States Consider Drug Tests for Welfare Recipients

Originally posted by aLiiEn

No, you have an ego, because you think your job makes you better than other people.
When you are just the same as them.
What you think makes your whole entire life of slavery, so good, can be removed from you quicker than you can blink.
If you worked in a job, that didn't require these kinds of tests.
You wouldn't expect to be tested for them.
Yet all people receiving welfare, should be tested for them?
Is being on welfare, a high risk job, that requires these tests?
No, it is not.

No, I don't think I am better than other people. But, you seem to think that welfare recipients are better and should not have to do the same things most Americans have to do to retain their jobs/benefits.

My life is not slavery. I choose to work. I choose to provide for myself. I choose not to depend on other people to prop me up. But, if there ever was a time when I had to depend on state assistance, then I wouldn't care what requirements there were for receiving it and I would work like hell to be on it for a very short period of time.

Being on welfare is accepting assistance from tax-payer money, you, me, our families, our neighbors, and other hard working people. It shouldn't be free money without restrictions. It shouldn't be a lifestyle. And, there should be strings attached.

Originally posted by aLiiEn

No, you have an ego, because you think your job makes you better than other people.

That is a personal attack, and uncalled for.
.

If you worked in a job, that didn't require these kinds of tests.
You wouldn't expect to be tested for them.

Have you applied for a job, lately? Name a job anywhere, that does not require drug testing! Unless you are self employed, it is required virtually everywhere! It is not just high risk jobs that require drug testing.

Yet all people receiving welfare, should be tested for them?
Is being on welfare, a high risk job, that requires these tests?
No, it is not.

Yes, everyone should be tested, even the dependants of the people applying!

reply to post by MikeboydUS

The community service idea you have is great.

In some states this is already in effect.

Originally posted by aLiiEn
No, you have an ego, because you think your job makes you better than other people.
When you are just the same as them.
What you think makes your whole entire life of slavery, so good, can be removed from you quicker than you can blink.
If you worked in a job, that didn't require these kinds of tests.
You wouldn't expect to be tested for them.
Yet all people receiving welfare, should be tested for them?
Is being on welfare, a high risk job, that requires these tests?
No, it is not.

It's not about risk. It's about the reason for the money in the first place - to help get families back on their feet, to help get individuals back on their feet. If they can afford drugs, they have no business receiving welfare. There is no reason to supply drug abusers and drug users with tax payer's money, so that they can continue an illegal practice. There are people out there that need the money, and they should rightly get it, but I'll be damned if the money that I worked for is going to go to some junkie who can't be assed to get a job because he's figured out how to get his fixes through the system.

Maybe I'm just thinking in the old-school way, though? Perhaps times have changed now. Socialism, anyone?

reply to post by Highground


The old school way needs to come back.

Times haven't changed that much for a lot of us. And, it is not too much to ask for people receiving public assistance to meet the same criteria that people who have jobs have to meet.

reply to post by jibeho

Nothing says yummy like buying a warm and raw T-Bone from a crack head.

LOL,

reply to post by Highground


That is true that welfare is not a constitutional right.

The community service would have to have an appropriate level of compensation though to not be considered unfree labor.

I would advocate that in such a system compensation would use something like Eagle Cash or EZpay that is used by the US military. Eagle Cash is electronic currency stored on smart cards that can be recharged at special kiosks and can only be used at specific places of exchange.

The goal with the Eagle Cash would be to reduce any exchanges involving illegal goods and services.


[edit on 26/3/09 by MikeboydUS]

reply to post by skeptic1


Why would using 'illegal substances' seriously harm an individuals ability to job hunt when the vast majority of 'illegal substance' users successfully hold down jobs of all kinds?

The whole benefit system needs overhauing, I agree it should not be a lifestyle choice.

I question you supporting the discrimination against one section of society.
Why just target 'drug users'?
What about people who speed in cars or commit other traffic offences whilst receiving benefits?
How can they afford a car?
What about people commit acts of violence against others?
I suppose it's ok for them to receive benefits.
What about people who protest against the government?
Perhap we should limit their ability to receive benefits.

Due to T&C and respect for the site owners it is impossibe to discuss the pro's and con's of drug use, not ABUSE, here.
Indeed it is not about that, it is about the targetting of one particular section of society in a discrimatiory manner.

Originally posted by Freeborn
reply to post by skeptic1

 

I question you supporting the discrimination against one section of society.

This has nothing to do with discrimination against a group of society. This has nothing to do with legality of drug use.

This is about random drug testing of people who are on public assistance.....who are getting handouts from the tax-payer, to put it bluntly.

