Argus Posted April 20, 2009 Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 Get a job, right? Most of the increase in usage of Food Banks in the late 1990's came from people WORKING FULL TIME at minimum wage. In one pathetic case a few years back, families of soldiers in Alberta has to rely on a food bank. There are food banks in universities. At one time, it was a humiliating thing to go to a food bank or beg for charity. That was the common culture here in Canada. Almost no one took what they didn't absolutely need. But that culture is gone. In particular, more than half the people in Toronto were not raised in Canada. They do not and never have had that culture. They came here, learned that they could get free food by just going to these "food bank" places, and immediately made them part of their regular shopping routine. They are not the least embarrassed. In their hardscrabble cultures, you take anything you can get. So a lot of those who go to food banks are not particularly poor. They're just using common sense and taking what is offered up for free to whomever wants it. Some years back I worked for a sweatshop (data entry) in a small business area in Ottawa's east end. There was a Good will shop in the same little mall, and let me tell you, the place was jammed with immigrants who'd drive up in nice cars every day, not because they were dirt poor, and needed help, but because those people know how to go after a bargain. There was a story in the Ottawa Citizen some years back, accompanied by a front page picture of a Jamaican woman who had been deported. She had lived on welfare in Canada, had many gold chains, and a minivan. She very matter-of-fact, without any shame or even a thought that she ought to be ashamed, told the reporter who asked how she afforded such things on welfare, that she went to different food banks every week to keep her food costs down (she was proud of her resourcefulness) and got free or nearly free clothes from charities all the time. In other words, don't assume that just because food bank usage is high that indicates hunger is spreading. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Argus Posted April 20, 2009 Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 People who have nothing better to do in life than to engage is generalizing cr*p like blaminjg the poor and the hungry for their condition to the tune of "if only they were not guzzling beer" have a great deficiency in logic and plain decency. Feel free to take that fact personnally, or even to report me if you think I am breaking this forum rules. It will not change my opinion. If only you were smart enough to realize you were generalizing in exactly the same way you accuse others of. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Argus Posted April 20, 2009 Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 I think it would be a very noble experiment to raise all people out of poverty by redistributing wealth, and then see how many social problems disappear. Yeah, they tried that. It was called the Soviet Union. It didn't actually work out that way. Instead of making the poor rich it just made everyone poor. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
g_bambino Posted April 20, 2009 Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 (edited) Are you sure the ones who walk up and say "gimme" are the poor and not just crooks? Maybe we're just not talking about the same people. I'm talking about families who do not have enough to eat, mothers who have to lock their cupboards because their teenaged sons will eat a week's food in a day (because they need it, but she can't afford it). Well, the point I've been trying to get at - albeit, perhaps not in the best fashion - is that we have to draw the line between crooks who pose as poor and those who are actually poor; giving freebies to anyone who simply says they're poor is not making that distinction at all. And there are mothers out there who will claim they are poor and unable to feed their children when the reality is that they can; they get away with this because they're protected by the stigma attached to anyone who dares questions whether or not a hungry mother is telling the truth. Of course, jumping to the conclusion that "needy" is just a synonym for "lazy" makes one equally guilty of the same assumptions, only from the opposite end of the spectrum. So, as I said some time ago, let's establish what poor actually is before we talk about how to help them; that, to my immediate mind, means first dispensing with both the over-bloated victim-industry (the focus of the article that instigated this thread) and the extreme every-man-for-himself crowd, to arrive at something close to the heart of the matter. My strong suspicion is that the problem won't be anywhere near as large as it's been made out to be. You just gave an example of a well dressed woman with a minivan going to the food bank.You may be right that she's a rip off artist. However, it's also possible that she just lost her job and doesn't have enough food. Maybe her EI is delayed, as it usually is. Maybe we shouldn't jump to conclusions ... Yes, what you say could be possible... for a small percentage of the hundreds who came through the food bank. Otherwise, I'd be interested to hear statisticians explain how it is that the lower-middle class in particular is so heavily hit with unemployment precisely before Thanksgiving. [ed. to add] Edited April 20, 2009 by g_bambino Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Muddy Posted April 20, 2009 Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 The poor business is a self perpetuating industry. Civil servants love it. They can create their own fiefdoms. The more poor they can find the bigger and more important their facade is. A bigger desk ,more employees under them. Poor people are now a government industry that can do nothing but grow. