Weekend Reading

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Wants To Raise Taxes On The Rich - And Americans Agree
Economists Get Serious About Harm From Monopolies
Declining Birth Rates: Are We In Danger Of Running Out Of People?
The House Democrats' Colossal Election Reform Bill Could Save American Democracy
Why You're Wrong About Communism: Here Are 7 Huge Misconceptions About It - And Capitalism
Why Scott Walker's Welfare Legacy Will Outlast Him
The Future Of The Great Lakes
Anticompetitive Mergers In Labor Markets
Labor Market Concentration
Beware of Consultants Bearing Rosy News About Mergers

Unions Did Great Things For The Working Class

Weekend Reading

Wisconsin's Unprecedented Welfare Reform Could Inspire Conservative Changes Elsewhere [And That's Not Good]
Wisconsin Is Shifting Up To $90 Million In Local Road Funding To Foxconn-Related Projects
The Metamorphosis Of Scott Walker
David Brooks Radical Dishonesty
Wisconsin Labor Unions File Lawsuit Over Act 10, Saying It Violates Free Speech
As Manufacturers Get Tax Reductions, Wisconsin Homeowners Pay More
The Supreme Court's Latest Union Case Is Designed To Kneecap The Democratic Party
Could The Supreme Court Really Bust Public Sector Unions?
Trump's Tax Cuts In Hand, Companies Spend More On Themselves Than On Wages
A Wave Of Corporate Propaganda Is Boosting Trump's Tax Cuts
Mueller And Trump: Born To Wealth, Raised To Lead. Then, Sharply Different Choices

Weekend Reading

The Transfer Problem and Tax Incidence
You Better Learn Our Lesson
Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies
Subsidies, Spite, and Supply Chains
There's Very Little Welfare Left For Trump To Reform
Economic Might By U.S. Metro Area
The More Guns, Less Crime Scam
Intellectual Property For The Twenty-First Century Economy
Those Luxury Condos Look A Little Drab
Insects Are In Serious Trouble
How Amazon Undermines Jobs, Wages, and Working Conditions
Amazon HQ2 And The Rise of Big-Ticket Megadeals
Big Question For U.S. Cities: Is Amazon HQ2 Worth The Price?

Weekend Reading

GOP Lawmakers To Write Blank Check To Hire Lawyers
Donald Trumps Economic Inheritance In 7 Charts
Janet Yellen Debunks Trump's Case For Killing Dodd-Frank
The Chair Of The Federal Reserve Just Fact-Shamed Donald Trump
Banks Are Lending A Ton, Despite Trump's Claims
Walker Proposes Eliminating Labor, Judicial, Education Oversight Commissions
Four Milwaukee County Retirees Receive Pension Backdrops Topping $1 Million
A Short History Of The Trump Family
Updated Figures Show Manufacturing & Agricultural Tax Credit Is Inefficient, Costly
Pharma's Inflated Claim About Drug R&D Costs
How Drug Companies Inflate Research Costs To Justify Absurd Profits
Walker Proposes New Welfare Work Requirements In Wisconsin
Wilbur Ross And The Era Of Billionaire Rule
The Illusions Driving Up Asset Prices
How Statistics Lost Their Power - And Why We Should Fear What Comes Next

Milwaukee Subsidizes The State

Milwaukee Subsidizes The State

In fact, even as Walker was libeling the state’s biggest city, the reality is the opposite was true: it was Walker’s state that was the relative loser, that was leeching off the city. By 2012, the data shows, the city’s economy had become so successful that Milwaukee got back just 88 cents in total state aid for every dollar in total taxes it paid to the state. 

That includes every category of state dollars flowing to Milwaukee, from state aid to Milwaukee Public Schools to shared revenue to cities, transportation aid and other smaller categories, and also includes every form of taxes flowing from Milwaukee to the state, including sales taxes and personal and corporate income taxes paid by city residents and businesses. All this information is tracked by the state Department of Revenue (DOR) and it shows Milwaukee is a net contributor to the state.