Most people holding a job today are subject to random drug tests. If people holding a job and earning a living are subject to random drug tests, then give me one good logical reason why those who are not holding a job, earning a living, but are receiving tax-payer funded assistance should not be subject to random drug tests.

Good topic and many ideas, and good arguments on this thread...

I feel that requiring testing for assistance would be very discriminatory.

How could the country backtrack in this manner by denying welfare, unemployment compensation to a mother with 4 kids, living in Section 8 housing, for toking on a doobie? It is about the children, is it not?

For the children, a phrase that has been drummed into the populace for decades.
NO WAY would benefits be disallowed to that mother, for the sake of her children... no matter that she's had 2 of the kids, while on assistance, and received a raise with each of them.

In that respect, it is discriminatory. The single dude would be chopped, immediately, and probably be required to return a percentage of the funds received.

Sorry, no amount of rehab is going to keep the addicted from beating the system. Just like now, the undeserving are finding ways on the dole, regardless of drug use, it will continue, and they will continue to abuse the system.

It is not an easy fix, and one that I fear we will not have to be concerned with for long...

reply to post by skeptic1


And what I am saying is why do you support restricting benefit for those who commit the crime of taking 'illegal substances', what about people who commit other crimes?
If you only support the restriction against drug users then you are discriminating against them.

So it's ok for paedophile's, rapists, murderers, committers of violent crime, fraudsters, thieves, burglars etc to receive benefits?

Originally posted by Freeborn
reply to post by skeptic1

 

And what I am saying is why do you support restricting benefit for those who commit the crime of taking 'illegal substances', what about people who commit other crimes?
If you only support the restriction against drug users then you are discriminating against them.

So it's ok for paedophile's, rapists, murderers, committers of violent crime, fraudsters, thieves, burglars etc to receive benefits?

Actually, they cannot, per the US law. They are "felons," and "felons" cannot receive benefits.

reply to post by Freeborn


No, that's not ok. I said that a couple of pages ago. There needs to be an overhaul of the system as a whole and strict regulations and guidelines put in place.

One of those should be random drug testing. I am still waiting to hear one logical reason why people on tax-payer assistance should be exempt from random drug testing when the majority of employeed people have to go through it.

Originally posted by pyrytyes


How could the country backtrack in this manner by denying welfare, unemployment compensation to a mother with 4 kids, living in Section 8 housing, for toking on a doobie? It is about the children, is it not?

If you think it's ok for a mother of four, to be toking on a doobie ,while on welfare, then that explains why this bill is being introduced! It is about the children, and any parent who feels they need to smoke a doobie, has no right having any children, lest a person who expects tax payers to support them!

I am all for this. I know way too many people who abuse and use the system and it really pisses me off. If you are going to receive assistance you should not be on any illegal drugs! You are getting help and yet people are using this money to buy drugs. I know one person amongst many who receive unemployment, yet they use that money to get drugs and get drunk every night all while losing their cars and homes. I mean it's sick!
I work 6 days a week and about 60 hrs a week to make ends meat. I have a job where I make my own schedule so I am lucky but it's very very slow and I have to work as much as possible to get what i need.
I dont understand people who just sit on their bums all day and do nothing to at least try and fix their situation. I have heard people say "oh I wont work there" yet they are on assistance! I mean right now a job is a job and if it were me I would take anything I could get!
What really gets me is when people abuse it and then it ruins it for people who really need it. I may be bias since it's my sister but she has been trying to get assistance for YEARS and is turned down every time. Her bf barely makes enough to pay the bills, she has been laid off and is at home with my nephew. She applies everywhere and when she finds a job she winds up getting laid off or they no longer need to position. She has tried for assistance and cant get it. YET I know people who LIE to get assistance and they dont need it. My sister really does. I help them out with money. She went and applied with her friend who was laid off and needing help as well. Their boyfriends work together and they both have one kid. Her friends bf makes more money in his position. Well guess what her friend was approved and my sister was denied?! How?! I do not like making this a race issue so I am sorry if it sounds like one. My sister is white, her friend is black. Now how does one get assistance when their income is about 8k more a year than someone else?! My sister has been trying for a while and each times is denied. I have seen this many times in the past and it sickens me.

Ok sorry for ranting....this is a sore subject to me. I just get tired of people abusing the help they get while others who really need it suffer. It's not fair.

Originally posted by skeptic1
No, I don't think I am better than other people. But, you seem to think that welfare recipients are better and should not have to do the same things most Americans have to do to retain their jobs/benefits.

My life is not slavery. I choose to work. I choose to provide for myself. I choose not to depend on other people to prop me up. But, if there ever was a time when I had to depend on state assistance, then I wouldn't care what requirements there were for receiving it and I would work like hell to be on it for a very short period of time.

