there is a rather rapid descent into homelessness or at least trying to survive in one of the city's  homeless shelters, e.g.

A homeless family crowds into a corner of an Aurora, CO shelter. A food shortage at the shelter meant it had to seek outside assistance

Which truth be told is still preferable to living in a tent near Denver's Lincoln Park - which is now beset by rats.  ('Rats Close Park Near Colorado Capitol', Denver Post, Jan. 16, p. 1A)

Meanwhile, Zinsmeister paints progressives as "opponents of civil society"  - which he conflates with private philanthropy. This is  because "77 million ordinary citizens"  donate "the lion's share" of charitable gifts annually.  But as one alert WSJ letter writer has noted (p. A14, today),  those 77  million ordinary folks donate "mostly after tax dollars".  

 Zinsmeister goes on  in conflationary mode (ibid):

"The lion's share comes from ordinary citizens, 100 million of whom annually donate an average of around $3,000."

Thereby conflating the 100 m givers, mixing the 77 million ordinary folk (like wifey and myself) who donate in after tax dollars, with the 23 million who only pay capital gains tax - then get enormous ordinary income write-offs on their largely self-directed charities.  As the same WSJ letter writer puts it: "They are not only giving  away tax -free appreciated property but are also able to eventually shelter 100 percent of their donation against taxable income, a twofer."

Thus, the rightful jab by the NY Times, NPR etc. that any who invoke that ploy are guilty of an "elite charade", i.e. disguising their merciless taking (in tax breaks, write offs)  by appearing to give back.

As admirable as are the donations of those 77m  "ordinary" citizens  they do not come in concentrated, large amounts - so only have limited impact on large scale problems.  Hence, our  own charitable donations of roughly $250 / month (combined wife & me),  are not the same as the Tulsa, OK billionaires plunking down $30 million at one time to provide low cost housing for the city's  homeless, e.g.

• "Hobo Cities" Growing - So Why Don't The Billionai...

Hence, the latter have vastly more potential  to change lives for the better if they truly wanted to,  but only a select few do.  For example, if they truly wanted to they could invest billions in new antibiotic manufacture to halt the spread of  antibiotic resistant bugs, and the increased incidence of sepsis in hospitals, etc.  See e.g.

A New Year's Resolution For Bill Gates & Co. : D...

And:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-05-03/antibiotics-aren-t-profitable-enough-for-big-pharma-to-make-more

 This conflationary  error (private philanthropy with 'civil society') entices Zinsmeister to claim that those of us  who actually oppose charity replacing government -state funding"  insist it is "illegitimate" for "civil society groups to compete with the state".    In fact, this is nonsense, as we've always contended private charity - from whatever source-  needs to supplement government -state spending.   Thus, the family that needs food stamps and shelter (shown above) also needs ready access to free kitchens and services in the area provided by private charities.

But one thing you do not do is take away the government support - say in Medicaid, disability benefits and food stamps- and expect charity alone to fill the gaps left in the wake.  

As if to underscore this we now learn that the Trump cabal plans to alter criteria to receive disability benefits ('Tighter Disability Criteria Weighed', WSJ, January 10, p. A3)   The move, and related ones, could toss over 600,000 mainly older workers to the wolves.  Would private charity be able to make up the $30-40 million to avert homelessness, medical catastrophe? (Since the new plan also seeks "more restrictions" for Medicaid benefits.)

Then there is also the looming plan to toss another 600,000 (mainly women and children) off of the SNAP (food stamps) program by April.  Will private charity be able to make up the $50m, say via expanding food kitchens? Again, I doubt it.  Food kitchens in Colorado are already facing bare shelves even before the month runs out.  Many of those needing help came to Colorado in search of better lives but found only debt and paychecks that couldn't cover rent or utilities.

In the words of Kathleen Romig, senior policy analyst at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (ibid.):

"The sum total of it just makes it more difficult  for people to meet their needs when they fall on hard times -  really basic needs like food, housing, health care."

Lastly. it should not take a rocket scientist or Mensa level IQ to figure out that private donations are an unstable, variable source of support.  In recessionary periods, for example, contributions tend to crater - as they do when tax law changes are implemented. Say drastically increasing the automatic deduction so that there's essentially no incentive to itemize the charitable deductions. (So donating  becomes a waste of time for many with limited disposable income.)

