So apparently there were two states passing laws to punish poor people last week

Because you know all these reps are like “Nailed it.”

Think Progress had this first piece on Thursday by Nicole Flatow.  Gov. Sam Brownback signed a bill last week to drug-test recipients of both welfare and unemployment. This makes Kansas the first state to implement the ALEC and Big Parma backed legislation because they will not be out done by other idiotic states. The law passed with a Democrat added provision to drug test legislators, but the provision is pretty weak. But tip of my hat to that Dem, who is at least trying.

The Wichita Eagle stated:

“The drug testing bill lets the Department for Children and Families require urine tests of any welfare recipient suspected of using illegal drugs. That could be triggered by a person’s demeanor, missed appointment or police records.

“Opponents of the bill said that may leave the decision open to people’s biases. But the bill was swiftly approved by the House 106-16 and backed by the Senate on a 29-9 vote […]

“Senate Bill 149, effective July 1, also bans anyone convicted of a drug-related felony from getting welfare for five years. Those convicted a second time lose benefits for life.

“The testing program for unemployment recipients is similar, although Department of Labor officials will require employers who usually drug test job applicants to submit a list of people who applied and didn’t get a job because they failed a pre-employment drug screen […]

“The state estimates it will need to hire four more employees to deal with drug testing and treatment management under the bill. The drug testing program and treatment is estimated to cost about $1 million the first year, after any savings from people losing benefits.”

In case you’re keeping score: 8 states have laws that test public benefit recipients or applicants, and 29 have introduced legislation in the last year.  A federal law passed last year authorized drug tests for unemployment beneficiaries. The bills keep spreading even through several courts have ruled to block state drug-testing laws as being potentially unconstitutional and all early indications show these laws are costing more money than just given the 2% of welfare recipients who use drugs benefits. The Florida law has been blocked by a federal appeals court back in February because, “The simple fact of seeking public assistance does not deprive a TANF applicant of the same constitutional protections from unreasonable searches that all other citizens enjoy.” The court also noted there is “nothing inherent to the condition of being impoverished that supports the conclusion that there is a ‘concrete danger' that impoverished individuals are prone to drug use or that should drug use occur.”

The Kansas law doesn’t mandate testing like the Florida law, but instead it requires “reasonable suspicion” to perform drug testing of already enrolled beneficiaries. Those who fail the first test can have their results retested at their own expense, and will be reimbursed by the state if the subsequent test is negative. If they test positive, they have to complete drug treatment and job skills programs before they are tested again and reconsidered.

Gov. Brownback, while signing the bill, called drug addiction a “scourge on Kansas,” but the law is vague on how to address addiction. Drug abuse programs are mandated for those who test positive, but there is nothing about an assessment in the law. Instead, it results in a poor person without income for six weeks while attending the program.

In a second story from last week it is North Carolina’s turn to shine. PolicyShop.net had a post by Ilana Novick last week on North Carolina’s legislature passing a background checks for social services bill. Novick begins by correctly asserting that you don’t need a background check to buy a gun in North Carolina, but now they are trying to require one for social services. There is so much wrong with the world. The bill, House Bill 392, enjoyed bipartisan support on a 106-6 vote. Wrap your mind around that.

The North Carolina House Health and Human Services Committee voted to make background checks mandatory in all of North Carolina’s Department of Health and Social Services (DSS) offices for anyone applying for benefits and trying to renew them. The law also requires that DSS tell local law enforcement agencies if an individual is a fugitive or has an outstanding warrant.

Of course, the bill provides no funding for performing the background checks. A lobbyist representing NC’s DSS noted at the hearing that the bill: “Right now, the county (DSS offices) are just strapped. We can’t afford another underfunded mandate.” It should cost the state's computers $144,841 to perform the background checks. The costs to local governments are unclear at this time, which is obviously why it passed.

North Carolina is the first state to pass a law requiring background checks, but according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, seven states have passed legislation for drug testing and 29 others have proposed it. I’ve ranted about how and why that is ineffective and a waste of money. But these are all backdoor attempts to end welfare and the social safety net.

Of course,  people looking for benefits almost always have children. So we’re targeting a vulnerable population.

