Poverty

So in reference to my previous post about Michael Moore, I decided to think about poverty. Moore said a strong social safety net is needed to support people in poverty so that they do not resort to breaking into homes etc.....

How much stronger of a net do we need?? Seriously - even in the United States, poor people have MUCH more access to assistance than anywhere else in the world. My friend goes to Costa Rica every year and her husband is a doctor and they are planning to move there in the next couple of years to practice medicine. Not because he will get rich, but because the people there are in dire need of EVERYTHING and this family wants to help. As soon as they tie up their finances here and can move down there with buckets of money, they are going to do it. My friend came back a couple weeks ago from her last trip and said that poor people in North America have no idea what poor really is. We HAVE social safety nets here, up the wazoo, and have for a very long time, but there are still people around the world in much more dire circumstances and they have no access to help. But guess what - in all the years my friend has been going there, nothing of their's has ever been stolen. The maids dont pilfer their rooms even though they dont make enough money in one day to use the washing machines at the local laundromat. The local kids dont try to steal my friends' kids phones and music or shoes and clothes. She said they are the most wonderful people she has ever met and she always cries when they have to leave. Youd think, living in such poverty as a one bedroom shack with a dirt floor, those kids would be trying to steal everything in sight to make their lives better - but it has never happened. Not in the town they go to anyway. But she comes back up here and has to lock her house down like fort knox because it has been broken into so many times. Yet the people near her have access to soup kitchens, extremely low priced clothing stores (or free), help with housing payments, health care payments, school payments, etc. She is disgusted by the people up here acting as though they have 'nothing' but not wanting to work for it either. Of course, there are many people out there who work their asses off and get a totally bumb deal in life, but for the most part what I have seen is people being greedy and wanting wanting wanting and not being happy with anything.

I speak from first hand experience through work. I have to watch single moms complain about their daycare bill when it only costs them about $20 a month from their own pocket. Or if you factor in all the CCTB etc they get, they always get free childcare. I watch them drive up in their brand new convertables (seriously, this just happened 2 weeks ago!), or their Jeep Liberty, or their brand new minivan, or whatever cars, and having packs of smokes in their designer purses, dressing their kids in Nike, Ed Hardy, Adidas, Point Zero, etc etc, brand new Nike shoes, or DC, DC hats and coats and fricken lunch kits. Mom having a smart phone, kid getting an iPad or iPod for birthday, and I just want to throw up! That is what you are helping a hell of a lot of people buy for their kids when you slog away at work every day and get hundreds or thousands taken off your cheques before you can put it in the bank. It disgusts me.

I get on the bus with a host of single moms every morning that are going to college. I see their brand new fancy strollers, they are tapping away on their smart phones the whole time, their kids are all decked out - and I watch them get off at another daycare, knowing that we are paying for that, and knowing we are paying for their college too. I dont help them with money so they can have a smart phone and fancy clothes. I want their kid to grow up with a decent roof over their head. Here is my take on it - if they have enough money each month to pay for all that stuff, they are getting too much!!

I think a major problem with robbery etc is actually the Entitlement class we are bringing up. Entititled to have everything right from birth instead of working for it. Wait til all those girls finish college and get a good job and then they might not get any assistance anymore, depending how much they will be making, and they are going to be shocked back into reality big time. What will they tell little joey who cant have DC runners anymore? Is he going to understand that mommy makes too much for assistance now and has to pay for everything herself, and he wont go steal someone else's DC runners? He will suddenly learn to work to buy his own? Hmmm dont hold your breath..