A conversation on TED.com: We need to stop giving money to those who are simply lazy, and need to get a job!

Neil Greco
Minneapolis, MN
United States

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We need to stop giving money to those who are simply lazy, and need to get a job!

This question, or statement really is one I hope to have debated from both sides of the tracks... Who agrees? and Who disagrees? Take a stance and state your rationale that backs up your stance.

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Topics: Underclass

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gary marinin
- 0
Jul 3 2011: These citizens you speak of, are they corporations? They happen to get way more in bailouts and tax breaks than is put into social welfare. If you don't attack corporate welfare first, then you don't even belong complaining about social welfare. What about automation that has put people out of work? With technological advances you get people who did work hard being displaced because of technology. Is that their fault? Do you know what drives labor prices down? It's the fact that is always a high enough unemployment rate so that corporations can have a large labor pool to pick from, which keeps wages down and profit up. Even if everyone wanted to be employed there would be no way to have 100% employment.

This post is a great example of what capitalist media has done to our society, let's blame the poor because they're clearly just lazy!
dick hopkins
- 0
Jul 3 2011: The Mormans have a good solution too. They'll feed you, but you gotta work in the fields in return.

The only people we need to help are the helpless. Physicall and Mentally, there are some that need help.
The rest can have food.
What do you do about the illegals and thier whelps? I'm for sending them back across the line with a warning about imprisonment in a barbed wire prison, outdoors, with little to eat!
The DNC buys votes from the 'needy' with handouts of the taxpayers dollars. Why do we need the Democrats, Liberals and Socialists?
Dick
- Mark Meyer 10+
  - 0
  Jul 3 2011: Whelps? I wonder why you chose the word 'whelps' to refer to human beings? Do you know that whelp is used to mean the offspring of animals? Were you intending a certain connotation? Here's a link to the English Learners Dictionary:
  
  http://www.learnersdictionary.com/search/whelp
Tourville Delerme Jr.
- 0
Jun 28 2011: I don't believe laziness is good, I just think we notice all to quickly the poor that are given table scrapes while oil companies that make record profits rake in unseen amounts of subsidies from the Gov.

Due to the export of manufacturing working class jobs oversees coupled with a systematic attack on workers' rights the gap between the rich and poor are growing due to joblessness.

If you can work you should. I work. One more thought it's not just about lazy people. It is about the kids they have. Is it fair for a child to suffer due to a derilect parrent's bad work ethic.

Communism is a failed model but uncheck Capitalism proves just astoxic.
Tim blackburn 30+
- 0
Jun 27 2011: but but but i thought this was a capitalist country, theres no way capitalism could be exploited! thats commie talk. serious though, just because you work and get paid dont mean you cant exploit the system you work for/in (or remove yourself from responsibility for who you work for (for the banker comment) )
Tourville Delerme Jr.
- 0
Jun 27 2011: Sponsered lazziness gave us the aristoctratic nobility, lofty philosophic systems, and creative playrights.
Daniel Sheehan 20+
- +1
Jun 26 2011: I hope that you are always capable to work and what you've put away for your retirement always stays where you put it.
Matthieu Miossec 100+
- +1
TED Translator Associate

Jun 25 2011: I think the amount of peope who are not getting a job simply by laziness is overexagerated. There will always be leeches in the system, but we should not have to make the other honest job seekers pay for these occasional leeches. I'm sure there are much more glaring inneficiencies at higher levels that could be fixed. I'm going to venture the possibility that you agree with me Neil and that your title is not your own opinion but a starting point for conversation.
- Neil Greco
  - 0
  Jun 25 2011: When I was working on my MBA the ethics professor related in simple terms that the rich, who want to be able to drop a factory or store anywhere.. prefer the masses to be disenfranchised.. easy source of cheap labor who will not question their good fortune to have a steady job... Viva the bankers?? I think.. I am just agreeing with a guy named Tim of whom I think his last name is Banker :)
Mark Meyer 10+
- +1
Jun 24 2011: A couple points:

1. This is a common sentiment, but those promoting it rarely supply an example of a real-life, simply lazy person who is collecting welfare. Everyone has difficulties, challenges and setbacks. It is rarely simple in my experience.

2. Welfare is not just for the benefit of the recipient. It is in our best interest to prevent rampant poverty even if that means spending money on people we don't think have properly earned it. Poverty increases crime rates, negatively impacts health, and represents wasted opportunity for our society and economy. Rather than thinking of welfare as a handout, think of it as an investment in your safety and health. Also, I suspect it's cheaper than incarcerating people.
Dain Brammage
- +3
Jun 24 2011: So, are you saying that if someone is on welfare they are just lazy? Because that is what I am hearing. There are many reasons to collect welfare. With with the unemployment rate as high as it is it seems like a pretty uncaring move to post this.

I think that every person in this great rich country of ours deserves a decent life, health care, shelter and to be able to eat healthy food. We can afford it, and we can afford to do it well. Socialization of human care is not communism, much to the chagrin of Fox News and the sorts who try to paint that picture.

We have a duty to our fellow human beings, and we are falling far short in the United States.
- Neil Greco
  - 0
  Jun 25 2011: One is being Lazy :).. However I think that is disapearing with better management.. and, yes, I want fund to go into people.. However, Tim keeps making a startling argument about bankers.. I think he thinks they only work on wall street.. Maybe he has some affiliation? :)
- Bob Shingles 10+
  - 0
  Jun 25 2011: "We can afford it, and we can afford to do it well."
  