All of which again reinforces the position of progressives and the left that charity has its rightful place - in a civil society - as a supplement to government assistance and benefits, not a replacement for them.  In addition, what we need to seriously consider now is Dem candidate Andrew Yang's proposal that everyone (especially in the lower economic strata) receive a universal basic income (UBI).

See also:

Why Advocates for the Homeless Are Forced to Repeat Themselves Again and Again

And:

Wealth Inequality

How Do Billionaires Make Money? By Having Money Already

Could Repukes Wreck The Economy By Cutting Food Stamps? Quite Possibly!

One doesn't have to read too much in the center right media before encountering the clarion call that food stamps, as part of SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) need to be cut, pared back.  One need look no further, indeed, than the recent (Apr. 13) WSJ Editorial ('Working on Food Stamps') which makes a series of outrageous and unrealistic claims that the SNAP benefit ought to be cut. (The editorial included the graphic shown, claiming food stamps had become an entitlement).  We read, for example:

"More Americans need assistance during recessions like 2008, but the question is why so many have stayed on food stamps even amid the long expansion."

That;s really a "Duh!" response -eliciting statement, given no one outside the upper 1 percent would make it. They'd be regarded as mentally deficient or incompetent. The obvious reason "so many" still need food stamps is that not everyone benefited equally from the so called expansion. Mostly, those at the top made out while the rest saw their wages stagnate so they were simply not enough to cut the mustard, often even working two jobs.

This is why the WSJ's other argument, i.e. "that too many Americans haven't returned to the labor force" is totally false. The "too many" Americans cited are actually children and elderly or retired people - not working people!  The incessant carping about "missing" Americans or the "low labor participation rate" is bollocks, because with an extremely low unemployment rate - sitting at barely 4%  that doesn't fly.

If there are "missing workers" in jobs it's mainly because the immigrants who might have picked up the slack are now in hiding  - thanks to Trump's ICE raids and assaults on sanctuary cities. The situation now so bad that many crops are rotting in the fields, e.g.

• California crops rot as Trump's immigration crackdown creates farmworker shortage

As for the "missing workers" in the other jobs well, blame that - if 'blame' is indeed the word -  on  the baby boomers currently retiring or retired (like yours truly). We have left gainful employment by the millions, well, because we saved and invested and now no longer need to work.  This is not some sudden revelation either. It's been known for years that a "labor crunch" from retiring boomers was imminent, but too many refused to believe it, preferring to imbibe the media jabber we'd all  need to work to 90.

The stupid thing which the clueless Trumpies have done is to make that retirement loss of workers much worse by cracking down on immigrants! Even the WSJ managed to get that right in an earlier editorial, 'The Vanishing Caravan'  (April  6, p. A14) underscoring the folly of the current immigration limits:

"Faster growth from tax reform and deregulation means a tighter labor market that attracts more migrants. Mr. Trump would be wise to trade border security for reform that allows more legal immigration to meet the economy's needs. Then he wouldn't have to pull stunts like hyping a band of poor migrants as an invading army."

The REAL question is why, with the current tight labor market the wages aren't rising faster to support families that need it- so they can get off food stamps! 

To answer this, back in January I cited a Denver Post Business column  (Jan. 7 p. 3K, 'Don't Get Your Hopes Up For A Raise') . Therein it was revealed by Paula Harvey, VP of Human Resources at Schulte Building Systems in Houston:

"Companies are really hesitant to give raises. When you give a raise, it's stuck in the pay system. It is something you're guaranteeing: it's becoming a fixed cost. "

She insists it's much better for companies to preserve "flexibility" so instead companies enact "variable pay". This can come in the form of one off bonuses - say on a per year basis- or if you are a stellar performer you can get a "bigger bump". It is also coming by having more workers work overtime, as opposed to hiring new  workers - either because they can't find them or don't want to pay higher wages. 

One also needs to be mindful -  as Andrew Gadomski, managing director of Aspen Advisors,   observed in the same piece -  that when companies lament they can't find workers to fill key openings, that is code for:

"I can find talent, I just don't want to pay them as much as they cost."

