18 replies to this topic

[cousin it]

Buried Provision In House GOP Bill Would Cut Off Food Stamps To Entire Families If One Member Strikes
All around the country, right-wing legislators are asking middle class Americans to pay for budget deficits caused mainly by a recession caused by Wall Street; they are attacking workers’ collective bargaining rights, which has provoked a huge Main Street Movement to fight back.

Now, a group of House Republicans is launching a new stealth attack against union workers. GOP Reps. Jim Jordan (OH), Tim Scott (SC), Scott Garrett (NJ), Dan Burton (IN), and Louie Gohmert (TX) have introduced H.R. 1135, which states that it is designed to “provide information on total spending on means-tested welfare programs, to provide additional work requirements, and to provide an overall spending limit on means-tested welfare programs.”

Much of the bill is based upon verifying that those who receive food stamps benefits are meeting the federal requirements for doing so. However, one section buried deep within the bill adds a startling new requirement. The bill, if passed, would actually cut off all food stamp benefits to any family where one adult member is engaging in a strike against an employer:
451,317http://thinkprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/strike2.jpg[/img]
The bill also includes a provision that would exempt households from losing eligibility, “if the household was eligible immediately prior to such strike, however, such family unit shall not receive an increased allotment as the result of a decrease in the income of the striking member or members of the household.”

Yet removing entire families from eligibility while a single adult family member is striking would have a chilling effect on workers who are considering going on strike for better wages, benefits, or working conditions — something that is especially alarming in light of the fact that unions are one of the fundamental building blocks of the middle class that allow people to earn wages that keep them off food stamps.

With a record 42 million Americans on food stamps during these poor economic times, it appears that the right is simply looking for more ways to hurt working class Americans.
By Zaid Jilani | Sourced from ThinkProgress
Posted at March 24, 2011, 8:14 am

[cousin it]

Oooh, the link: http://www.alternet....member_strikes/

[PERM BANNED]

So the government should pay someone money because they choose not to work? Sorry my friend, I don't give sympathy for that one. Unemployment is at record highs and you want to encourage and allow people to willingly quit their job and suck up welfare. Thanks but no thanks.

[wedjat]

So the government should pay someone money because they choose not to work? Sorry my friend, I don't give sympathy for that one. Unemployment is at record highs and you want to encourage and allow people to willingly quit their job and suck up welfare. Thanks but no thanks.

Well Randall, where is it stated that people are being encouraged to quit their jobs & suck up welfare?

[cousin it]

and allow people to willingly quit their job and suck up welfare. .

Of course not. Since when did collective bargaining become equivalent to one quitting "their job and sucking up welfare"?

[wedjat]

and allow people to willingly quit their job and suck up welfare. .

Of course not. Since when did collective bargaining become equivalent to one quitting "their job and sucking up welfare"?

Since conservatives said so.

[Jill]

With a record 42 million Americans on food stamps during these poor economic times, it appears that the right is simply looking for more ways to hurt working class Americans.

And then deny them the benefits they need to survive, once they're relegated to poverty-level by the wealthy and powerful elite.

At the rate we're going with wealth disparity in this country, and the insanely easily-manipulated populace buying into their overlords' commands, we'll have a Third World economy in less than a generation.

[PERM BANNED]

and allow people to willingly quit their job and suck up welfare. .

Of course not. Since when did collective bargaining become equivalent to one quitting "their job and sucking up welfare"?

Does not striking equate a refusal to work? Does not this bill prevent those who choose to willingly walk away from their job to collect assistance from the government? If we're going to play semantics, fine. But there is more inherent in this then simply collective barganing. Personally I'd assume that since the unions care about their dues payers so much, they'd shuffle some of that money away from political donations and into assistance for workers on strike.



I'm not Glenn Beck fan, but I did catch his show last week where a high ranking Union delegate was advocating efforts to bring the banks to their knees again to gain support for themselves. I don't want to make this about unions, but I don't believe they're in the best interests of the country, company or those who pay them. If you choose to participate in a union, you choose to suffer the consequences being a member incurs. Your collective barganining has already gotten you better job security and pay than someone outside of the union (supposedly) so why should you get the perks of the safety net for the private sector when you willingly choose to quit your union job for an extended period.

[Jill]

Does not striking equate a refusal to work? Does not this bill prevent those who choose to willingly walk away from their job to collect assistance from the government? If we're going to play semantics, fine. But there is more inherent in this then simply collective barganing. Personally I'd assume that since the unions care about their dues payers so much, they'd shuffle some of that money away from political donations and into assistance for workers on strike.



