re: LA SNAP -- 25 percent given per week

I’d like to know how many are actually disabled. “Disabled” is a buzzword now. I’ve known a few who were quite capable of work but chose to lean on “disabled” bc bipolar disorder and complain. Never had money for repairs or bills, but sure had enough money to have fun and go to restaurants and post up large seafood platters. Most can work.

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When the wealthy get tax breaks or bailouts, it’s called 'trickle-down economics.'

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The only people who call it that don't understand economics (read: leftists, since they are the ones who coined and use the phrase).

Depending on how you define "wealthy," that group pays anywhere from most to all of taxes which fund all of these giveaway programs.

When the programs become a ball-and-chain keeping people on them while those costs rise, people blame the wealthy for not giving up enough/even-more of what they've worked for to fund the lifestyles of those who haven't achieved.

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In both cases, the middle class pays for it.

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Yes, but it's not quite the way we are told to think on it. I recently sat down with census and income numbers and was a bit surprised at the changes.

First off, everything is set to 2023 Dollars (2023 is the latest year with full data available).

Next, income groups are set thusly:

Low: <$35,000

Middle: $35,000 – $200,000 (this is made up of the three middle income tiers to create a 3-group aggregate)

High: >$200,000

When looking at 3-group aggregates for 1993-2023 we see those broken down like this:

Income Level:=-=-=-1993-=-=-=-=-2023

Low:=-=-=-=-=-=-=-: 25%=-=-=-=-: 29%

Middle:=-=-=-=-=-=-: 61%=-=-=-=-: 51%

High:=-=-=-=-=-=-=: 14%=-=-=-=-: 20%

So what we've seen over that timeframe is the Middle tiers shrink by 10% with 4% moving to the lower tier and 6% moving to the high tier. When that timeframe is broken down a bit, most of that growht happened in the 1993-2003 timeframe with Low growing by 2% and High growing by 5% during that period. The remaining growth, at least at the broad view, happened from 2003-2013 with pretty much no change happening between 2013-2023.

During the period (1993-2023) the population grew by ~30% (~77M). I haven't dug deeply enough to see how the growth in illegal immigration over the period has impacted this, but I would imagine it's fed a lot of the growth in the Low and Lower-Middle income tiers.

In other words, while the middle tier is shrinking, the High tier has had more growth than the Low tier but that's slowed. Still, it's important to note that we have almost has many households in the High as we do the Low. If I'm right about illegal immigration's impact on the lower tiers (Low and Lower-Middle, which is roughly <$75,000), then upward migration over the last decade was stronger than the broad numbers indicate (but that would take time and effort to ferret out that I don't have).

The problem with the idea of raising taxes to fund more government programs is that the programs aren't built to help people ease out of them. They are set to income tiers instead of a proportional tradeoff. In other words, if someone makes $1 more a month than their current income tier, they lose far more than $1 in benefits (many are on multiple programs, so multiply that by the number of different programs a given person is on), thus the program structures act as incentives for users to stay on them rather than take advantage of opportunities to get off of them.

We can't keep subsidizing the incentivizing of failure and taxing the rich to pay for that is self-destructive and short-sighted.

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How do you know their employers are "greedy"? What if their employer is some guy running a lawn care business?

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Walmart, Kroger, Tyson's, and McDonald's, to name a few, are not some guy running a lawncare business.

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Is it business' responsibility to see that its employees are socioeconomically stable?

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Not as long as they have you(taxpayer) doing it for them.

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Are they forced to work jobs that pay minimum wages?

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No, they can stay home and collect full benefits.

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Walmart, Kroger, Tyson's, and McDonald's, to name a few, are not some guy running a lawncare business

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Why should they pay more than what gets them the employees they need? They are not a charity.

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Is it business' responsibility to see that its employees are socioeconomically stable?

Not as long as they have you(taxpayer) doing it for them

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You're going to pay through taxes or prices. We can cut unnecessary govt benefits.

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Are they forced to work jobs that pay minimum wages?

No, they can stay home and collect full benefits.

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SNAP can be cut drastically.