Welfare doesn't cut down on people's desire to work, it cuts down on the necessity of doing soul-crushing work that benefits someone else more than themselves.

Calling bullshit: food stamps reduces initiative. (1) Most people on food stamps have a job, but they do not earn a living wage even though their employers (like Walmart) have huge profits. (2) Nobody likes to live in a shitty neighborhood, have almost no food choices, have to choose which bills to pay in the current month, spend a month or more without electricity, etc. People in the right, especially those multibillionaire psychopaths, who claim that welfare promotes laziness should spend a month in poor people's shoes. Only then would they realize that nobody *chooses* to be poor.

@EzerEben

5 жыл бұрын

Your rebuttal to the claim that food stamps reduce incentive to work seems to center on your argument that "nobody likes poverty". I would do a bit more research and use better premises. It's an important conversation that deserves intelligent, evidence-based arguments from both sides. Anecdotally, I am in need of food stamps and am surrounded by many who abuse the U.S. food stamp program in a state that ignores Federal safeguards against abuse. I don't need to spend another month in poverty to see that the Food Stamp program needs reforming. But maybe the rampant abuse only happens in my town. And perhaps you have actual evidence that abuse is marginal problem in a system that, outside my little circle, never incentivizes people to be slack about getting a job. I would like to see your data. The data that I just now looked up saw nearly 13 million able-bodied recipients who do not work at all, despite record low unemployment rates, and with more than 6 million open jobs across the nation. I think there really is room for improvement. And improvement would help people who actually need the help and are not able-bodied. Like me.

@incognitoanonymous4756

3 жыл бұрын

@@EzerEben There are many variables such as how long they've been out of work, for what reasons, and what exactly is considered able bodied? I know there are many people that have disabilities that the government doesn't consider technically disabled, especially when it comes to the mentally ill. I have no doubt there are many people taking advantage of the system but overall I believe there are way more people who aren't abusing it. In one of their other videos they talk about Fox reporting that around 70 million dollars a year is wasted on welfare on people who are just cheating the system. They go on to say how 70 million does sound like a hell of a lot of money, but when you work out the numbers of how much per year is actually being spent of welfare, 70 million turns out to be only about .2% of that. The ones that really need it shouldn't be punished because of the few that do take advantage.

Two Words: Causal Modeling. See Judea Pearl and Spirtes, Glymour, and Scheines.

I call bullshit on this The food stamps / poor graph is relevant to this lesson, but not the poll shown afterwards. Both "welfare causes poverty" and "lack of welfare causes poverty" deal with how "food stamps" causes "poor" (with one saying it increases it's rate, and the other saying it decreases it). Here we see that that increase in "food stamps" means increase in "poor". That's the correlation. This correlation supports the claim that increase in "food stamps" means increase in "poor", but doesn't prove it, because correlation does not mean causation. This correlation disproves the claim that increase in "food stamps" means decrease in "poor", because causation has to have correlation. (correlation does not mean causation, but without it there is no causation). Obviously we're missing key variables here, like the process of receiving food stamps. Is it automatic or does one have to apply for it? How hard is the process? How much money in food stamps does each poor person get? Is it the same in every country? And the most important one, the element of time. This is just a snapshot. How does the graph change over time? And many more.

The question: "Does poverty cause food stamps or do food stamps cause poverty" is a straw-man question. There's no national debate questioning the fact that food stamps are given to people who are already in poverty. The second part of the question is the actual topic of debate. It asks "Do food stamps incentivize any of the millions of able-bodied recipients to abstain from getting full time work?" The professor with obvious political un-nuanced leanings seems to suggest that the answer to the second question is a categorical no. It's surprising to me that there's a type of financial help NEVER incentivizes ANYONE from working. I would seek some actual data from the highly political professor backing up his point of view (which seems to be shared by a number of people). I would also challenge the professor to stop asking his students leading questions. A real educator trains the student how to think. It's brainwashing when he teaches students what to think.

@EzerEben

5 жыл бұрын

BTW, I call bullshit on this professor's question.

@avradio0b

5 жыл бұрын

The class isn't about food stamps or poverty, it's a class about calling bullshit and finding evidence. In previous videos, they often reference when they are wrong or have been bullshitted about something. Instead of expecting all information from a figure of authority of single source, you should research it yourself and come to your own conclusions or hypothesis about what is actually true. Other videos are literally about them showing different methodologies of identifying and thinking about bullshit

@wo0topia

4 жыл бұрын

I think a big issue is none of what you said has any measure on the credence of their lesson. you took two paragraphs to say "I dont agree with his political leanings, and therefore he's a bad teacher for showing his" He wasnt leading the kids, he told them what he thinks and then asked their thoughts, Anyone who's ever been a student knows that that is an opportunity for people who have different opinions to share. If you havent been a student I could see how you might misunderstand. Additionally he was perfectly upfront about his leanings which MORE ethical than him trying to hide his leanings. Also you said it yourself, we know for a fact that poverty increasing is positively correlated with Food stamps, you and I can both fundamentally agree this is true, which means we have to be...wait for it...SKEPTICAL that the reverse may also be true. So in sum your comments are basically "this professor is brainwashing kids to a certain political leaning, but I dont have any criticism of the actual information, just that he uses the information to state a factual thing...which implies my belief MIGHT not be true, and its disgusting"

@incognitoanonymous4756

3 жыл бұрын

I think you are the one being extremely biased with your views. You obviously want to believe that welfare is bad and a waste of money. I doubt there would be any talking you out of this. People such as myself on the other hand, can admit that I'm sure there are people who take advantage of the system, but overall the positives by far outweigh the negatives. Why punish the majority because of the very low minority? People like to exaggerate and make it seem like a quarter of the people who receive food stamps are just lazy or con artists cheating the system, but in reality there's no evidence to suggest it's anywhere even near that.