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Hardner Posted April 20, 2009 Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 The poor business is a self perpetuating industry. Civil servants love it. They can create their own fiefdoms. The more poor they can find the bigger and more important their facade is. A bigger desk ,more employees under them. Poor people are now a government industry that can do nothing but grow Muddy - if you really believe this, then it's your duty to hold them to a higher standard of reporting on these problems. I concur that there isn't a good amount of information out there, but if you just throw up your arms and accuse the government of having a hidden agenda, then you aren't helping. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Muddy Posted April 20, 2009 Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 Muddy - if you really believe this, then it's your duty to hold them to a higher standard of reporting on these problems. I concur that there isn't a good amount of information out there, but if you just throw up your arms and accuse the government of having a hidden agenda, then you aren't helping. Michael, a few weeks ago we had the city of Toronto hiring people to pretend they were homeless to be interviewed on what the homeless needed. It boggles the mind. The best thing for the homeless ,is to discern why each individual is homeless. !. Are they mentally ill and unable to function in society. If so then pass laws that give authorities the ability to incarcerate these sad folks and nurse them to health, if at all possible. 2. If they are on the street because they are young people rebelling against parents ,give them a swift kick in the nether regions and give them a choice. Jail for vagrancy or respect your parents rules. We will need vagrancy laws returned of course. 3. If they are just bums then again invoke the vagrancy law, take them to jail ,clean them up and give them some grub and clean clothes and drive them to the city limits and tell them to keep going. 4 drug attics and drunks should be incarcerated in institutions and nursed back to health if at all possible One of the things we must recognize is that some people are sick and can not be left to their own devices. Some are just plain tramps and bums. Meanwhile we must stop giving respectability to being in these situations. As a society we must not encurage what is now the status quo. It is not alright to be homeless and sick.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M.Dancer Posted April 20, 2009 Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 Who are the poor in Canada?http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/166353 But after the Ontario government claws back the National Child Benefit Supplement from her meagre payment and she pays her $990 rent, she is left with only $122 to feed and clothe her children and herself until the middle of each month when her $300 child-support cheque arrives. [/i] Feeding a family on $422 a month make take skill, but it is doable. I've been realatively poor twice...when I first moved to Toronto and the job I thought I had didn't come through and when I started with my company in 1993. Back then I made $800.00 a month before taxes and I budgeted $100.00 for groceries and toiletries. At teh same time the Ontario Tories wewre being lmbasted for saying that a person on welfare could live on $90. a month....I tell you I ate well, had people over for dinners once a week and never went hungry longer than it took to make supper. Why I could do it and others can't is I know how to cook and how to shop. I didn't buy frozen food, I did buy cheaper cuts of roast and either sliced the into steaks or cooked them so I had roast beef sandwiches....I never bought chickenn breasts but I did buy whole chickens and cut them into quarters at home....and of course I made stews and froze them, spaghetti sauces and froze them.....bought nothern white fish and froze it... I lived that way for about 18 months until the business started making me some $$$... Most poor people just don't have the brains to be poor.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
g_bambino Posted April 20, 2009 Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 One of the things we must recognize is that some people are sick and can not be left to their own devices. Some are just plain tramps and bums. Meanwhile we must stop giving respectability to being in these situations. As a society we must not encurage what is now the status quo. It is not alright to be homeless and sick. Indeed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Muddy Posted April 20, 2009 Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 Dancer , that is a great story of resiliance , being proud and independent. Good show! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M.Dancer Posted April 20, 2009 Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 Feeding a family on $422 a month make take skill, but it is doable.I've been relatively poor twice...when I first moved to Toronto and the job I thought I had didn't come through and when I started with my company in 1993. Back then I made $800.00 a month before taxes and I budgeted $100.00 for groceries and toiletries. At the same time the Ontario Tories were being lambasted for saying that a person on welfare could live on $90. a month....I tell you I ate well, had people over for dinners once a week and never went hungry longer than it took to make supper. Why I could do it and others can't is I know how to cook and how to shop. I didn't buy frozen food, I did buy cheaper cuts of roast and either sliced them into steaks or cooked them so I had roast beef sandwiches....I never bought chicken breasts but I did buy whole chickens and cut them into quarters at home....and of course I made stews and froze them, spaghetti sauces and froze them.....bought nothern white fish and froze it... I lived that way for about 18 months until the business started making me some $$$... Most poor people just don't have the brains to be poor.... Now with better spelling... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tango Posted April 20, 2009 Author Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 Yeah, they tried that. It was called the Soviet Union. It didn't actually work out that way. Instead of making the poor rich it just made everyone poor. The Soviet Union was corrupt. The money went to politicians and their cronies, not to the poor. Bad example. Perhaps it hasn't been done yet. What countries have a guaranteed annual income above poverty level for everyone? