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It's a balancing act, and its not one that I envy.
I fully agree that part of what makes our country great, is a well structured safety net. And make no mistake-its self-serving. A desperate person will take desperate acts. Put a program in place to keep a few people from being mugged for their money.
So we balance-do we know that there is a lot of fraud and bullshit in the welfare system? Yes. But what are the options? Spend more money in the system to root out those that are being fraudulent, instead of actually funding the system? Make people jump through hoops to get help that makes said help harder to obtain?
I kind of like the solution we have: do what we can with what we've got. We catch the big ones, accept some of the small ones and make life on welfare not something to emulate or enjoy.
And I'm a huge fan of changing the system and eliminating huge bureaucracies. Great! But THAT costs money. And when you eliminate huge swaths of government, you eliminate oversight.
As far as I'm concerned..keep administrative budgets tight and make sure that the unions don't make too good a case that at $50/hr they are underpaid and the problem will solve itself. You can't bloat anything if there is no excess money just sitting around waiting to get soaked up.
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