Would you think of claiming benefits?

[Cresselia~~]

I noticed that many college graduates in USA/ UK/ Europe, etc, are unemployed, and that unemployment is actually quite high in many countries.

So I would like to ask, how would you feel about getting benefits?

Let me talk about myself-- I admit, I had actually claimed benefits before.
I have 2 disabilities, and I am not capable of working part time.
I cannot be outside for more than 3 hours per day, so even working part time is impossible.

So, before working freelance, there was a time which I claimed benefits.
But I stopped due to social pressure.
I live in Hong Kong, which is an extremely elitist place.
Unemployment is also very low in Hong Kong, at only 3%. Almost everyone would have a job unless they have committed serious crimes.
(Actually, you can still work even if you have stolen something before)

So, even really poor people (people who are on minimum wages) don't see the point of anyone getting benefits.
People also feel that only immigrants would claim benefits. And immigrants are very discriminated.

People strongly believe that people on benefits are parasites, and that any person with 2 hands should work.

Many old people/ poor people actually refuse to claim benefits (partially due to social pressure), even if they earn less than the benefits.

========

But that said, if unemployment is high in a certain country, would people be more tolerant towards people who claim benefits?

I noticed that many people on facebook/ Smogon dislike elitist views.
So I would like to listen to how you guys feel about claiming benefits?

 

[Jellicent]

Absolutely.

If you need benefits to get by, and you qualify for them, there's no reason to not collect. That's why they exist. There's nothing shameful about it, and they seem especially silly to ignore if you're a taxpayer.

 

[TheFourthChaser]

I don't see any problem with taking fair advantage of benefits of any kind. Their sole purpose is to aid those who need it.

For a number of years my family was legally in poverty (this is below 30-40k for a family of 6 in the US iirc) and it would have been impossible to get by without government assistance. Even now im basically being paid to go to a university that would normally cost around 15k annually. If you're making the most out of your assistance how can anyone fairly call you out on it?

 

[Aldaron]

^ fuckin tfc using my tax dollars to feed his 17 hispanic siblings...

Take any and all benefits you're eligible for. Hell, find out if you're eligible for any that you might not think you are eligible for as well.

I've personally never had to go there, but you should never feel "bad" or "inferior" or whatever other bullshit adjective some supposed elite might throw at you for taking benefits.

The following points are only relevant for the USA (not sure if they apply elsewhere as I've never lived elsewhere for a significant enough period):

A.) If you're in poverty / disabled / whatever, you're severely handicapped even beyond your lack of resources / disability. Societal attitudes towards you (and people really really underestimate the power of societal influences on individual actions) are so biased in the negative sense that you're fighting an uphill battle even if you somehow get past your lack of resources / disability. There have been recent studies that demonstratively displayed (note, just displayed, not proved) EXTREME bias for the average US Citizen to want to go out of there way to assist those who are well off vs. those who are not.

B.) People seem to forget this, but a country's / business's / general organizational entity's MOST VALUABLE resource is human resources. Benefits are the government's way of investing in its human resources...so if you feel bad taking them out of some selfless feeling, just realize you are contributing (eventually) to what the government hopes is a resourceful future (at least your individual part in it).

C.) Our economic system itself is so rife with corruption, cronyism, and general socioeconomic inertia that you should take what you can and run away with it (provided your overall goal is to improve your lot in life and hopefully contribute positively in some manner to society at large). Individuals and businesses alone use so much government money for such fraudulent bullshit (plenty of examples, like organizations misappropriating disaster relief funds or government employees approving their completely unnecessary OT) that you should never, ever feel bad for getting benefits if you are eligible for them.

Now, all that said, sure, you should feel bad if you feel you're stringing the government along and only technically eligible even if you don't need them (ie, you can work fine but an old surgery qualifies you for disability, and you can live off of disability instead of going to work and making more). There is also something to be said for getting dependent on benefits but...just use them.