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tango Posted April 20, 2009 Author Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 (edited) Most poor people just don't have the brains to be poor.... You have touched on the crux of a problem. Intellectual, and problem-solving and environmental adaptation skills are not distributed equally among all people. It behooves those of us who are genetically and environmentally fortunate and advantaged, through no efforts of our own, to recognize our own advantages and the disadvantages of those less able, and seek to compensate for it, instead of denigrating and dismissing those who remain poor. You, for example, had ability, a job and good prospects. How long would your motivation have lasted if there was nothing in your future but unending poverty? Edited April 20, 2009 by tango Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tango Posted April 20, 2009 Author Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 (edited) The poor business is a self perpetuating industry. Civil servants love it. They can create their own fiefdoms. The more poor they can find the bigger and more important their facade is. A bigger desk ,more employees under them. Poor people are now a government industry that can do nothing but grow. That's a good argument for getting rid of the bureaucracies caused by 'means-testing', and implementing a simple guaranteed annual income, above poverty level, for all Canadians. And I would include the rich too. (If they don't want it they can donate it to the charity of their choice, but I don't think we should leave them out.) We could save the money required for a GAI by getting rid of the 'means-testing' bureaucracies. imo Edited April 20, 2009 by tango Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M.Dancer Posted April 20, 2009 Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 You, for example, had ability, a job and good prospects. How long would your motivation have lasted if there was nothing in your future but unending poverty? No one's future is that....they only have to realize it for themselves. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tango Posted April 20, 2009 Author Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 (edited) No one's future is that....they only have to realize it for themselves. You are intentionally ignoring the fact that you may have the ability to do so, but others may not, due to a variety of factors. That's disingenuous. A fallacy that you are promoting, that all Canadians have the ability you have. Simply not true. At any given time, about 20% of Canadians live in poverty. For most of them it is temporary, but for some it is unending. At any given time in our schools, 20% of children are deemed to be at risk of academic failure due to learning disabilities, temporary or permanent mental and physical health issues, or just the 'luck of the (genetic/environment) draw. The similarity of these facts is not a coincidence, but a reality that should be addressed as such. Insulting and denigrating the poor is an extremist arrogance born of perpetrating false information about the poor - ie, deluding yourself that every person is as capable as you are. You are the one who needs the realization. Edited April 20, 2009 by tango Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
g_bambino Posted April 20, 2009 Report Share Posted April 20, 2009 Insulting and denigrating the poor is an extremist arrogance born of perpetrating false information about the poor... I must admit, I'm having a hard time finding the crux of your argument, tango. On one hand you acknowledge that only a small percentage of the poor are actually poor, and are such because they have uncontrollable mental or physical disadvantages. Yet, on the other hand, you espouse an across-the-board guaranteed minimum income for everyone, regardless of whether or not they have uncontrollable mental or physical disadvantages. Which is it to be? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tango Posted April 21, 2009 Author Report Share Posted April 21, 2009 (edited) I must admit, I'm having a hard time finding the crux of your argument, tango. On one hand you acknowledge that only a small percentage of the poor are actually poor, No I never said that. I said all of the poor are poor, but for some it is a temporary condition. and are such because they have uncontrollable mental or physical disadvantages. Yet, on the other hand, you espouse an across-the-board guaranteed minimum income for everyone, regardless of whether or not they have uncontrollable mental or physical disadvantages. Which is it to be? I never said that either. I believe those requiring assistance, and those in minimum wage jobs should be paid enough that they can live without hunger. Currently we punish them for being less able than most of us by paying them less than is required to live in good health. I also believe in a guaranteed annual income for everyone, and it should be well above poverty level. The 'means-testing' required for our current social safety net is a red tape boondoggle that consumes billions of our dollars, and that money could be spent instead guaranteeing that every Canadian can live without hunger. The obsession of some with demanding that the poor prove that they are 'deserving' costs us far too much money. http://www.progressive-economics.ca/2006/0...