Discussions

Enough already about people on welfare needing more money..... there are only 2 reasons you should EVER be on welfare..... you are a single parent or have REAL!!!! mental or REAL!!!! health issues.  
 
AND if you must be on welfare as a single parent you SHOULD be doing something to get yourself out of the financial situation where you get more money on welfare... I lived in MB housing for awhile and knew and became friends with many single parents (mothers AND fathers). The majority were on assistance because financially it made more sense because they had health coverage and got more money that way than if they were working a min. wage job. HOWEVER almost ALL of them were doing nothing to get themselves OUT of THAT situation. Assistance pays for eduacation AND daycare, they pay for you to go to college for crying out loud. So if you're on assistance because you're a single parent... take advantage of the opportunity that gives you... GO TO SCHOOL, make things better for yourself, and don't tell me it's hard to do by yourself with kids, because I finished my grade 12 by going to some classes in the AM, because I didn't have subsidized daycare and could only afford to send my son half a day and took 1 evening class, twice a week. When my partner hurt himself and couldn't work for 6 weeks, with no way to cover the money he was bringing in I sucked it up and took my son to daycare in the am because my partner was in a cast and struggled taking care of him (he was 2) went to work from 2-8, 5 days a week and also had my evening classes the other 2 days, and every night I'd sit up doing 2-4 hours of homework. I was burnt out, it was hard, but I did it and graduated with good grades and recieved awards.  
 
I hear and read about all this help being given to middle class people and to low income people, but there seems to be this whole other class (for lack of a better word) of people that no one ever talks about, and that is the WORKINGP POOR. People seem to think it goes low income, middle class, and high income, but what about those like my partner and myself. We make too much money to get help from the government like subsidized daycare or housing and get very little for child tax. But we don't make enough money to be able to put cash away to get ahead. And guess what, getting help with money for school?!? Forget it. We're both employed and even if one of us weren't the other one would be and there for can't get help, because we should be able to pay for it ourselves. We can't get ahead. Thankfully for me, I am a status indian and can hopefully get into school that way, but if I wasn't status... I'd be screwed, I feel for those that are in the same situation as me that aren't status because they really ARE screwed.  
 
Perhaps what needs to happen is the government needs to offer welfare in a give/take situation, as in we give the money, you take the education, unless of course there is a VALID mental or health issue. I do agree that people on assistance may need a bit more, but I also think we need to be stricter about people who ARE on assistance and make some serious guidelines about what you have to do to be on assistance if you aren't mentally restricted. The main cause of poverty is lack of education so let's get educated people.  
 
Maybe the government should be less focused on the people that do nothing to earn what they are recieving and more to help those that are doing everything they can to get ahead and NEED help to do so. I'm tired of my tax dollars going to help people who do nothing to earn what they have when I bust my ass and still can't afford what I don't have. Not to mention most of those people I met while living in Mb housing had internet and cable and cellphones, I don't have cable or a cellphone and only recently got the internet because there was a special so it's only $20 a month and I will need it when I'm in school in September.  
 
Let's stop being so gosh darn politically correct and having sympathy and not being pissed off about it and let's get mad and say "YOU WANT THIS, EARN IT, WE'LL HELP YOU BUT YOU BETTER HELP YOURSELF SO WE DON'T HAVE TO AGAIN!!!!!"