Welfare Drug Testing Essay

The United States provides financial assistance to individuals that face unpredictable life circumstances through numerous welfare programs. By providing both short and long term aid to families whose incomes fall below the standard poverty level, these programs try to preserve values regarding family life and reduce the poverty of the nation. The U.S. Welfare has become a debatable topic for conservatives and liberals, who argue primarily about the morality and the money involved in these programs. Affirmatively, a great amount of people has become dependent to these programs and use this aid gratuitously, even when these programs were not intended to produce nor support long term dependence. These people have become parasites of the system,

In Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, Barbara Ehrenreich asks the question “How does anyone live on wages available to the unskilled?”(1). Ehrenreich investigates by going undercover as a low-wage worker to understand how workers ‘get by’ and see the effects of recent welfare reform aimed to help them. Ehrenreich, over the course of two years, worked unskilled labor intensive jobs in three different cities. Frequently, just to afford bare living expenses, Ehrenreich had to possess two jobs, which took a toll of her health. After completing her stint as a low-wage worker, she comes to the conclusion that they are treated as disposable by employers, often being manipulated or threatened to be compliant about their meager wages

The article informs that in 1953 the federal government reported an official poverty rate, this was the first time this was done. Gallaway’s article essentially describes the war on poverty. Gallaway argues that the war on poverty, unintentionally, creates slow economic growth, greater income inequality, and high poverty rates. The author broadly examines poverty and economic growth and as a result, it is concluded that those who are below the poverty line are no longer impacted by any economic growth. In 2010, 15.75 million of America’s 70 million children were classified as living in poverty. Countries have attempted to end poverty for many years now but it seems that the numbers continue to increase. Some people blame the government while others blame the individual for their own situation. The article also addresses public attitudes towards welfare recipients which tends to be negative. Many think that the welfare system is only hurting the American economy. Therefore, many African American women are oppressed for receiving food stamps, but when compared to a disabled person the treatment is

Mandatory drug testing of welfare recipients would be a money saving action if more of the recipient population actually used drugs. Drug testing can make recipients turn away from drugs to get approve for assistance, but it can also have harming effects. Drug testing could have recipients turn away from assistance, punish children for their parent’s actions, and can lose money.

Today in American society, countless people feel that they are entitled to everything no matter what. People who abuse the welfare system is a perfect example of how people believe that they deserve everything without having to actually do any work, causing laziness and selfishness. These individuals misuse welfare that helps countless people by taking the money for individuals who can’t support themselves or can’t find a job, and use it as a way to get free money without working. Another problem is that some of the youth demands respect of others without earning it and expect a successful job right out

This policy is aimed at the poor that receive welfare benefits. Drug abuse often is rampant among the lower socio-economic classes. The bill will directly affect families whose benefits are decreased, specifically, the children of the parents who test positive for drugs. This policy seeks to deny aid to the recipients who are using drugs, but benefits will continue for minor children. However, they will continue to suffer because they are dependent on their parents for sustenance. A reduction in benefits will cause families to sink deeper into poverty. Members of the direct population group come from

Welfare Abuse “Today, we are ending welfare as we know it, but I hope this day will be remembered not for what it ended, but for what it began” (Welfare Reform). These words were spoken by President Clinton during the signing ceremony of his passed legislature that called for a drastic reform of the welfare system. After years of implementation, the current welfare system of the time, the AFDC, had been said to cause familial issues when it was meant to be providing aid to families in poverty. It had been accused of promoting fatherless children and providing the poor and out-of-work with reasons and motives to stay unemployed. Being funded by taxes, it does not make much sense to continue a program that hinders both those receiving it

Drug testing is expensive and cost states a lot of money one drug test cost averages to about 42 dollars, not including the cost for equipment and hiring people to conduct the test. States start programs that require welfare recipients to take a drug test and the programs end up costing them up to 1 million or, even more, depending on the number of welfare recipients that reside in that state. According to Time.com during the four months, Florida drug tested welfare recipients only 2.6% of applicants tested positive. Drug testing results do not justify the cost of the test and is using money that could be used for something much more important. States are having to pay for an expensive drug test while getting less positive tests and more negative tests. The states that are

