DrGrip - Somerville is far from cheap.
It depends on where you live. I have a pretty nice spacious apartment in a nice-ish safe part of the city and we signed for under 700/person. We looked at multiple other apartments that weren't as nice but they were around the $600 mark. Some of the worse neighborhoods get even lower. Food is what, $100/mo/person, tops? Bills can be managed under $100/mo. It won't be a life of luxury but its certainly possible. That said, where did the $900 figure come from and how did we get on the topic of the cost of living in Boston?
In the video the sheriff/reporter said he was illegally getting 900 dollars in total benefits and you said you wondered why you even had a job. Hence the assumption you could make it in Boston for 900 a month. I just assumed you watched the whole video you posted and paid attention to it.
I don't think I've ever suggested shutting down all of these programs. I'm happy to help those that need it. Drastically reform, however, is something that I do support.
The typical ra-ra from the right/libertarians is that this fraud means we should drastically cut and eliminate most public assistance programs because the people on them don't really need them. They are moochers and if just eliminated the programs then they would get a job and pull themselves up from their own bootstraps. They are just defrauding the system.
Now if you don't think that then well oh wait what did you right down here.
Man that is just exactly the same thing that I was talking about.
Its the whole lucky poor fallacy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucky_duckies
See, this is something I actually disagree with. Three seekers for every opening implies that all three are actively seeking employment, which is not the case. I honestly refuse to believe that in one year someone can't find any work. High school students and college kids can find work somehow, can't they? And before you say that a part-time job is not enough to live on, I'd be happy to support someone who is working but is still struggling to get by. Instead, people tend to scuff at the idea of an "inferior" job. Do you know what I did when I graduated from college? I went to the local liquor store where I worked the summer before and lined up a job hauling empty cans and broken bottles from the return room to the trash bins. Luckily I found another job but I was not about to sit on my ass for a year complaining that I can't find any employment.
I did the same thing when I got out of college. I worked for my old shop and worked at night at UPS too so I could pay off my credit cards and buy my first new car at 24. I was working 80 hours a week non-peak season and over a 100 hours a week peak. But we both had two big things going for us. We were young and college educated oh and being white help. All of those things help.
The unemployment rate for people with a college degree right now is 3.3%. For those with only a HS diploma it is 7.1% and if you don't even have a HS Diploma it is 9.8%.
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t04.htm
That chart is for age 25 and up so it lines up with the age demos. Not everyone can go to college nor should everyone. I wish there was more support for trade schools in the US that weren't all for profit private schools ripping people off.
The long term unemployed, and there are millions of them that were laid off at the height of the recession, have the hardest time getting work and many of them are older as well. People in that 55 plus age range are just dropping out of the labor force and retiring early or going on disability.
The unemployment rate for blacks is about double that for whites. And young black males are even higher.
You have never been in a position to hire and fire have you? On those low skill entry level jobs there is a lot of turnover. MY first stint at UPS we had a new training class just about every week. Our turnover rate was in the 70% range before new hires hit their 30 day seniority date. Granted that was a very tough physical job but back a decade ago you could get that job anywhere at just about any UPS hub 52 days a week.
When I left UPS in July we weren't allowed to hire. We needed to bad but Atlanta wouldn't let us. Not enough volume. We could only hire temp workers starting a week or so before Thanksgiving though to the first week of December. Even then they only let us hire a handful maybe 10 or 12 people. Nearly all of those would be let go after the new year. Maybe one or two would stay on. The same thing happened this peak and they got killed. I still talk to my old boss on a fairly regular basis. They needed to hire more but Atlanta is too skittish so they couldn't. My old air hub is run on 40% fewer union hourly employees then before the recession and 50% fewer management employees. They are doing probably 70 to 80 percent of their old volume with fewer people.
I don't know what my old ground hub is doing but they might be slightly better. Ground volume has come back 100% or more as a lot of companies shifted to cheaper shipping alternatives. Its why UPS has done better then FedEx. Much better ground network at UPS.
