Fixing Welfare

If you live in a large metropolitan city like New York, all you have to do is visit any cashier at the end of the month to see the long line which wraps around the dividers, making it impossible to use the cashier services unless you’re willing to wait a while. In my case, Ill come back tomorrow. I have no patience. Who are these people you ask? Americas Welfare roll. In New York, benefits come in at the end of the month, and unlike days of yesteryear’s where the welfare check and or foodstamps were mailed to welfare recipients, they are now electronically loaded into a Government debit card, and the recipient has to go to a cashier to withdraw funds. Hence the overcrowding at the cashier.

But this is not about crowding, I mentioned the cashier because when I see its crowds at the end of the month, they remind me of the corruption, wastefulness, and laziness surrounding the Welfare system and its recipients. 

The Government has tried to tackle this problem throughout the years with poor results. One solution is known as “Workfare”. This is a system whereby a Welfare recipient has to work a predetermined amount of hours per week in order to earn his/her keep and continue to qualify for Welfare. the problem with this system is that it creates a pool of free labor, adding to the pool of cheap labor known as illegal immigrants. If Workfare participants work for free, employers might not hire staff. There is no incentive for employers to hire people or create jobs. And many Welfare recipients have tried to circumvent being forced to work by faking a medical condition which prevents them from working.

So if Workfare does not work, what is the solution? While there is nothing one can do about the disabled, elderly and truly needy, or those legitimately looking for work in a market with high unemployment, there is something we can do to hold the abled body on Welfare accountable, and break the generational dependency once and for all. Here is my solution:

1. No added benefits for mothers who once on Welfare, continue to have kids. This solves the problem of Welfare moms looking to increase their free income by squeezing out babies like a flesh factory. And trust me, it happens.

2. Any Welfare mother whose child drops out of school, that child’s benefits are immediately suspended. This will hold Welfare mothers accountable and start penalizing them for failing or refusing to take a more active role in their kids education. 

3. Mandatory drug screening once a month. If you’re using your Welfare benefits to go out and feed your drug dependency then my taxes should not be used for that purpose. I would employ a three strike policy. After the third failed drug test, NO MORE WELFARE.

4. NO WELFARE for undocumented illegal non-US citizens. PERIOD! Can’t afford to live here? Who invited you?

5. And lastly, I would add an educational incentive. If you’re a young mother on Welfare, who is a High School drop out, I would increase benefits if you get your young butt back to school, get your High School Diploma or GED. For the increased benefits to continue you would have to, once a week, check in with your social worker and provide proof that you’re currently attending school or a prescribed course of study toward your diploma. Once accomplished, we can work on getting you into the workforce.

 

Next Stop, Medicaid;

Medicaid fraud accounts for billions of dollars from tax payer money each year. Particularly in New York, where we have the highest Medicaid expenses in the nation. Two types of fraud occur, from the recipient and the provider. 

The provider commits fraud when he/she submits a false, exaggerated, or duplicate (with different date) claim to the Department of Health.

The recipient commits fraud when he/she forges a prescription, obtains a duplicate prescription, lends out or borrows anothers Medicaid card or re-sells items or equipment obtained through Medicaid for drug money. Not to mention the abuse by those who love to hang out in hospitals to get a free sandwich, so they fake an ailment and use their Medicaid privileges.

 

Solution:

1. No private doctor operating out of a private medical clinic or a basement with a shingle hanging on the wall may submit a Medicaid claim unless its accompanied by that patients referral from a bonafied hospital emergency room with a verifiable unique doctors emergency ID referral number (such an ID number does not exist, but that can easily be arranged). A patient with an HMO cannot step out of their network without a referral, the same should apply for patients on Medicaid. ALL Medicaid patients should have to go through an emergency room, since Medicaid should be provided for emergency purposes ONLY anyway. Ive known cases where patients have used their Medicaid benefits to obtain cosmetic surgery.

2. Except for the elderly or disabled, ALL Medicaid recipients would be mandated to pay a $5 co-payment, for both hospital services and prescription services. Don’t have $5? Not a problem, they will be deducted from your Welfare check at the end of the month. This will put an immediate stop to the emergency room sandwich seekers, those slight headache cry babies, narcotic abusers, and will effectively clear up the over crowding in our cities emergency rooms. 

 

Are these solutions perfect? Maybe, maybe not, but they will go a long way toward fixing our growing Welfare problems. And I don’t see any solutions being offered on either side of the isle. Do they seem cold and harsh? Inhumane? I’ll tell you whats inhumane, the proud poor bastard working three jobs in the winter to keep food on the table for his family while a welfare mom sits back on the couch in the warmth of her Welfare payed apartment watching cable while yapping on her cell phone with  her girl friend about plans for Saturday night. And that’s reality folks. JP