Welfare Waywardness

The simple observation that annual spending on myriad welfare programs exceeds $1 Trillion on behalf of 40 million people ($25,000 per) says something is very, very wrong.

A Heritage Foundation report puts it this way: “According to Census figures, the aggregate pre-welfare poverty gap in 2016 was roughly $248 billion. Calculations based on U.S. Department of Commerce, U.S. Census Bureau, Current Population Survey, Annual Social and Economic Supplement (ASEC) data, March 2017, downloaded from DataFerrett. Supplemental Security Income (SSI) and cash welfare were subtracted from the family’s total income before comparing it to the poverty line. In 2016, means-tested welfare spending on cash, food, and housing in that year came to $351 billion. Thus, means-tested welfare spending on cash, food, and housing programs was roughly 1.4 times the amount needed to raise every poor person’s income above the poverty level.

Adding medical spending to that amount brings the total to $1.02 trillion in that year: over four times the pre-welfare poverty gap for 2016. Thus, if means-tested welfare spending were simply converted into cash, the sum would be over four times the amount needed to eliminate poverty by raising the income of each poor family above the official poverty income thresholds.”

Where does the money go? Bureaucrats. Administrators. Policy Consultants. Regression Models. It’s not just a shame, it’s an abomination. How would you fix it? Some of my thoughts at Fair Tax Proposal.