"Fascist" Thought Of The Day

A modest proposal to end welfare.

A camp, in a remote place. Nice air-conditioned trailers. Well stocked Wal-Mart style store across the street. You can stay until the kids leave high school. They graduate, you get to stay six more years. They graduate college in that time, you get four more. Not too bad, huh, 28 years with no bills? All you have to do is keep your kids healthy and in school for K-12. Is that asking too much?

However, no cable. No satellite dishes. No cell service. No cars.

You can leave whenever you want. Daily bus service to a transportation hub to take you back to your home town. If you leave, you never come back. Even if you starve. Kids starve, you go to jail for premediatated murder, you CHOSE to leave a zero demand environment.

Now, the kids. They NEVER get to come here with their kids, neither do their grandchildren. We invested enough in them, far more than we invest in the people who never apply for welfare and work crappy jobs to take care of their kids (Thanks Mom!). They should have at least a high school education and hopefully many will have college.

Welfare gone in a generation. I think that it is worth it.

Michele Evermore questioned this idea, "Kinda takes away thier ability to get out of the welfare situation, though, doesn't it?"

Ravenclaw Eric replied, "You'd have to also make sure the schools were _tough._ NO slack cut for athletes, no excuses accepted for poor performance other than medically-based ones, no misbehavior tolerated, and severe punishment for misbehavior."

I responded:

What I have proposed gives Mom some interest in seeing the kids through high school (oh, no GEDs). Six years rent free if they don't even bother with college. Encourage the kids to get that college education and she gets four more. Potentially ten years of no rent and no kids to take care of. Pretty damn generous actually. And that is on top of the 18 years of rent free raising the kid.

I do not care about hurt feelings. I care that the system produces functioning, tax paying adults. The cost of the program should produce benefits that exceeed the costs, the current system doesn't.

There are several escape options. First and foremost, stop making babies that you cannot afford to raise. I call this the "Never touch the tar baby option". Any time the poor welfare mommy feels that she is being put upon, she can leave. The job market is still there for her. I am not asking her to do anything my mother didn't do. What I have proposed is the stick to go with the carrot. The kid cannot just pork out a kid and hop on the 18 year free ride in the camp. Welcome to motivation 101. The kids will be on their own, but have every opportunity to obtain the skills that will allow them to make it. Show me where the current system does this. To me this is all about the children, I want them to succeed. My idea does not deny them shelter, clothing, food, education or medicine. It does deny them some luxuries.

The program is not manditory either. You can CHOOSE to not enter the program and go it alone. I hope that this is a popular option. But if you expect me to pay for your kids, your kid is going to join me as a citizen. I demand it.


And another thing. I don't envision a ghetto or reservation. I want a nice, clean place. Playgrounds, grass and birds chirping. Give the lawn maintenance to the Army (some soldiers might even be visiting where they grew up!) Hell, give security to the military too.

Some stuff is going to be harsh though. Mom cannot plunk out any extra kids. She has to follow the camp rules (which won't be draconian) just deed restriction type stuff about keeping the grass mowed and such. She has to stay out of jail. She goes to jail, kids go to adoption. Remember, this is for the kids, not mom. Kids go to jail? There is a pickle. I have to think on that, but my first thought is kid goes to jail, mom leaves. If there are other kids with her, they go to adoption.

This program should represent the last chance, not the first choice. The goals are twofold, make responsible adults, and eliminate the need for such a place.

Ravenclaw Eric replied again: "One thing that a lot of people don't understand about the Victorians and their workhouses was that the Victorians were _not_ cruel. If anything, they were soppily sentimental by our standards. They just knew what did and didn't work. The reason Oliver Twist's workhouse was so bleak wasn't to punish the poor for being poor, but to make it a literal last resort, instead of a place to go for a free, parish-funded vacation. Yeah, it was tough on orphans...but maybe it was better to be tough on them than to allow a whole class of hereditary parasites to evolve."