-annual-income/ Senator Hugh Segal: A guaranteed annual income or basic income is the concept of a floor income provided on a continual basis varying on family size, age, and other sources of income. Now, more than 20 years since Macdonald’s recommendation, the newly released report by the National Council of Welfare paints a scathing picture of the assistance programs currently available in Canada to our neediest Canadians. It concludes that those on welfare were actually worse off in 2005 than they have been since the late 1980s when the council began tracking the numbers. According to the report, 1.7 million of our fellow Canadians are forced to rely on welfare; more than 500,000 of these people are children. ... For more than 30 years, I have been a relatively lonely Conservative proponent for a guaranteed annual income, or a basic income floor. I do not believe that, in a country such as Canada, fellow citizens must live so far below what we consider a poverty line that they are unable to provide the basic necessities of shelter, food and clothing for themselves and their children. And based on the current allowances provided by the welfare system, I also refuse to accept that people purposely choose to avoid employment in order to subsist on such a paltry income. More here... http://www.thestar.com/News/article/188196 Edited April 21, 2009 by tango Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oleg Bach Posted April 21, 2009 Report Share Posted April 21, 2009 You see well dressed people walking down a city street..and quietly bow down to pick up a substantial cigarette butt..I have never seen that before - there is a new hidden and proud poor forming. - I have visited the local food bank in the basement of the local Catholic church --- The broken - the cripple - those whose only recreation is drugs and drink...and the food IF GARBAGE..They feed these people out of the damned dumpster. More and more people that I know who I assumed had money quietly approach me for a loan..those that I little expect to be in dire straights..Health- is waining..instead of providing money to feed the poor good food - they provide - expired crap - I fear that most are protien starved and are becoming more and more stupid ---IT'S A DISGRACE ...and in time this situation will be visited on all of you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CANADIEN Posted April 21, 2009 Report Share Posted April 21, 2009 (edited) on't assume that just because food bank usage is high that indicates hunger is spreading. No, I'll just assume that a few examples (of immigrants, why should I be surprised that an immigrant-basher like you would only use those) does not disprove the reality that humger is a reality in our society. And guess what, I'll be right. Edited April 21, 2009 by CANADIEN Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CANADIEN Posted April 21, 2009 Report Share Posted April 21, 2009 If only you were smart enough to realize you were generalizing in exactly the same way you accuse others of. If you were smart enough, you would realize that generalization in this case would be to assume that anyone who think that a job for those who can work it is better than handouts is in the wrong. Or generalization could be to assume that anyone who think some people need a good kick in the rear-end is a jerk. Obviously, if I held such opinions, you would know it by now. Or generalization would be something like constantly putting immigrants, French-speaking Canadians, Muslims, the poor in the same bag. You know, like what you do. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Muddy Posted April 21, 2009 Report Share Posted April 21, 2009 The argument has been made that everyone should be guaranteed an above the poverty income! Just what would that accomplish?The mentally ill would still be left to their own devices. The druggies and booze hounds would have instant gratification without bumming for few days and would give us a reprieve from their panhandling I guess. Now where would this unearned income come from? What would happen to inflation if we just print money. If we just print money what would become of our savings for old age? I think this plan would guarantee we would have a lot more elderly living below the poverty line in the long run. . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M.Dancer Posted April 21, 2009 Report Share Posted April 21, 2009 You are intentionally ignoring the fact that you may have the ability to do so, but others may not, due to a variety of factors. I have no problem subsidizing the lives of those incapable of work...but anyone capable of going to a food bank is capable of going to work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oleg Bach Posted April 21, 2009 Report Share Posted April 21, 2009 The argument has been made that everyone should be guaranteed an above the poverty income! Just what would that accomplish?The mentally ill would still be left to their own devices. The druggies and booze hounds would have instant gratification without bumming for few days and would give us a reprieve from their panhandling I guess. Now where would this unearned income come from? What would happen to inflation if we just print money. If we just print money what would become of our savings for old age? I think this plan would guarantee we would have a lot more elderly living below the poverty line in the long run. . All are mentally ill to some degree - no human bio-machine runs with perfect percision. Poverty generates mental illness not the other way around! As for druggies and booze hounds - all that use alcohol as a medication even that sophisticated glass of wine is a degree of alcholism - as for drugs - anyone who seeks relief from prescription drugs is part of the drug culture..what makes you think you are superiour to the rest you believe are under your foot? Nutrition and the good health that is gained by good food ensures good phyisical and mental well being. YOUR time will come my friend - no one is immune to poverty - rich is not forever nor is poor. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oleg Bach Posted April 21, 2009 Report Share Posted April 21, 2009 All are mentally ill to some degree - no human bio-machine runs with perfect percision. Poverty generates mental illness not the other way around! As for druggies and booze hounds - all that use alcohol as a medication even that sophisticated glass of wine is a degree of alcholism - as for drugs - anyone who seeks relief from prescription drugs is part of the drug culture..what makes you think you are superiour to the rest you believe are under your foot? Nutrition and the good health that is gained by good food ensures good phyisical and mental well being. YOUR time will come my friend - no one is immune to poverty - rich is not forever nor is poor. As for panhandling - you all are panhandlers...those that except bailouts and corporate welfare subsidies are bums - Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.