Text 13806, 83 rader
Skriven 2007-04-22 18:09:19 av Carl (169.babylon5)
     Kommentar till en text av rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated
Ärende: Re: OT: Finesse contest finalists - thanks to all!
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"Amy Guskin" <aisling@fjordstone.com> wrote in message 
news:0001HW.C2514906039A99F2F0407648@news.verizon.net...
>>>On Sun, 22 Apr 2007 09:40:13 -0400, Carl wrote
> (in article <BvidnVn5Eqgh-LbbnZ2dnUVZ_ualnZ2d@comcast.com>):
>>
>
>As defined by the Office of Management and Budget and updated for inflation
>using the Consumer Price Index, the average poverty threshold for a family 
>of
>four in 2003 was $18,810; for a family of three, $14,680; for a family of
>two, $12,015; and for unrelated individuals, $9,393.<<

>I'm not sure you'd want to trade your 3-bedroom house for theirs! 
>(Probably
>you have more than three bedrooms, but I think you get my point.)

1) The homes were aquired before some unfortunate circumstances.
2) No, of course I wouldn't.
3) I'm not claiming that people on social programs are having a party every 
night or that
    we should abolish welfare.  Far from it.  I'm simply countering the 
initial image of
    milliopns of people living in their cars.

I don't have a problem with welfare, I have a problem with welfare 
fraud...and there's a lot of it.

Consider:

Almost concurrently the Los Angeles Times, in an August 14, 1998, article, 
reported an egregious instance of large-scale internal fraud by an employee 
of the DPSS. Subsequent newspaper articles and television documentaries 
further highlighted that instance and other potential and actual problems in 
the operation of the DPSS. We also learned from preliminary interviews that 
the potential for fraud, both external (recipient) and internal (staff), 
that exists in the Los Angeles County Department of Public Social Services 
is enormous. Further, based on extrapolated audit data obtained from two 
other Southern California counties, the potential annual savings that may be 
realized by Los Angeles County could exceed $500 million.

(http://grandjury.co.la.ca.us/gjury99/REPORtgj-15.htm)

That's just LA County.

Figures that I've heard in the past have estimates of Welfare fraud anywhere 
from 15-45%.  If we could work on reducing the fraud rather than simply 
accepting it we could keep the money in the system and help people more 
without increasing the governments annual seizure or earnings.

>>> Also, even in terms of health insurance, the figure given out most often 
>>> is
>> that there are 45 million uninsured people in the US,<<
>
> According to the census bureau, 243.3 million people were insured in 2003.
> Current population is 301,672,000.  I don't know if insured people have 
> gone
> up or down in recent years, but I'm guessing down.  But for argument's 
> sake,
> let's assume it's stable.  That's more like 58 million uninsured, 8.4 
> million
> of which are children.

You mixed your figures. 2003 insured vs current population. I won't quibble, 
nor am I aware of any currently insured figures off-hand.  I wasn't quoting 
an actual figure for illegal immigrants either, just repeating the figure I 
hear quoted (which is usually 12-15 million).  I specifically chose the 
lower figure to try to be the most fair and I'm certainly open to more 
accurate figures.

There are programs that specifically deal with children.  The one that's 
come to my attention most recently is SCHIP (State Children's Health 
Insurance Program) which is "Title XXI of the Social Security Act and is 
jointly financed by the Federal and State governments and administered by 
the States."

As a side issue, it's been reported that the SCHIP program for MN currently 
has 57,000 single, non-pregnant, childless adults on the program.  This is 
87% of those enrolled in MN.

Carl
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