Moron Elgar wrote:
> On Sun, 14 Sep 2008 19:15:19 GMT, Wayne Boatwright
>
> http://www.apa.org/pi/wpo/myths.html
> Myths and Facts About Welfare

Congratulations. You found the link I posted.




> Myth: People on Welfare Become Permanently Dependent on the Support
>
> Fact: Movement off Welfare Rolls Is Frequent
>
> A prevalent welfare myth is that women who received AFDC became
> permanently dependent on public assistance. Analyses indicate that 56
> percent of AFDC support ended within 12 months, 70 percent within 24
> months, and almost 85 percent within 4 years (Staff of House Committee
> on Ways and Means, 1996). T

Do the math here.
- 56 % of the AFDC support ended within 12 months.
- 70% within 24 months
- (almost) 85% ended within 4 years.

That makes 211% ending within 4 years. To say that 85% ended within 5
years sounds pretty good, except that this figure also includes the 70%
that ended within 24 months and the 56% that ended within 12 months.
That leaves 14% that milked it for an extra two years, 19% that were on
it for four years, and more than 15% that were still on it. In some
people's minds, having an assistance program that more than 15% of
people are still relying on welfare after four years would qualify as a
more or less permanent dependence on the support.



> Myth: Most Welfare Recipients Are African American Women
>
> Fact: Most Welfare Recipients Are Children-Most Women on Welfare Are
> White
>
> Children, not women, are the largest group of people receiving public
> assistance. Less than 5 million of the 14 million public assistance
> recipients are adults, and 90 percent of those adults are women (U.S.
> Bureau of Census, 1995). The majority of the recipients are White (38
> percent), followed by 37 percent African Americans, and 25 percent
> other minority groups (Latinos, Native Americans, and Asian Americans)
> (McLaughlin, 1997). However, African Americans are disproportionately
> represented on public assistance because they are only 12 percent of
> the population (O'Hare, Pollard, Mann, & Kent, 1991).

And as I pointed out in the response to the post about most welfare
recipients being white males, this is clearly not the case. Blacks make
up only 12% of the population but account for 37 percent of recipients,
which pretty clearly demonstrates that they are way over-represented on
welfare rolls in relation to their numbers. Of the 14 million welfare
recipients, 5 million are children, and of the other 9 million, 90% are
women..... 8.1 million, leaving us with .9 million men on welfare, and
since they indicate that 38% are white we may extrapolate that less than
half a million of the 14 million on welfare are white males.



> Myth: Welfare Encourages Out-of- Wedlock Births and Large Families
>
> Fact: The Average Welfare Family Is No Bigger Than the Average
> Nonwelfare Family
>
> The belief that single women are promiscuous and have large families
> to receive increased benefits has no basis in extant research, and
> single-parent families are not only a phenomenon of the poor (McFate,
> 1995). In fact, the average family size of welfare recipients has
> decreased from four in 1969 to 2.8 in 1994 (Staff of House Committee
> on Ways and Means, 1996). In 1994, 43 percent of welfare families
> consisted of one child, and 30 percent consisted of two children.
> Thus, the average welfare family is no larger than the average
> nonrecipient's family, and despite considerable public concern that
> welfare encourages out-of-wedlock births, a growing body of empirical
> evidence indicates that welfare benefits are not a significant
> incentive for childbearing (Wilcox, Robbennolt, O'Keeffe, & Pynchon,
> 1997).

Interesting skewing of factual information. It appears that 73% of
welfare recipients do not have larger families than non-recipients.
That leaves 27% who may have larger than average size families. Then
consider than the non-recipients are paying for their own children, and
that 90% of the adults on welfare are women..... they may not have
larger families that the rest of us, but they are having a kid or two
that they cannot support on their own.

It is fascinating that this article busts myths and then provides the
very data that proves them to have some truth behind them.