Well, ok, fair enough. But then the media and other whiners can't bitch because more lower wage  - or stagnant wage workers living in high cost areas (like Denver) -resort to food stamps.

This is exactly why Colorado is now experiencing an exodus of many thousands of people from other states, who'd originally moved here to chase the gold ring. They soon learned their new job wages were  inadequate to cover their new location's housing costs. (Trulia recently estimated that only 29 percent of homes listed on the metro Denver market are affordable, and that was to those workers earning at least $70, 790 in 2015.  This from The Denver Post, April, 8, p. 10B)

The median listing price for homes on the Denver market now is:   $529,000

The average teacher and cop wages are significantly less than the $70-k figure, and with rents running nearly $1,500 a month for a typical Denver area apartment, it doesn't take a math genius or Mensa member to run the numbers to see that after accounting for a domicile (whether rent or mortgage) and utilities, food - say to feed a family of 4 - there will be scant disposable income left. Hence, the need to supplement via food stamps.

But here's the issue now, with this new Farm Bill, the GOP is determined to kill the goose that laid the supposed "golden egg" via more growth with their stupendous tax bill.  The reason is they want to cut food stamps by nearly $130 billion over a decade  (WSJ, 'Food Aid Cuts Would Hurt Grocers' p. B1. April 7-8).   That represents a "20 percent reduction of its current annual allotment of $63 billion"  and moreover, "could constitute one of the biggest yearly reductions in program sponsored purchases for retailers since the recession."

How serious is it? According to Alex Baloga,chief executive of the Pennsylvania Food Merchants Association, quoted in the article:

"It's well known that the food industry operates on a 1 percent profit margin. So there's no way to absorb any kind of decrease in sales, It's just that simple. It would be devastating."

SO we are clear, that cut in SNAP would therefore  deliver a major hit to aggregate demand. Recall as per my posts during and after the 2008 recession, that ) Aggregate Demand or AD is the total demand for final goods and services in an economy at a given time. It specifies the amounts of goods and services that will be purchased at all possible price levels. This is the demand for the gross domestic product  GDP) of a country..

Clearly if the grocery sector is clobbered by this Farm Bill, via cuts to SNAP, there'd be a measurable hit to the GDP (estimated of up to 0.4% per year) given some  16 million households would no longer receive all their benefits on cards. (Instead they'd get meager benefits from food "boxes" with oats, canned beans, potatoes, rice, etc delivered to them - via food purchased wholesale by the government.

In other words, Trump's government would cut the national grocers entirely out of the purchase-demand loop, and little wonder grocers and trade groups have criticized this diversion. (ibid., p. B2)  Let's also note, for reference here, that if the grocery sector's  1 percent profit margins are cut or eliminated  they will have no choice other than to lay off workers.  Given the PA Food Merchants Assoc.  alone represents  3,500 grocery and convenience stores, and if an average of 10 workers are laid off from each, that is 35,000 more dependents who'd almost surely be needing food stamps.

Are the Trumpkins and GOP not bright enough to see this? That their SNAP cuts will likely crash their "golden economy" and lead to another recession? I doubt it, because the Right's ideologues - bent on austerity for the masses (who voted for Trump in droves) -  aren't invested in reality.

The reality is how these economic misfits incessantly yap about fiscal discipline and exploding deficits, yet when they're in power, inevitably pig out. The most recent episode of fiscal "gluttony" was their tax bill which promised to deliver huge benefits to corporations and ordinary workers alike.  But the corporations just used their largesse to buy back their own shares, thereby increasing stock valuations even further  '"making it even more difficult for stocks to absorb bad news without falling further". (WSJ, April 11, p. B14)

As for ordinary blokes, well, they aren't spending as the Reeps expected. (WSJ, today, 'Despite Tax Cuts, Consumers Shy From Spending',  p. A3). And why is this? According to Susan Sterne, president of Economic Analysis Associates:

"It's an old recovery, people just don't need as much."

But this isn't too surprising given for a $40,000 a year primary wage earner, the tax cut amounts to a total of barely $300 for a year. In which case  6- odd bucks a week wouldn't even be visible on their pay stubs. But they will most likely need food stamps, given their wages are stagnating while corporations would rather buy back shares than give decent pay.  So the tax cut bill's payoff is....drumbeat!  Zilch, zero, while digging us into $1 trillion-plus added deficits.