I'm not Glenn Beck fan, but I did catch his show last week where a high ranking Union delegate was advocating efforts to bring the banks to their knees again to gain support for themselves. I don't want to make this about unions, but I don't believe they're in the best interests of the country, company or those who pay them. If you choose to participate in a union, you choose to suffer the consequences being a member incurs. Your collective barganining has already gotten you better job security and pay than someone outside of the union (supposedly) so why should you get the perks of the safety net for the private sector when you willingly choose to quit your union job for an extended period.

Okay, I reread the provisions and here's what I'm getting out of them:

1.) You have a Union job, but your family is currently eligible for, and receiving food stamps.

• Your union goes on strike
• Your family continues to receive food stamps at the level previously eligible for, but not more due to the decreased family income.

2.) You have a Union job and your family is not currently eligible for, nor receiving food stamps.

• Your union goes on strike
• You cannot apply for food stamps due to your family's decreased income, since said decreased income is viewed as "voluntary".

I actually kind of agree with this. Especially since the bigger unions have "hardship" funds to assist striking members with rent, utilities and other bills (though not food, specifically, except what's provided to them personally while they're actually on the picket line).

[PERM BANNED]

Since when did they start allowing ANYONE to draw unemployment if they quit their jobs? That's not how the program works in my state and I suspect it's the same in others.

I've never been on unemployment, so I don't know. If it's a non-issue, then why the fuss from alternet?

[Jill]

I've never been on unemployment, so I don't know. If it's a non-issue, then why the fuss from alternet?

It's politics, baby!

[freedom78]

Does not striking equate a refusal to work? Does not this bill prevent those who choose to willingly walk away from their job to collect assistance from the government? If we're going to play semantics, fine. But there is more inherent in this then simply collective barganing. Personally I'd assume that since the unions care about their dues payers so much, they'd shuffle some of that money away from political donations and into assistance for workers on strike.



I'm not Glenn Beck fan, but I did catch his show last week where a high ranking Union delegate was advocating efforts to bring the banks to their knees again to gain support for themselves. I don't want to make this about unions, but I don't believe they're in the best interests of the country, company or those who pay them. If you choose to participate in a union, you choose to suffer the consequences being a member incurs. Your collective barganining has already gotten you better job security and pay than someone outside of the union (supposedly) so why should you get the perks of the safety net for the private sector when you willingly choose to quit your union job for an extended period.

Okay, I reread the provisions and here's what I'm getting out of them:

1.) You have a Union job, but your family is currently eligible for, and receiving food stamps.

• Your union goes on strike
• Your family continues to receive food stamps at the level previously eligible for, but not more due to the decreased family income.

2.) You have a Union job and your family is not currently eligible for, nor receiving food stamps.

• Your union goes on strike
• You cannot apply for food stamps due to your family's decreased income, since said decreased income is viewed as "voluntary".

I actually kind of agree with this. Especially since the bigger unions have "hardship" funds to assist striking members with rent, utilities and other bills (though not food, specifically, except what's provided to them personally while they're actually on the picket line).

It would make more sense if, when big businesses and banks went on strike against competent, LEGAL, ETHICAL management of their business models, assets, and money, they didn't get their own set of "food stamps" to help them survive...to the tune of billions of taxpayer dollars.

This is jsut another attack on the middle class. The free market crowd will rightly point out that unions (and anything else that drive up wages and business costs) hurt the bottom line. What they dishonestly refuse to mention is that, for this to cease being a problem, we'd have to pay the same wages as, say an India or Mexico (this amounts to about $2.50-$5.00/day). So, yes, attack unions as the problem, but organized labor has been a far bigger SOLUTION to a far more important problem over the course of US history. It's no surprise that, as per capita union membership declines, so too do the wealthiest get relatively wealthier compared to the rest of us.

Can anyone explain why we must be in the business of attacking the masses to the great benefit of the very few? What a fucked up place this is.

[Hula]

screw the man. free said it well. randy not all of us are willing to be a mindless worker drone whoring ourselves out for pitiful wages and pay. taking the crap while the big bosses get the big money. fair is fair. if my coworkers as a whole wants to strike to get what the employer should probably be giving them anyway, I would support that.

you can't punish someone by trying to starve them. striking like skateboarding is NOT a crime. the "punishment' should always fit the crime, taking away food stamps is cruel and unusual.

take this in the lighthearted manner in which I mean. randy you got your head up your ass on this one

[PERM BANNED]

Taking away a social service, to someone who willingly abandons their job, is cruel and unusual punishment. Is this what we have come to as a country folks? Where not giving people entitlements when they refuse to work, is on the same page as torture. YES HULA YOU FIGURED IT OUT! That is what the founders meant when they wrote that. That people who quit their jobs should be given lots of free shit. I'm shocked the SC never ruled on that before. All lighthearted manner of course.