Originally Posted by momofsix:
When my eldest dd was born I was a single parent. I tried to get medicaid for her (not me) for emergency care only. I was living with my parents, working and going to college at the time. When I applied I was denied, but was told that I should move out of my parents house so that we could both get health insurance, food stamps, housing...They actually tried to talk me into getting all that stuff!
I think that the problems all started when the government started taking over helping the poor instead of churches, extended family, local businesses etc.
We as individual people are called to help others, it shouldn't be the government's job. If I'm hungry, I should be able to go to my church and get food, or my family, or my neighbors, or my local grocery for seconds that will be thrown away but are still good.
When our neighbors got foreclosed on I was heartbroken because it all started with ONE late payment! I'm sure they could have found 20 people willing to donate $50/each to help them make that payment, then they could have saved their home
When an individual is helped by someone when and as needed, that's when a sense of gratitude and a sense of paying it forward is developed. Of course, someone could still take advantage, but I think it would be much less.
It's too bad we're so entrenched in the welfare system that we could never fully go back to the old ways of people helping each other.
This actually happened to a friend of mine. She couldn't even get wic because she still lived at home and they counted her parents income also or something. It was ridiculous!