And then, lastly, we beheld insult being added to injury as today's WSJ editorial ('Crowding Out K-12 Education') lambasted striking teachers in Oklahoma and Kentucky.  In the case of the Okie teachers, they were too greedy given they were already to receive a $6,100//yr raise (By gasp! raising taxes on oil and gas) and besides "Oklahoma educators' mean annual pay only lags $1,000 - 3,000 behind the overall state mean of $43,340".  In other words, once that $6,100 is tacked on, they're above the state mean so there shouldn't be any more complaints.  As for the striking Kentucky teachers, they failed to appreciate poor little Gubernator Matt Bevin was just trying to make state "pension reform" a priority  - especially preventing greedy teachers from "gaming the system", i.e. "cashing in on accrued sick days at the end of their careers."

NO mention of how these OK and KY teachers have often had to also work Walmart jobs to make ends meet for their families. But that's the way the elites in this country roll.

The WSJ's  editors/ and business elite's hand wringing over food stamps  and Medicaid expansion - as well as striking teachers' greed-   is not to be taken seriously until and unless the GOP and its minions follow their own advice about fiscal responsibility. In the meantime, their best play is leaving the SNAP as it is, unless they plan to increase benefits! Oh, and giving those striking teachers the pay raises they deserve so they also don't have to resort to food stamps.

See also:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/jill-richardson/78775/another-counterproductive-assault-on-food-stamps

Errrr.....NO One Is Taking Joan Walsh Literally!

Joan Walsh used a reductio ad absurdum ploy to show how bad SNAP limits COULD  become if abominations like Brownback's KS limits on SNAP purchases were accepted. 

Evidently, the blogger who took issue with my take on poverty in Colorado and food stamps, seems to believe I took Joan Walsh's words literally as opposed to a metaphor of  (extreme) reference for what Repukes are trying to do in states like Brownback's Kansas. So let me clear the air here once and for all.

When I gave Joan's quote from a salon.com piece:

if you’re in Wisconsin, and relying on food stamps, remember that Republicans don’t want you to have ketchup on your hamburger.They’d probably rather you didn’t have a hamburger at all, but Wisconsin farmers and ranchers have clout, and so proposed cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program made room for Wisconsin products. But they still don’t want you to have “crab, lobster, shrimp, or any other shellfish.” Or ketchup. Or spaghetti sauce. Really.


I (and she) intended it as a reductio ad absurdum illustration of how bad it MIGHTget if bully programs like those Brownback has tried to implement in KS aren't halted or demolished. To remind readers, this was in reference to Brownback's ill -conceived notion of  limiting what Kansas food stamp-welfare recipients can purchase using their benefits. That included, but was not limited to, some minor pleasures, such as KFC chicken, Snickers bars, giant bags of M&Ms, or even playing an arcade game or two, buying a lotto ticket or paying to go for a freakin' swim.

Joan's point and mine then, is that if a brain dead scalawag like Brownback can get away with this shit in Kansas, what's to stop another state  from preventing or limiting people from buying food perks with their SNAP or welfare money - things that make burgers taste better like ketchup (catsup) or sauce for spaghetti, or hot sauce for rice, or bbcue sauce for spare ribs - oh wait, I forgot they mustn't eat ribs either!  Poor folk gotta stick to rice, oats, and such with no flavor.

Oh, and god forbid they try lobster thermidor or go to Red Lobster for unlimited shrimp. You see what I mean?   Thus, if one accepts Brownback's stupid limits one could see the pukes going even further to deprive SNAP folks of the good things of life. And my point was - as well as Joan's -, they SHOULD be able to enjoy those damned things even if receiving gov't benefits! (Certainly up to the limits they can afford, so if they have $22 left on the last day of the benefits month they ought to be able to get a bucket of KFC chicken - OR a few Five Guys burgers! It's not the state gov't job to wag fingers and say "Oh no!" for fuck's sake.)