The idea that children would lose their own benefits has also been a controversial topic that has been defied by the third-party tactic put-forth by these states. Despite intensive research, Florida and Oklahoma were the only states that allotted information discerning how they chose to pay for the welfare drug tests. Both states had differing payment methods which leads to the conclusion that each state has their own individual plan of action to cover these costs.

How do you think the average American feels when he pays taxes to the government, just to know that it is going to people who use the money to buy drugs? According to Missouri, Oklahoma, Utah, Mississippi, Kansas, Tennessee, and Arizona only 10% of people receiving welfare are getting caught using drugs, the reason we only catch a small amount is the state government tells the recipients when they are drug testing them. In the technology we have today we can tell if a person is on drugs by three ways one way is urine, another way is blood and the last way is hair. These ways to drug test recipients are all efficient and effective. The most effective way is if you use hair to see if someone is using drugs you can usually tell for about 9 days it also depends on what drug they are using. We can tell from the DNA that is in their hair. The welfare system in America is broken, understanding what the welfare system is , should we drug test recipients, and should we background check recipients; however we may spend too much money and not get the result we want.

In 2000, a judge from Michigan ruled that drug testing welfare recipients had violated the recipients privacy rights (“Federal Appeals Court Upholds Ban on Testing Welfare Recipients for Drugs,” p. 1). The drug testing method also goes against the Fourth Amendment right to be free of search and seizures by the government without probable cause. People feel that the poor should not have to choose between providing for their family and give up their rights (“Federal Appeals Court Upholds Ban on Testing Welfare Recipients for Drugs,” p. 4). As a result, some states choose not to require drug test, because they feel it is

The article addresses the myth surrounding welfare. Americans common belief government's aid enhances corruption among poor people has its roots in the past —even Franklin Delano Roosevelt considered welfare “a narcotic, a subtle destroyer of the human spirit.” However, recent statistics highlights the beneficial’ effects of cash assistance for the poor. The welfare positively impacts the life of children, improving the quality of their nutrition and education. Moreover, in a moment of great economic recession the welfare is the only net that can support people in need. Consequently, the Americans should reconsider the importance of regulated welfare policies in helping people, as the way to thriving, not merely surviving.

Like the bike you bought after saving lawn-mowing money for a year, welfare reform was the prized trophy of the conservative governing philosophy. We believed that we’d found the vehicle of social mobility for poor Americans, once and for all. No one should live on taxpayer money without doing some work on their own, right? Everyone agrees, right? Wrong. President Obama ran over our bicycle, issuing illegal waivers to welfare’s work requirements and taking the wheels off the program. The fact is, we never won the welfare battle after all. Out of the 80 different federal welfare programs, the ’96 welfare reform really only fixed one. A third of the U.S. population received benefits from one or more of these 80 programs in 2011. According to

In my opinion participants of any welfare program should be drug tested no matter the circumstance, but where will they get the money to fund the drug tests. The money will be taken out of the tax payers, which means taxes will eventually go up overtime. Drug testing the participants will decrease the amount of people getting welfare. I have seen people that will receive the help but they are on drugs, or abusing the

Furthermore, an article written by Robert Rector, Katherine Bradley, and Rachel Sheffield for the Heritage Foundation, states that all means-tested from federal and state sources combined were $956 billion. This $956 billion in annual welfare spending is distributed among as many as 100 million people which average about $9,500 per beneficiary. I am in agreement with the article in Discover the Networks intitled; “The Welfare States’s cost to American Taxpayers” that says, “If converted entirely to cash, these benefits equal more than five times the amount of money needed to lift every poor person in the United States out of poverty” (2012).