I see the same thing in the car business. We have openings on a semi-regular basis but the turnover is still very high. All those entry level jobs are. The last time we had interviews for salespeople at our big dealership 30 people showed up for two slots. We hired those two and one quit within two months the other got fired two months after that. Couldn't make enough money because it is hard to start out as a salesperson in the car business if you have no experience. The turnover is probably 50% every six months.
I see half a dozen resumes a week and it isn't even my primary job to hire and fire but I have input. Our company HR guy sees 100s for all positions in the company per month. In a month maybe three or four get hired.
Our Subaru store is kicking ass they are doing 50% more volume then before 2008 but that is because Subaru is just hitting everything out of the park. Kind of crappy cars but super cheap, AWD, plus good mileage is just what New Englanders want.
Even with all that volume they turn over about 30% of their salespeople in six months.
Our other big dealership that I used to work at is doing 80% of their peak volume with half as many people. Half as many managers and well less then half as many sales people.
The dealership I run now is doing slightly more volume with a 30% smaller sales force. The service side is doing more business with one less tech and no shop helper.
Tons of people are looking for jobs all the time but plenty of businesses got lean during the recession and figured out how to do more with less. Our service manager is begging to hire one more tech but they won't let him.
Don't forget also that this isn't just about unemployment benefits - I don't have too much of a problem with those. What I do have a problem with is welfare, foodstamps, and EBTs. I have a problem with single moms popping out more and more kids they can't afford in order to get more benefits. Too many assistance recipients drive nicer cars than I do, have better TV and internet than I do, wear nicer clothes than I do, all on my dime. Public assistance does not entitle you to a life of luxury; this is wasteful and fraudulent behavior and no, I can't possible support it. The system needs drastic change. Our current setup provides little, if any, incentive to get a job and stop receiving benefits.
edit: oops, that was a little rant, eh?
http://www.fns.usda.gov/pd/18SNAPavg$PP.htm
The avg SNAP benefit is 133 per person. When was the last time you ate on 133 a month? I might have done it in college when I was really broke a couple of times but I don't know for sure.
Why don't you try this
http://feedingamerica.org/get-involved/hunger-action-month/snap-challenge.aspx
See if you can do it.
The avg TANF benefit for Mass in 2013 for a single parent family of three was $618. That is 26.4% lower in real dollars then the benefit in 1996.
http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=4034
Mass is one of the higher ones too. In Texas or Arkansas it is barely $200 for a single parent family of three.
That is not living the high life no matter what you think.
http://www.mass.gov/eohhs/gov/departments/dta/cash-assistance.html
Transitional Aid to Families with Dependent Children (TAFDC) is a state and federally funded program which provides cash assistance to families with children and pregnant women in the last 120 days of pregnancy, with little or no assets or income. It is operated under the federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) block grant and is described in the Commonwealth's TANF State Plan. Participants receive child care and transportation support associated with job assistance and can access a number of supportive referrals to substance abuse and mental health services, and domestic violence specialists.
As part of TAFDC, participants may be required to perform a work-related activity in order to receive benefits. DTA provides job assistance to TAFDC participants including job training, job search, and placements into jobs. Other key services include Access to Basic Education, English for Employment, Graduate Equivalency Diploma (GED) assistance, work readiness and skills training. It is especially important for clients to gain employment during their time on TAFDC as recipients are limited to 24 months of assistance in any continuous 60-month period. DTA offers many job assistance programs to provide clients with access to employment and training opportunities.
To be eligible for TAFDC, a recipient must:
Meet certain requirements including:
Have at least one dependent child under 18 or 19 (including teen parents) OR
Pregnant women with no children (the child is expected to be born within 120 days of the application)
Meet income and asset limits
Be a U.S. citizen or a legal immigrant
Live in Massachusetts
That is the Mass guidelines and every state is different. I repeat the states set up these guidelines as TANF, emphasis on the
temporary, is a federal block grant program. Some states require that the individual have basically no assets. Kind of screws them if they want to try and safe up money for a decent cash car or first/last plus security on an apartment.