The reasons were made clear in and excellent WaPo piece ('What Kansas Gets Wrong with Welfare Decision')  by Emily Badger but perhaps my blogger critic did't get them or didn't want to. To re-reference the point of the piece, Badger flayed the "logic" behind the Brownback bunkum noting,  "the decision is problematic in at least three really big ways" . This was after already skewering  the underlying  canard that it provides  "protection for the taxpayer who shouldn't be asked to help people who squander gov't money on 'vices'".

Ms. Badger's three arguments again:

1) Economic: There's virtually no evidence that the poor actually spend their money in the rash ways advertised by Brownback.  The poor are actually much more savvy about how they spend their money because they have much less of it - as Gweneth Paltrow learned when she tried the "SNAP Challenge" and gave up after 4 days. (She'd already exceeded the $29/ week  limit.)

2) Moral principle of equivalence:  She observes: "We don't require Pell Grant recipients to prove they are pursuing a degree that will get them a real job as opposed to say philosophy or English Lit. We don't require wealthy families who cash in on the home interest deduction to prove they're not using their homes as brothels."   In other words, the strings we attach to gov't aid are uniquely for the poor - as if being poor itself is somehow immoral-  requiring criminal monitoring- like for a felon wearing an ankle bracelet.

3) Prejudicial perceptions:  In many ways the lack of application of a moral principle of equivalence (2) arises because Americans who receive other government benefits fail to see they are also in the recipient class. They don't recognize that, like the poor, they are also getting something from the government and hence - at taxpayer expense.  The issue, again, isn't the specific benefit form - whether Medicare, VA benefits, or Social Security - but that ALL come at taxpayer expense!

But this is covered up in two ways: (i) the belief that their benefits are different because they are "special" or "earned" so can't be classed with SNAP or welfare, and (ii) their benefits are always "submerged" (hidden or more concealed) than compared with a SNAP recipient who must actually produce a special card (see image) at the grocer's so is immediately recognized as "on welfare".  Thus, the SNAP card inadvertently becomes a "badge" of shame that enables other gov't beneficiaries to instantly make judgments.

Political scientist Suzanne Mettler, cited by Ms. Badger, calls the judgmental gov't  beneficiaries part of the "submerged benefits state". This means their own benefits are more "out of sight, out of mind". Thus a SNAP card and a welfare check are "incredibly visible ...while tuition tax breaks and Medicare are not".   This submerged state, then,  is evidence of a basic and pervasive double standard.

It is time we remove that damnable double standard which was the actual thrust of Walsh's reductio ad absurdum. In other words, irrespective of the gov't benefits received (VA,Social Security disability, Social Security proper, SNAP) we let recipients spend them any damned way they wish up to the practical limits they can afford  - without, for example, resorting to theft or shop lifting to satisfy them. (I.e. once your monthly benefit is exhausted,  that's it - THEN you pinch pennies and maybe settle for rice instead of KFC chicken or Five Guys burgers)

Is that point clear enough? I hope so!

Seriously? Those On Food Stamps Not Allowed To Buy Any Goodies?

It is a sad fact, known mainly to those of us who have the opportunity to travel beyond our shores, that we inhabit a very mean-spirited country. This came out back in Nov.,2013 when the SNAP (food stamps) program was viciously cut back with far reaching repercussions of hunger - especially for 16 million kids.  Many pediatricians warned of the consequences, but the GOP didn't care. They were determined to cut so the military could get much more.

Now we learn of a number of states (such as Kansas) where plans are afoot - such as by the mean-spirited guv Sam Brownback, to pass legislation to ensure food stamp recipients can't even purchase anything that remotely hints of luxuries - including cookies, candies, cakes - as well as preventing families "on the dole" from using public pools. Are you shitting me? We're going to worry and fret about forlorn families and their kids having it too good when our whole malformed system is bent to ensure only the richest prosper and jobs are sent away overseas by the millions? Meanwhile, these same rich bastards are able to milk the system for everything it's worth to the extent they can even afford luxury, gold laminated bathtubs:

Excuse me, but what the hell is wrong with this picture? Well, the misbegotten notion - dispelled by the most basic research - that the "wealthy earned their goodies".  Oh yeah, they earned them all right, by pushing through policies that sent millions of jobs overseas. Policies started by the likes of "Chainsaw Al' Dunlap back in the nineties when he was with Sunbeam - and decided having jobs in Mexico was better for shareholders, since the Mexicans would only earn half of what Americans were getting - and no benefits. A shyster born every minute!