Weekend Reading

Tim Cook's Disingenuous Argument to Justify Apple's $215 Billion Offshore Cash Hoard
Ronald Reagan Wasn't A Ponzi Schemer
Suburbs Trying To Attract Millennials Diverge on Development Patterns
The Sinister Side of Cash
Media Loves Doomsday Stories About the West's Water Crisis. Here's What They Miss
The Freedom Lover's Case for the Welfare State
How to Learn to Love Maths
Undervalued Properties Deprive Schools of Millions in Funds
Life got better for pretty much everyone under Obama

The Economic Recovery Hasn’t Reached America’s Schools

Conservatives' Government Dependency Fairy Tale

Acclaimed Mensa member and Wrangler jeans spokesperson, Sheriff David Clarke, following the calamity in Milwaukee, has fingered "progressive policies" as the cause of the protests.

The growth of the welfare state” encourages the destructive behavior seen on Saturday and Sunday nights...

“These progressive policies have hit the black community like a nuclear blast, and until we reverse this government dependency, that’s what creates all of this – and encourages it, by the way,” Clarke said.

Just like the good little conservative soldier he is, Clarke regurgitates right-wing tripe on cue.

In case you haven't heard, everything the Democrats, liberals, etc. have ever done is the cause of everything bad in the world. Nevermind reality or facts, everything the Democrats, liberals, etc. have ever done is the cause of everything bad in the world.

TANF Continues to Weaken as a Safety Net

In 2014, for every 100 families in poverty, only 23 received cash benefits from TANF. This is down from the 68 families for every 100 in poverty that received cash assistance when TANF was first enacted in 1996. This ratio, which we call the TANF-to-poverty ratio (TPR), has declined nearly every year since 1996 and reached its lowest point in 2014.

Improving the State of Our Welfare State

By the time Bill Clinton first ran for president, the concept of public assistance had diminished to such an extent that that he pledged to “end welfare as we know it.” He fulfilled this promise when he signed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act of 1996. With the stroke of a pen, the government’s largest direct cash assistance program for families with low or no income AFDC was replaced by the more restrictive Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program. What was called “welfare reform” at the time was in fact an attempt to lessen the financial commitments of the federal government. It also included several features advanced by conservatives, including time limits on assistance, connecting benefits to work effort, and a block grant structure that gave states greater discretion in how to distribute resources.

The End of Welfare as We Know It

More than 13 million people received cash assistance from the government in 1995, before the law was passed. Today, just 3 million do.

If nothing else, these policies were an effective way to reduce the number of people on welfare rolls. People on the left and right agree that they helped change a program that was in need of reform. But there were real human costs too: Those who didn’t find jobs, who weren’t working, who lived in states trying to reduce their cash-assistance programs, were left to struggle on their own...

Today, in large part because of welfare reform, the safety net—the set of government efforts to come to the aid of the country’s citizens when they are down on their luck, much of which has existed since the Great Depression—is thin and getting thinner. And this thinning goes beyond welfare, which gives needy families cash support: On April 1, between 500,000 and one million childless adults will lose access to food stamps (officially known as Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP). This is the belated consequence of a rule that was part of Clinton’s welfare reform, which stipulated that childless adults can only receive three months of food stamps if they aren’t employed at least 20 hours a week or in a training program. For years states received waivers for the rule, but in many states, governors have chosen not to ask for extensions for this year.

How the rise of America’s massive military welfare state led to the decline of the civilian welfare state

Over the past four decades in the United States, as the country has slashed its welfare state and employers gutted traditional job benefits, growing numbers of people, especially from the working class, grasped for a new safety net – the military. Everyone recognizes that the US armed forces have become a global colossus. But few know that, along with bases and bombs, the US military constructed its own massive welfare state. In the waning decades of the 20th century, with US prosperity in decline, more than 10 million active‑duty personnel and their tens of millions of family members turned to the military for economic and social security.

Reality appears to be almost the exact opposite of what Clarke claims. It has been, in fact, the decline of the welfare state and the lack of investment in the poorest persons and neighborhoods that has caused the current situation.

Too much money for stadiums and the well-connected, not enough investment in the needy and underprivileged.

In can also be argued that our recently militarized police state has diverted dollars from more appropriate investments in the communities that need it most. We keep increasing our police force in communities nationwide, claiming a need for law and order. But, what if, rather than employing a force to "keep order," we were, instead, investing in community institutions and assets, schools, real estate renovations, public spaces and jobs for these economically blighted neighborhoods? Rather than employing a force to lock down a neighborhood, why not try a New Deal-like infrastructure investment and jobs program targeted at these distressed areas?