Representative Paul Luebcke noted that the bill assumes “poor people were automatically suspect while well-off people were considered above reproach.” Yes, because poor people are all criminals and burdens on the system. Oh feel my rage. Luebcke, in an attempt to be my favorite person, submitted an amendment requesting that the state change the way job development grants are awarded making CFOs and CEOs subject to background checks. It was symbolic and not voted one, but the point stands.

Fingers-crossed this doesn’t take off. I don’t have the self-control for it. I should make a bingo game: this week in stupid welfare policy changes that do absolutely nothing but persecute the poor and cost money no one has. All of this is ridiculous and ineffective. I wish everyone would leave welfare to people who know what it is and how it works. Also, someone for the love of all things hold vote these idiots out of office. That is all.

That's it people are lazy

 Professor Richard Vedder of Ohio University is an idiot; well he’s an economist, which is basically the same thing. Vedder has an article in the Wall Street Journal where he argues that Americans are working less. The time frame for his assertion is from the mid-17^th century to the late 20^th century. I have a variety of questions for his flawed pseudo research such as:  Who are being included in the study? Women, people of color or slaves as they would have been called at least through part of this time period, are only wages laborers included? How does he control for that? Where his data is coming from? Etc.

He claims that economic growth was about 3.5% per year, but this has dropped to about 1.81% in the last twelve years. Vedder, being a genius has this all figured out, people work less. He claims there has been a decline in proportion of working-age Americans who are employed (he also notes nothing about outsourcing or how that could play a role or the rise of part-time employers) because people are lazy. Vedder, and I don’t doubt this, asserts that the increase in the employment-to-population ratio is because more women are being included as working-age Americans. Sure. I’m sold on that. We now have more people who “count” in the employable group. But the rise in the number of people looking for employment doesn’t have a negative impact on the number of jobs available resulting in an increase in the unemployed? The number of people of workable-age minus employment opportunities yields the unemployed. Not for Vedder.

Vedder argues that there are more working-age people not working. This is his argument:

“The decline [employment-to-population ratio] matters more than you may suppose. If today the country had the same proportion of persons of working age employed as it did in 2000, the U.S. would have almost 14 million more people contributing to the economy. Even assuming that these additional workers would be 25 % [no idea where he gets this number] less productive on average than the existing labor force, U.S. gross domestic product would still be more than 5% higher (800 billion, or about $2,600 more per person) than it actually is. The annual growth rate of GDP would be 2.2%, not 1.91%. The retreat from working in short has had a real impact.”

See this is where I’m confused by economists. They seem to believe everything exists in a vacuum. Where are the jobs people are refusing to take? One cannot really be unemployed unless there is employment out there to have. [Wow, I think I’m dangerously close to understanding philosophy.] For Vedder public policies are to blame. [I don’t think he knows his welfare history.]

• Food Stamps: Vedder claims that people work to eat. If the government provides food stamps then the lazy awful people will not work. Vedder argues that food stamps have increased over time, yes this is true. We let more people qualify for it by getting rid of racial (and clever) restrictions. But then he asserts that because the economy is recovering fewer people should be on them now. Except the poor are usually hurt first and feel the recovery last. Sorry Vedder, pick a new program because your logic demonstrates a gross misunderstanding at best and at worst an inability to do basic research [UMD’s Welfare Research and Training Group has lots of information on the subject].
• Social Security Insurance (Disability): Vedder once again, knowing nothing of the human condition because he’s never met one apparently, argues that American health has improved and thus these payments should be less. But now because health has improved we identify and know about more diseases, people are also living longer because of advancements in health care. That doesn’t mean everyone is perfectly healthy.  He doesn’t take this into account at all. You can read about Nicholas Kristof’s idiocy here, if you want to talk about SSI more. Vedder’s argument only works if everyone is healthy, he ignores that working people tend to suffer from more illnesses (including work related ones) than their academic counterparts.
• Pell grants: Wait, why is this on this list? Oh, he’s making the “we’re over educating the poor argument.” According to Vedder, people should know their place and work low wage jobs without aspiring to anything higher (he did a study on it with Christopher Denhart and Jonathan Robe for the Center for College Affordability and Productivity). He is right people with an undergraduate degree are having a harder time finding employment. He says nothing about the race to the bottom by corporates that results in lower wages or how that could affect this. He also, like so many others doesn’t even acknowledge who Pell Grants help. Just say it Vedder, you don’t want poor people who don’t look like you in your classes.
• Extended unemployment benefits: Nothing motivates you like abject poverty I guess. He argues this is paying people to stay at home. He also seems to lack any understanding of how unemployment or any of these benefits work. He talks about them as if they are free money. Clearly, Vedder has no experience with any of these programs, and they only exist in some abstract terms.