But don't think Dunlap is the only clown who did this and got away with it (hint: Jack Welch of GE did too)!  So then, years later the path was already paved for endemic poverty of millions  -yet the proud and the ignorant pound their breasts and believed they were doing a good thing by keeping the poor off "welfare" - hence designing the hideous "welfare to work" programs.

While all this was going on, I got a real kick out of some outraged WSJ pieces in the late 90s - some of which I still have- caterwauling about the nerve of those Germans to use unemployment benefits to take holidays in Italy or France's sun coast.  So what? If they need time off from pounding the pavement, big deal! But the WSJ and its snarky assholes made a federal case out of it, and then bragged how - at least in the US of A- we'd never allow any unemployment insurance recipients to get away with such nonsense. But see, the Germans aren't all anal about such stuff as we are. As my friend Reinhardt put it two years ago: "The Germans helped to pay in for those benefits and they can use them any way they wish up to a year. And if that means taking a holiday or two, so what? It's no skin off our noses and that's what we pay our taxes for!"

Which thinking would be totally anathema to the Puritan American, brainwashed by the early messages of John Calvin, to keep his nose to the grindstone if he wants to win an eventual place in the next world. Even today, evidently, too many buy into this Puritan-Calvinist bull pockey, hence the yen to ensure food stamp beneficiaries go to no amusement arcades, Malls or just to the candy store for M&Ms.  Jeezus, it makes you want to rip your hair out - the level of petty thinking - tied to "wasting taxpayer dollars" while the rich waste hundreds of billions a year with their own rancid games- including tax write offs and dubious trusts!

Look, no one - no American, "likes to" file for food stamps, but since the Bushies sent the whole U.S. economy into the crapper ca. 2007-08 with their push for minimum wage jobs only (and keeping the minimum wage as low as possible), sending 7 million other jobs overseas to China and India, and de-regulation of banks - allowing them to sell crap subprime mortgages to people who couldn't afford them, not to mention wreaking havoc with their tax cuts and wars of choice, lower and many middle class families have had no choice. The Bushie combo of massive tax cuts for the wealthiest combined with setting off a speculative bubble that burst in 2008 - with more than 30 million middle class folks losing up to 40% of their 401ks, engendered the need for families to seek food stamp relief out of pure desperation.

To now heap insult onto injury and assert they're not even entitled to some pleasures (including swimming - and we know how important exercise is!)  is just plain nuts and, as I said, mean spirited. Certainly, if the families are able to wisely budget their meager resources to have some enjoyment it ought to be allowed- without the likes of Brownback or anyone else having a cow.  And we can damned well afford to be a little bit generous here given how the parasitic wealthy are endlessly using their ill-gotten gains to splurge on expensive toys and trips, and gorging on  $25,000 (apiece)  Frrrozen Haute Chocolate   desserts,  while children go to bed hungry. Shit, those poor kids deserve a bag of M&Ms once in a frickin' while! 

Sensible Americans need to express outrage on this, at least to the same degree of decibels as when Indiana tried to foist its phony religious freedom laws on its people - in the name of bigotry. In this case, Brownback and his misbegotten ilk are trying to force perpetual misery on already downtrodden families by denying them even the most benign luxuries.

 I leave with Barb Ehrenreich's powerful words (This Land is Their Land, pp. 6-7):

"How many 'wake up calls' do we need, people? How many broken levees, drowned cities, depleted food pantries, people dead for lack of ordinary health care? (Waters poisoned by blown deep water oil wells)......Why don't we dare say it? The looting of America has gone on too long, and the average American is too maxed out, overworked, and overspent to have anything left to take. We need a new deal, a new distribution of power and wealth, if we want to restore the beautiful idea that was America".

With a new distribution of wealth and power, no American will have to depend on food stamps, and we won't have the likes of Sam Brownback or his clones dictating to people what they can purchase using food stamps or welfare monies!

See also:

http://www.salon.com/2015/04/17/why_gwyneths_snap_challenge_bombed/

Hey, Pope Frank! Child-Free Couples Are NOT "Greedy" and "Selfish"!