Being on welfare is accepting assistance from tax-payer money, you, me, our families, our neighbors, and other hard working people. It shouldn't be free money without restrictions. It shouldn't be a lifestyle. And, there should be strings attached.

Yes, on here, you come across, and no doubt in person you would be worse.
To think you are HIGHER and BETTER than people.
I didn't say welfare recipients are better than anyone.
In fact I tried to explain to you, how they are the same as you.
Your life is slavery, you are a slave to the illegal federal reserve.
You choose to do some work, ok, but you don't choose to have part of your money stolen from you.
You might need someone, one day, to prop you up, what are you going to say then?
You new everything?
Yes you would care, if you were unfairly judged, and harshly labeled, as a person who was considered bad to others.
Then you WOULD miss, indeed, say that you were unfairly judged.
Being on welfare is acknowledging, the faults in the system.
It is acknowledging, that tax payers are victim's of crime.
No one lady, and I mean no one, in this great republic, ever authorized income tax.
Why don't you go look it up, miss braino?
You are just another example, of an under educated, go with the flow, plod along.
That makes JP Morgan rich.
You are the people, with all good intentions, that make the world, a worser place.
I am done trying to help you understand where you went wrong, in your brainwashed thinking.
Either figure it out, or get out of my way.

reply to post by skeptic1


Don't know about over there in the US but over here in the UK the vast majority of people DO NOT require drug testing in their work place.

I think I have made my view perfectly clear.

The benefit system is being abused by many, many people, not just drug users, and the whole system needs to be reviewed and radically overhauled.

reply to post by aLiiEn


You need to calm down and get a grip.

No one is saying that people receiving welfare are a lesser group of people. They are a group of people who receive benefits funded by the tax-payer. If people with jobs have to get random drug tests in order to keep their jobs and benefits, then people on public assistance should not be treated differently.

And, yes, I know all about the tax thing. I wasn't born last night.

Plus, it seems like you can't make an argument for your side of this without resorting to personal attacks. Most of us don't have to resort to that tactic.

No one is discriminating against welfare recipients. If this happens, then they will be treated just like the majority of the people in the country who hold jobs.

How the hell is that discrimination??

[edit on 3/26/2009 by skeptic1]

reply to post by Freeborn


Well, here most people do have to undergo random drug testing in almost any job.

And, I agree that there are huge abuses in the welfare system. The system needs a complete overhaul. I just feel that random drug tests of all public assistance recipients is a good first step to that complete overhaul.

Originally posted by aLiiEn
Yes, on here, you come across, and no doubt in person you would be worse.
To think you are HIGHER and BETTER than people.
I didn't say welfare recipients are better than anyone.
In fact I tried to explain to you, how they are the same as you.
Your life is slavery, you are a slave to the illegal federal reserve.

Let's start here. You are implying that you are better than all of us by making these statements. You have our government all figured out, you know that our economy is based off of an illegal scheme, and we're all the same. Makes you sound a little self-righteous, doesn't it? Makes you sound like exactly the person you're calling us, if not moreso. We don't claim to know these peoples' lives, as you claim to know ours.

You choose to do some work, ok, but you don't choose to have part of your money stolen from you.

It's not stolen. In fact, if you pay your taxes and apply for the benefits, you actually see your federal withholdings come back. Not that you'd know this, as I'm sure you avoid this "illegal system."

You might need someone, one day, to prop you up, what are you going to say then?
You new everything?
Yes you would care, if you were unfairly judged, and harshly labeled, as a person who was considered bad to others.
Then you WOULD miss, indeed, say that you were unfairly judged.

I might possibly need help one day, and I'll be willing to do what it takes to get that help. Submitting to drug tests, sure. I'd have more problems to worry about than scoring my next hit if I was on welfare.

Being on welfare is acknowledging, the faults in the system.
It is acknowledging, that tax payers are victim's of crime.

Howso? I daresay you're trolling given this statement.

No one lady, and I mean no one, in this great republic, ever authorized income tax.
Why don't you go look it up, miss braino?

Actually, it's written in our constitution. Why not give it a read, sometime, instead of regurgitating "facts" you hear from ill-conceived conspiracy movies? (I'll give you a hint: 16th amendment)

You are just another example, of an under educated, go with the flow, plod along.
That makes JP Morgan rich.
You are the people, with all good intentions, that make the world, a worser place.

Again, with your accusatory stance and your "holier-than-thou" attitude that you try to claim we have.

I am done trying to help you understand where you went wrong, in your brainwashed thinking.
Either figure it out, or get out of my way.

Good riddance.

[edit on 26-3-2009 by Highground]