I can’t help but notice Vedder left TANF off the list. Afraid of who will come at you bro?

People pay into these programs through taxes with the expectation that these programs will be available for them if they ever need it. Cutting benefits will push people even further under the poverty line, and as another article by Michael Fletcher of the Washington Post points out, “Nearly a third of the nation’s working families earn salaries so low that they struggle to pay for their necessities, according to a new report [put out by the Working Poor Families Project]. The ranks of the so-called working poor have grown even as the nation has created new jobs for 27 consecutive months and is showing other signs of shaking off the worst effects of the recession.”

The Working Poor Families Project report also includes data from the 2011 American Community Survey that states 32% of working families earn incomes that put them at the poverty level. I can also tell you from my research, the people who have join welfare and food stamps during the recession stay on for shorter periods than those with a history of welfare receipt (we do an annual report on this). Only children receive TANF benefits without the work requirement. Everyone else works or has to prove a disability, which is really difficult. Now, they work low-wage jobs without benefits which can encourage people to turn back to the system if they face illness or pregnancy.

Weird, who to trust, who to trust? People who work with and study this population or some tenured dude who has a very limited understand of the programs has criticizing? Well, you can make that decision for yourselves.

Vedder concludes challenging people to rise up and insist on saving the nation by cutting benefits to the poor. He gives a head nod to worker-based immigration policy (which according to him is also to blame) and taxes because you can’t tax the rich. Then there is this gem: “If more people have less incentive to stay out of the work force, they might seek jobs and help spur economic growth.” Fuck you buddy. This guy doesn’t seem to have a twitter account or I’d be trolling him challenging him to live off the benefits he mentioned here. I’d like to see him eat off of $2 a day.

Cobra subsidy set to end September 1st

Ok, so why didn't I know about this? No idea. Really, I'm pretty on top of these things. I read a lot of blogs.

Cobra, the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985, is set to end on Thursday. Cobra allows people to continue with their health insurance plans after leaving their employment. This has a variety of subject matter including Title X, which allows the Public Health Services Act to deny income tax deductions to employers for contributions to group health plans.

In 2009, the feds subsidized Cobra reducing the costs for unemployment by 65%. According to The Kaiser Family Foundation the subsidy brought costs under control:

The average monthly cost of maintaining COBRA coverage without the subsidy is about $1,137 for a family policy and $410 for an individual, according to calculations from The Kaiser Family Foundation. With the subsidy, costs plummet to a more affordable $398 per month for a family and $144 for individuals.

Clearly, without the subsidy people are going to go without insurance, which is find because we have a public option...wait that's not right. Cobra enrollment ended in May 2010, but extensions for the subsidies prolonged them for the past 15 months. People would still qualify will lose that benefit on September 1. The $25 billion Cobra subsidy was predicted to help 7 million laid off workers and their families, but Kaiser found that the program doubled after the subsidy was made available. This implies many people couldn't afford insurance without the subsidy so I guess those program numbers will bottom out.

Important stats for this conversation:

In November, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that nearly 59 million Americans went without health insurance coverage for at least part of 2010. Federal health officials said 4 million more Americans went without health insurance that year compared to 2008.

Currently, about 9.1 percent of Americans are unemployed, according to the most recent statistics from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

This is a serious concern for the unemployed. But then again who cares. They're just poor people. But let's continue to fight for the rich people's rights to keep their money. Without insurance those pesky poor people won't be around for long [sarcasm].

http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/204002/20110825/cobra-subsidy-to-end-on-sept-1.htm