Isaac Asimov makes a crucial point  concerning overpopulation and carrying capacity at his Queen's Park Lecture in Barbados, on Feb. 6, 1976

Well, like Obama - it seems Pope Francis, or "Pope Frank" - as Bill Maher has referred to him, oscillates in the media between appalling (meriting virtual brickbats) and inspiring kudos and congrats. It seems the Pope's latest contribution to appalling - hence meriting brickbats - is calling out no kids couples for opprobrium. I mean, the pope actually called couples who choose not to have children “selfish” and part of a “greedy generation”.

Speaking on Wednesday, Francis said:

 “A society with a greedy generation that doesn’t want to surround itself with children, that considers them above all worrisome, a weight, a risk, is a depressed society. The choice to not have children is selfish. Life rejuvenates and acquires energy when it multiplies: It is enriched, not impoverished.”

Sorry, Il Papa, but on the contrary we are realists and also grasp the world is overburdened with a human plague as it is - contributing to everything from trashing the environment so nothing is left for future generations, to greenhouse warming (which will lead to the same end),  to mass extinction of other species, to ever scarcer and more costly resources - including food. You really want 1 billion deaths from starvation on your hands, Papa? I don't!

But the Pope, bless his heart, has an agenda - which is to populate the planet with as many Catholics as possible. That's why he denies them the use of artificial birth control - under the pain of committing "mortal sin" and going to "hell".  Well, for those of us no longer Catholic, let me offer clue one here: most of us left because we got tired of padres and popes sticking their noses into our bedrooms and lecturing us on reproduction. We took our own paths, and have no intent now other than to try to prevent the planet being trashed to smithereens by over breeders.

As for being "selfish", give me a break. We are actually people who are altruistic and volunteer and serve in many other ways. We just have to concede - most of us - that we'd make horrid parents because we're not wired for minding rug rats. We'd likely leave them locked up in a car while dashing oft to a meeting or conference, or we'd feed them the wrong foods (bratwursts instead of whatever else babies eat), neglect changing their nappies or worse, strike out at them physically in a moment of   impatience...because they're crying too loud and too long.

Thus, we regard ourselves as doing the world and society a favor by NOT having kids and we regard ourselves as morally superior to the yahoos who burble at babies before marriage, then have too many and can't support them. Or the turkeys who have two or three, then leave them in a car freezing while they run off for a tryst in a mountain cabin - like a woman did here in Colo. 3 years ago. Or, like the character in Georgia who left his kid locked in a hot car one sweltering day while he went to text online gfs.  Or the mom, again from Colo. - who helped hold her son down in a tub of boiling water while granny beat the "devil" out of him  Then there is the recent case of the woman from Provo. UT - reported in today's press- who admitted to killing 6 of her babies over 10 years. She said she couldn't afford even two more because of her meth habit.  NONE of these derelicts should have had offspring but they did. Does the Pope reckon any of these into his complaints? No, he doesn't!

But "Frank" is obviously railing at the recent trends, born out by statistics, that couples are having fewer kids or no kids. To fix ideas, in 1976 there were 1 in 10 childless couples - we actually call them child FREE - and now there are 1 in 5. The reasons are multifold but one of the main ones (apart from lacking a child-oriented temperament) is that it costs so damned much just to raise one kid to maturity - nearly $230,000.

That includes all the clothes you have to buy for them - and believe me they will demand the best brand names - not any old jeans or hand-me-downs, like we used to have. It also includes all the food you have to buy and it better be foods they like. Then we aren't even counting yet the costs of  all the electronic toys they will insist on including the latest and best smart phones, Ipods, Ipads or whatnot. Then there is their education through college and you can bet your sweet bippy it will have to be one of the "Ivies"  - State U. will not fit their inflated egos or designs. (And the "Ivies" means lots of moola spent on SAT prep lessons!) Lastly, even if they do graduate on time and all, you still aren't done with them because if they can't find jobs that pay enough with that fine arts or philosophy degree, they will want to park themselves right back home - and live rent free!