I honestly wish the government would get more efficient at providing benefits and would appropriate a higher percentage for investing in our future via education (because, while the USA certainly isn't stupid (stfu), we waste a ridiculous amount of human resources in not educating them), but that's a different conversation.

 

[Martin]

I have nothing against benefits until the system gets abused, which is something that I have heard stories about over here. If you need benefits, then fucking take them. If anything our government should make it easier for people who need them to have access to them. However, if you don't need them and are abusing the system for your own gain, then you need to take a minute to step back and look at yourself and realise how selfish you are being.

 

[jumpluff]

I don't see any problem with taking fair advantage of benefits of any kind. Their sole purpose is to aid those who need it.

For a number of years my family was legally in poverty (this is below 30-40k for a family of 6 in the US iirc) and it would have been impossible to get by without government assistance. Even now im basically being paid to go to a university that would normally cost around 15k annually. If you're making the most out of your assistance how can anyone fairly call you out on it?

I agree, and had the same experience (in fact, my family is still legally in poverty). I get substantial scholarships now and might get a paid internship soon

Since I was 16 I have been supporting my family out of my disability support pension. I feel great relief that I will always be able to claim the DSP if I can't work, because not only is it security for me, it's security for the people I love. It's hard to have pride about benefits when you're aching with hunger, or seizing up and unable to afford to go to the neurologist; it's also the easiest time to have pride ever, when you feel like you have nothing to lose.

It's degrading to take benefits, it feels terrible; you're exposed to the scrutiny of the world, you're forced to juggle ridiculous resources, borrow money, delay debts, frantically juggle money. It takes up your whole day and energy. I personally feel anger at receiving paltry benefits from the profits of my country being colonised. And I know a lot of other people like me (Indigenous Australians) agree, that it's disgustingly paternalistic and humiliating to be reduced to this, that once we could provide for ourselves but now we've been put into a situation where we have no choice but to take what we're handed. But that's it, we don't have a choice. My brother used to feel too much pride and pretend he was better than the rest of us about his benefits, then he had to fend for himself at school and stopped acting like we were shaming ourselves for receiving the benefits that were just a portion of what was due to us, and necessary for our survival. Now it's just a matter-of-fact thing.

So I can't say I feel good, but I feel right, and I don't feel any compunction; I feel that I am doing the right thing by myself and everyone else to claim all the benefits I do, and I hope to convert my scholarships into a career that I can further use to help with medical disparity. I don't feel shame for not working; I'd be working for the sake of useless labour, because there's no job I could get that wouldn't make me sicker with the qualifications I have, so I'd be busy just so I could satisfy myself that I wasn't lazy. It's infinitely better for me to use my health on a) living b) getting an education so I can do something worthwhile. And it's often the case that working part-time will make you poorer than accepting certain pensions, because income over a certain threshold from part-time work will cause your pensions to be cut at x cents a dollar. My mother, who is disabled too and my carer and receives a carer pension, could have performed some work as a lab tech, but at the expense of her own health and mine, and struggling to make even with her pension. Isn't that ridiculous?

Aldaron's post is the most logical post in this thread imo. How can you worry about people occasionally loopholing benefits so they function as human beings when tax evasion and white collar crime and insider trading occurs at scales of thousands of livelihoods lol? I'd rather 99 people get what helps them and 1 person get a bit extra, god forbid they get a bit extra like pensions are luxury lol, than nobody because people are scared on some idealistic level of pension cheating. If you're abusing you're not even really hurting anyone, it's the people who want to take away pensions who are hurting infinitely more; the government is not excessively drained by the small amount of pension abuse that occurs relative to the amount of people who actually need them (I'd say the amount of people who are eligible and/or need them and don't get them easily outweighs the abuse). But you should still probably contemplate what you are doing

Fun fact: welfare queens are a myth that was first propagated strategically by Reagan

 

[OLD GREGG (im back baby)]

I would only claim benefits if absolutely necessary. There is a world full of air and opportunity; I'll be damned if I depend on anyone else to feed my family.