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Originally Posted by Anjew
they make money on the side dealing dope, collecting cans, working under the table.... while i see decent people getting layed off getting nickle and dimed (EI benefits are capped) and trapped (not being able to goto school)by our shitty EI system...
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Collecting cans is a shitty way to earn extra cash and dealing dope ends eventually (how many drug dealers do you know make it to their 40s?). Working under the table, unless you're good with your hands, is not sustainable in the long run. I highly doubt that people scamming the system and working under the table accumulate much wealth over the long run. Assets equal wealth, not flashy cars and handbags for the short-term gold-digger they're sleeping with. Even if you somehow make enough cash drug dealing and working-under-table to accumulate say half a million, the government finds out eventually (unless you're a major player in organized crime which excludes 99% of those scamming the system.)
Most people collect EI at one point or another in their lives. Sure, it's great for a while, but eventually most people get restless and want to get off of it. Why? Because living off the system has a negative stigma associated with it. You're less of a man, so to speak, if you collect assistance for too long.
I have absolute sympathy for those who are getting nickel and dimed, but at some point, people have to take chances, or be proactive and stay on the edge.
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You put one social housing unit in an otherwise functional place and actually manage to integrate them into part of the community and they'll actually have some social support/pressure to get earning. Telling people to pull themselves up by their bootstraps isn't always enough. If what we're doing now isn't working (providing them practically nothing and saying 'deal with it') then we need to figure out some way to motivate them intrinsically.
Obviously this kind of pressure doesn't work. So let's find one that does.
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Absolutely agree. The NIMBYs in this province will have none of it though. The prevailing attitude today is that it's far easier to sweep things under the rug than to deal with them proactively and this attitude is a major cause of the state of the DTES today.