Thanks but no thanks! If you want kids, you have 'em, Frankie!  Oh yeah, you adhere to celibacy so it's easy to talk trash with zero experience. Including of making simple budgets as my folks had to do when we were growing up in the 50s, 60s - trying to keep 5 kids clothed and fed when one parent was often out of work.

So from all those POVs, kids are indeed a "weight, a risk" and a liability - at least to those of us who share this child-free temperament.

This is not to say all turn out that way. A perfect example is my great niece Shayle, now at UMASS, Amherst,  finishing her Masters degree in clinical psychology. She grew up in Barbados in the  90s, and so never had access to brand name clothing from hifalutin stores, or "cool ones" like J Crew. She basically wore the clothes her mom made her, or her great Aunt (my wife) passed on. She didn't suffer from problems and her peers didn't mock her or bully her for her clothing or her daily peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

When she graduated with honors, and a Barbados Scholarship - fully paid with money left - to Clark University - her mom and dad could rest assured she was on the right path.

But let's get real:  having a kid like Shayle is roughly the same odds as winning the Powerball. Maybe 175 million to one. To the realist with a diehard child -averse  temperament those odds aren't good enough to take the risk - say that you might get a serial killer, or druggie loser instead. (Think how the parents of James Eagen Holmes - the Aurora mass murderer - feel now as he faces trial).

What was always special about Shayle is that she was never swayed by external influences, be they her peer group or the media - which is always trying to peddle some useless crap to entice kids to get mommy and daddy to cough up $$$.(I still have the image in my head - shown on a.m. TV three days ago-  of the 4 yr. old brat lugging a giant 'Frozen' doll across the aisles and screaming at her pop to buy it or else.)

Thus, the choice not to have children in the end is rational and personal, not "selfish".  It is especially rational in a nation that pays lip service to children and "family values" but by its actions discloses it doesn't give two craps about them. If it did it would have free child care like many European nations so parents didn't have to hock their homes and cars to be able to go off to work!

And then there is the Reptile party which - despite the fact 15 million kids are already living in conditions of food insecurity - are prepping to cut food stamps once more from the SNAP benefits program, e.g.

http://www.salon.com/2015/02/12/the_callous_party_gop_poised_to_further_cut_food_stamps/

So why would any sane person bring kids into such a child-hostile political environment?

Lastly, the Pope is delusional when he asserts that:

"Life rejuvenates and acquires energy when it multiplies: It is enriched, not impoverished.”

No, not really. Too much "life", in terms of the human population, can overtake and overburden a fragile world which can barely provide for all the people living on it as it is.  On any given day nearly 1 billion are living on half or fewer calories than they need and it will only get worse with climate change ramping up. Not yet attended to is the scarcity of water.

In the ‘State of the World’ report (2000, pp. 46-47), it is noted that the ever increasing water deficits will likely spark “water wars” by 2025.As they note (p. 47):

Quote:

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“When a country’s renewable water supplies drop below 1,700 cubic meters per capita (what some analysts call the water stress level) it becomes difficult for the country to mobilize enough water to satisfy all the food, household, and industrial needs of its population.”

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The same 'State of the World’ report notes at present rates of decline and even without factoring in the worst global warming influences – the number of people living in water-stressed countries will rise from 470 million to 3 billion by 2025. More than a six-fold increase

One of the first to emphasize this planet has a limited "carrying capacity" was the science and science fiction writer, Isaac Asimov.  Asimov, as part of his Queen's Park Theater lecture in Barbados in February, 1976, touched on the specter of overpopulation and warned that humans had two choices: Decrease their population to the point of the carrying capacity (which he estimated at 3 billion) or nature will increase our species death rate - whether via violent climatic events we can't even foresee right now, or new virulent diseases,  or nuclear war. He also remarked:

"It is now the willingly childless woman who is the heroine of our planet. She is the one who now deserves all the kudos and praise, for helping to do what is necessary to spare humanity from the ravages of over-population"

We who are rationalists are far more likely to attend to the words of Asimov than to the Pope. We choose being child-free not only because additional humans pose an unsustainable burden on limited planetary resources but also because we are self-aware enough to realize we aren't cut out to be part of the faux child-centric cult that dominates this nation.  Pandering to the selfish whims of kids as "consumers" but nowhere to be found when actual child welfare is at stake.