Liberty Pen: Walter E Williams: The Many Welfare State Beneficiaries

It depends on how you define welfare and who it is supposed to be for. That is who should benefit from welfare and those programs. But generally speaking Americans probably view welfare as public assistance for people in need. And if that is the welfare you are talking about, then that assistance benefits people in poverty. Whether they are working or unemployed or perhaps not working, but are adults who have such little job experience even at low-income jobs and perhaps do not qualified as unemployed.

If welfare only benefited people in need the less-fortunate whether they are low-skilled workers, or the low-skilled unemployed and they must have this assistance just to survive, then I believe welfare would not be popular. But Americans would say we need these programs to prevent people from starving and going homeless. And so the do not feel the need to steal and so-forth. Which would be bad for the society as a whole.

But a big problem with welfare is that it just doesn’t support the less-fortunate in America. But it goes to people who simply do not need it. Like big business’s, big farmers included. Walter Williams example in the video of it benefiting upper middle class. And wealthy families with the school lunch program even though these parents can more than afford to pay full-price for their kids lunch. And because of this at least some Americans people who work very hard just to pay their bills and not have to collect from public assistance, say “why do I have to pay for people who can pay for themselves.”