  I have heard this statement over and over again and it simply is not true. No evidence is ever given to prove that there is and always will be enough money.
  
  "As Baby Boomers start to retire and draw down these benefits, there will be fewer workers to support them. By 2040, the Social Security Trust Fund will be depleted and, instead of a surplus, there won't be enough revenue from payroll taxes to cover the benefits." http://useconomy.about.com/od/glossary/g/Soc_Sec_Trust.htm
  
  There are other issues which makes the welfare state a bad idea.
  
  The problem is that the safety nets have been extended well beyond what they were meant to be and they have grown to be too expensive.
  
  Paying people for being unemployed for up to two years is ridicules. In most cases in the United States, the employees do not pay into the unemployment insurance. In the few states that the employee do pay, the amount flowing out is greater than the amount going in.
  
  Dain, what you call "duty to our fellow human" I call slavery to beggars.
  - Dain Brammage
    
    0
    Jun 28 2011: The rhetoric of the moment is stop spending to fix everything, do not raise the taxes, not even on the rich. In Europe this is called austerity measures, and it further penalizes the lower and middle class. It is as though the rich want a two class system again, serfdom if you will. Will we cut spending on defense some of the some of the proposed cuts, as well as raised taxes, a little on the middle class, and a lot on the rich, then we would be setting ourselves up for success.
- Drew Bixby
  - 0
  Jun 28 2011: Dain, you stated, "With with the unemployment rate as high as it is it seems like a pretty uncaring move to post this."
  
  Are you saying we should not discuss certain things? I would argue that it is better to air out comments. This is a great forum to debate these kind of issues. There is a greater chance of people seeing the issue from a different perspective if they post it for discussion than if they keep their beliefs internal. Wouldn't you agree?
  - Dain Brammage
    
    0
    Jun 28 2011: No, I am saying that you lumping all of the people who receive social benefits into a single category of Lazy, when the unemployment rate is so high is reckless. Many of those people want to work, but the governments stance that the rich create the jobs is flawed and not working. FDR put people back to work with social programs, government paid work that created infrastructure that is now crumbling. We need to replicate that, it will broaden the tax base and reduce the welfare roles.
    
    I will say this, your point of reference for this conversation has gotten people talking, but it created a very adversarial conversation.
    - Tim blackburn 30+
      
      0
      
      Jun 28 2011: this^ the shear number of water pipes needing replaced or fixed alone would create so many jobs, not counting the bridges/highways/dams ect.
Helen Hupe 20+
- +1
Jun 24 2011: I think the state of Oregon had a pretty good solution. If you were able bodied and were receiving welfare, then you were put to work in public service to do jobs that were not being done by regular employees. This was some time ago when the economy was better and sure enough the welfare rolls decreased.
- Abhiram Lohit 10+
  - 0
  Jun 25 2011: That's a pretty neat solution. It's like killing two birds with one stone. On the one hand, this finds out the truly needy from the truly lazy. On the other hand, some work gets done for the money being given out.
  
  Nobody said collecting welfare means not doing any work at all, and sitting at home until you get a job. It means you should feel morally obligated to contribute in any way you can.
- Neil Greco
  - 0
  Jun 26 2011: Minnesota is similar.. You get assistance.. you get on a "Welfare to Work" program. I have worked with persons who were used to the old system which was "babies = more assistance... no questions asked." I love this system because it will still provide some aide, like childcare, food assistance if you keep looking for and if you get employed... So much better than built in dependency... :)
- Drew Bixby
  - 0
  Jun 28 2011: Sounds good, but what about people who do the public service, but do it poorly? Do you "fire" them? If so, then what do you do, especially if they have children?
  - Abhiram Lohit 10+
    
    0
    Jun 29 2011: OK, how about this: we begin at the highest rate of "pay", and hope the public service is of acceptable quality. If this quality goes down, the amount of welfare goes down.
    
    I mean, come on, people who had jobs got those jobs in the first place because they were smart to the extent of the job. How they got fired may not entirely be their fault. But if they don't have the adaptability and learnability, then they'd have a lesser chance to find a job again. Why not start being more adapting and learning when you're on welfare, and do a good job?
Michael Roberts 10+
- 0
Jun 23 2011: Yes, we do...Not sure what you are hoping to get out of a discussion based upon your initial question.
- Neil Greco
  - 0
  Jun 24 2011: An honest reply by the brain washed and maybe some debate from those who don't think they deserve what they have and the rest can "eat cake.." Where are you on this spectrum? Ever went hungry???
  - Michael Roberts 10+
    
    +1
    Jun 27 2011: Yes, I have been hungry. I've been on the edge of poverty, the proverbial living from paycheque to paycheque with not wiggle room should I be fired.
    However, your initial question seemed simplistic(you've clarified your position since I wrote the above comment), as it would be obvious that we shouldn't reward the simply lazy, rather than the legitimately unemployed. However, what I was reading when I initialised saw your OP was the hint that you felt that Welfare= paying the lazy, which, although there are scammers, doesn't hold true to the fact that there are many people who need to have welfare to avoid slipping even deeper into the cracks.
Tim blackburn 30+
- +6
Jun 23 2011: those bankers? tell me about it!
- anthony bruni 30+
  - +1
  Jun 24 2011: Ha I don't think I seen someone twist the conversation in a better way.
  
  Banker indeed Grumble angry in the air grumble