Welfare is for the Drug Addicted Lazy People Who Keep Having Babies To Get More Money!

This is what you might believe if you spent a few months believing posts from friends and family on Facebook.

Posts saying that since I have to drug test to have a job, then welfare recipients should have to drug test.  Even though the states that do this or did this and stopped found that the amount of money they saved on denying those 2% of people who failed a drug test didn't even come close to the amount of money it cost testing every applicant.

Posts saying that "It's wrong to tax a working person almost to the breaking point then give it to a person who is able to work but refuses to.  But studies show that more then 60% of those on welfare do work, even if not full time.  The Californian average for a family of 4 receives $1025 a month (thats cash and food stamps) They are hardly living high on the hog.  Meanwhile the taxes paid by Americans are relatively low both compared to our own history and most of the developed world, and only a small proportion of those taxes go to welfare.

I have collected welfare.  In California you can only collect for 5 years in your life time, They require you to participate in job training and help you get out there to find a job, and if you don't, they cut you off.  Whatever your family size is after the first year of collecting welfare is your set family sized for the remainder of the time you are on welfare, so if you have 4 more kids in the next 4 years, you do not get more money or more food stamps.

It's easy to judge those things that seem unfair...

"Why do they get free money when I work my ass off"
"Wow he has an iphone and he is paying for his food with EBT"
"They probably spend all their money on cigarettes and Beer"

But until you actually have to walk in their shoes, have to spend hours and days applying for welfare, after you waited for months to get approved, and feeling the joy of being able to actually buy some groceries at a grocery store instead of just taking what has been handed to you at the food bank, until you know what it is truly like to fear losing your job because your state funded daycare has ran out and you can't afford both rent and childcare.  Until you lay awake at night crying because your aren't sure you can keep playing "bill paying roulette" and stay afloat.  Until you have to tell your child you can't afford to send them the Science camp with all their friends because you can't afford it... After all that I still don't think you should judge...but if you do after all that at least you aren't doing it blindly.

Rather then pointing the finger and saying "Not fair, Not fair" like a four year old, maybe we should be thankful that you don't need to be on welfare.