Trump Wants to Lower Poverty Line

Maybe we should implement some new designation, like "the poor line", in addition to the poverty line.

People who can manage to survive with all the basics but live in a very precarious situation, and really struggle having to budget the most basic items.

 

So, poor children did it to themselves? Those bad kids should get jobs instead of sitting on their butts in school classrooms.

 

If you are an adult, making 15 bucks an hour, you made some pretty shi-ty decisions in life,
And I don't feel sorry for you.

The world does not owe you a living.

 

Meh, the lefts wish for open borders hurts those at the bottom the most.

 

That's right. The Mexicans are sucking up all the jobs, and happy to do them cheap.
Go to McDonalds, it used to be our kids worked there for a stepping stone job.
Now adult Mexicans are taking all the positions.

 

No need to hire a bureaucracy to micromanage people. If they get hungry because they waste their money, their stomach will send them a message.

 

I knew someone would make this moronic comment. It's already been addressed though so try again.

 

We are talking about government assistance. It's not their money they are wasting. If you are buying luxury items you shouldn't be on government assistance. Your stealing it from people who really need it.

 

Even food stamps, go to steaks and exotic foods.

 

You think? It's the government who helps out business owners to push their wages down and maximize profit, by providing that tit.

 

You're lying again... "big surprise"
https://www.wisebread.com/heres-what-you-can-and-cant-buy-with-snap
Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that people in the income group low enough to qualify for SNAP hardly buy any beef or seafood (only about 10 percent of the average monthly grocery bill), because it's too expensive.

 

https://fellowshipoftheminds.com/food-stamps-used-to-buy-lobsters-and-steaks

 

So the govt is colluding with business owners to depress wages? That's interesting. Means theres a whole lot more cooperation in govt than we were lead to believe. How many administrations have been involved in this conspiracy? How small of a business can still be included?

 

It's not that simple. There are a number of people who simply don't have the basic ability to compete for well-paying jobs. That means most low-ability employees will be limited to low-skill, low-wage employment.

As well, we will create serious economic problems if we arbitrarily provide low-skill workers with much higher incomes through the tax system. High-skill workers are motivated to contribute more by being able to earn high wages. If we de-incentivize high-skill workers, we'll see them take less strenuous work, retire early, and not make the effort to upgrade their skills.

Finally, we see employers increasingly unwilling to retrain older workers nearing retirement. Older workers have a harder time picking up new skills, partly because they've lost a step mentally and partly because many of them have a sense of entitlement. Then there's the reality that older workers won't be around all that long to pay of the investment in their skills.

 

I dunno what you're meaning with all these questions. It's a fact that the government helps people from suffering from malnutrition, who actually work a whole day. So it's obviously that the wages are too low. The government simply could raise the minimum wage to counter it. But since that just would mean less profit for the rich, it chooses to give out food stamps.

 

You're source doesn't state how many people do that. So it's useless.

 

You don't think government looking the other way while employers hire illegals is a strategy to support employers depressing wages? How about increasing visas to bring in skilled workers?

Name one that hasn't.

Every business benefits on the employee side from having a greater overall supply of labor.

 

One metric of making America great again is to have a nation where no one is poor..... one way or another

 

We would help low-income workers more by having a negative income tax than raising the minimum wage.

 

The problem with housing has a lot to do policies that increase home prices, from not creating planned communities complete with industrial land in areas well beyond the suburbs of major cities, to keeping interest rates artificially low. A friend bought and moved a 1600 sq. ft. factory home to a lot for $100,000 a couple of years ago. You can't tell by looking at the home it wasn't built onsite. The lot was inexpensive because it was south of Blaine, Washington.

We don't create planned communities because their attractiveness would cut outrageous prices in our cities and suburbs. Lower prices means developers, speculators, and existing homeowners in our cities won't see rising home prices lining their pockets.

 

That still means the government supports the idea that companies get to pay such low wages that those people need governmental aid to surviving. I don't know why a company get to under pay their employers that much in order to not pay a honest day pay for a honest day work. There is plenty of money being made in the US.

 

Why did the Trump GOP give 85% of the personal income tax cuts to people making $400,000 per year? Trump said he wouldn't cut taxes for rich people when he ran for President. Promise made. Promise broken.

 

So, a single-parent with an average income whose spouse walks out, dies, or gets sick should put the kids up for adoption? No takers? Then hand them over to the gubermint?

Try to be realistic about our society.

 

How about a negative income tax? We have to do something to end this trend...



... if we don't want Joe and Jane American to turn on our free enterprise system.

 

Could it be that some of that "Real GDP per Worker" growth is the product of technological (capital) investment, and not due to workers working any harder?

Unclear on what a "negative income tax" could be, I suppose some sort of guaranteed basic income?