Does Welfare Encourage Dependency - 1368 Words

Jar’ee Rhodes Professor Davis ENC 1102 16 July 2012 Does Welfare Encourage Dependency? Created by Franklin D. Roosevelt during the Great Depression, the idea of welfare was to help those who are living in poverty and need help to feed their families. Since then, welfare has helped people in many ways, such as unemployment insurance and food stamps. However, with over 4.4 million people, Welfare has evolved from a program that is designed to help people who have fallen on hard times, into a large scale program that often keeps more people down than it helps lift up. It has become a program where people are encouraged to be dependent on the government. With the amount of people who are currently on welfare many critics feel that this†¦show more content†¦As well as receiving low paying jobs, substance abuse among welfare recipients is another thing that hinders the ability to become independent. In America today, about fifty percent of welfare recipients have substance abuse occurring in their homes. According to James L. Payne the author of â€Å"Overcoming Welfare: Expecting More from the Poor—and from Ourselves,† welfare payments promote idleness and dependency by undermining the social disapproval of dysfunctional behaviors. He is telling us that social norm has changed to a point where welfare recipients are no longer ashamed of relying on the government to support them. Also according to the article â€Å"Substance Abuse and Women on Welfare† written by Barbara C. Jordan and Frank G. Wells, researchers from The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, twenty-eigh t percent of adult individuals receiving assistance abuse or are addicted to drugs and alcohol, a higher rate than the 20 percent of people in a comparable age group not receiving assistance. However, these results are not accurate. For instance, many recipients who abuse drugs refuse to tell it or if they did they may not admit to doing it frequently. Also many people say that drugShow MoreRelatedThe Australian Welfare State and How to Kick it1401 Words   |  6 PagesWelfare dependency has increased dramatically since the mid 1960s, with a growing trend of more claimants and fewer payers. Saunders believes the welfare system is revealing serious flaws which are encouraging welfare dependency mainly due to a system which does not encourage self-reliance and work ethic for the majority of recipients. 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