Update:

Another aspect of this issue in which Republicans, Conservative, Right-Wingers, etc. are hypocritical and wearing blinders - where are the their complaints about corporate welfare? We have millionaires and billionaires with their hands out asking for public dollars for stadiums, business parks, factories and on and on. These are The Haves asking for more...and getting it. Talk about a culture of dependency.

Wisconsin's Corporate Welfare
Corporate Welfare
Where Are The Conservative Calls For Accountability For Corporate Welfare Recipients?

Another Wisconsin Corporate Welfare Failure

Wasteful Corporate Welfare

More On Scott Walker's Stadium Corporate Welfare

Weekend Reading

Federal Report: Vegan Diet Best For Planet 
Fish Oil Claims Not Supported By Research
Why The Paleo Diet Is Half-Baked
How Medicare Reduce Spending By $315 Billion Without Even Trying
No, The Estate Tax Isn't Destroying Family Farms
Obesity Is Hurting The U.S. Economy In Surprising Ways
Get A Job? Most Welfare Recipients Already Have One
Debunking The Myth Of The Job-Stealing Immigrant
Corporations Now Spend More On Congress Than Taxpayers Spend Funding Congress

Inherited Wealth & The Value Of Work

Episode 346 by billmaher56

Weekend Reading

Paul Ryan Declares War Against Math
The Remarkable Impact Of The Deep Tunnel
Corporate Deadbeats: How Companies Get Rich Off Taxes
Return Of The Bums On Welfare
Skill Gaps, Skill Shortages, And Skill Mismatches: Evidence For The U.S.
Rep. Paul Ryan's Whopper About Competitive Districts
Why Public Investment Really Is A Free Lunch
Unlike Walmart, Costco Has No Plans To Cut Employee Health Benefits
The Koch Brothers' War On Transit
Wisconsin Supreme Court Vs John Doe

Weekend Reading

Wisconsin's Health System Ranks In Top 10 In National Report
The Privatization Backlash
Backlash Against Privatization Is Growing in States and Cities Across the US
Biggest Infrastructure Need: States
Scott Walker's Health Care Dilemma
John Doe Probe Raises Issue Of Potential Conflicts With Justices
Federal Judge Strikes Down Wisconsin's Voter ID Law
Wisconsin Voter ID Ruling Could Cost State More Than $1 Million
FOX Find Another Anti-Government Wingnut [David Clarke] To Prop Up 
Ill-Advised Sheriff [David Clarke] Who Warned Of Second American Revolution
Walker Declines To Commit To Four-Year Wisconsin Term
Corporate Tax Attacks In The States
The Most Important Economic Chart

Time To Raise The U.S. Minimum Wage

A Chart That Demands Attention

A Rough Guide To Spotting Bad Science
A Chart To Share With People Who Complain About People On Welfare

Why Not Pay Everyone In Cocaine & Unicorns?

The Daily Show
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The Daily Show
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,The Daily Show on Facebook

For Further Reading:

Research Shows Minimum Wage Increases Do Not Cause Job Loss

Minimum Wage

Why Does the Minimum Wage Have No Discernible Effect on Employment?

Red State Welfare Queens

 

[source]

Bullshit Mountain

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

The (Red) Welfare States

h/t The Economist and Paul Krugman

For Further Reading:

How Conservatives Lie About Government

Welfare

Disrobing The Welfare Queen

Red States Are Welfare Queens

The Real Welfare Queens

What do the top ranking states - in Federal spending per dollars of Federal taxes - have in common?

They're red states.

The biggest "welfare queens", as far as states are concerned, are conservative states.

As Jon Perr details, Sarah Palin often rails against government (as most conservatives do) spending. She always (as most conservatives do) fails to mention that Alaska (ranking 3rd) is one of the largest welfare-queen states in the U.S. Alaska takes $1.84 from Washington for every $1 it sends there.

Another great example of the never-ending hypocrisy, and total delusion, of the right-wing.

[Wisconsin takes $0.86 from Washington for every $1 it sends there. 1 of 18 states, including D.C., which get back less than they give.]

For Further Reading:

Another Difficult Year For States

Stimulus Spending By State