2020 Vision: Stimulus Work Programs instead of Disability?

This is the first installment in my new series
"2020 Vision: A Clear Look at America's Future"

This information came from an Outstanding, Interesting and perhaps Alarming article at pbs.org about the steep rise in Americans who receive disability payments.

The article includes these graphs and quotes, and a lot more and is worth reading in full.

Here it is, I'll wait........

:  http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-work/


Ok, you want to be Persuaded? Wined and Dined? Wooed?

Here are the appetizers....

This chart shows the number of people formerly in the work force who now receive disability:

It turns out that as Welfare shrank, Disability Grew.  This is an improvement nonetheless, people receiving disability are, after all, in pain and unable to work, by definition. They also paid into the system, and receive benefits according to those payments made when they were working.

Still, it is expensive. The article at pbs.org takes your emotions back and forth, one minute seeing the plight of desperate formerly hard-working Americans who  can no longer do the jobs they intended to retire from, then back to the desire of most people to see everyone pitch i and earn their keep, then forth once again to the very real suffering and the unhappy lot in life some of the people drew, than back, well, you get the picture. If not, here's a handy chart, direct from the article

The unemployment rate is also affected by the number of people on disability:

One thing that author found was that there is a monetary advantage for tthe states to move people off of state-financed medicare or other health plans, and move them into the Federally funded disability program.  So the States finance outside companies to attract and assist people within in their state who can qualify and so be moved to a different funding source wlll away from the state's budget.

And here we go forth again to a 'business-lens' with which to view the growth of disability in America.

I found the author,  Chana Joffe-Walt, to be well balanced in the approach, and to bring up all sides of the issue, despite how it might appear by showing all the numbers and the rising costs without the context of people who have been approved by a several doctors and a judge prior to receiving anything back from a system they helped finance, and who are undoubtedly in pain a good deal of the time, as I do here. (You still with me? Read it again if you need to. Good!)

Yet plenty of people who have jobs go to work also in pain, what is the difference?

One difference is that lower-educated workers tend to have more physical jobs, and it is harder to do a job on your feet all day, lifting, moving things, working a line, &c than it is to sit at a desk and work on the computer.

In one town the author looks at, the factory closed, and there simply are no jobs for people who might be able to work a little, but are not able to move or to travel a long commute to work for low wages in a backbreaking job.  The allure of disability is obvious under these circumstances.

But as Joffe-Walt points out, Americans don't want to deny people the assistance they need, but also don't want to be played for chumps.

I know from personal experience, the disability system is not well-set-up for someone to transition to work, or to work some to supplement the payments they receive.

The threat of losing hard-earned benefits is real, and it just makes no sense for someone to make the huge effort to be productive i some fashion if they risk losing the money they depend on to survive.

 Almost no one who goes onto Federal Disability ever comes off of it.

This should be a chart showing that:

 but I don't see it.

Regardless,

It is no picnic being poor and living on benefits, anyone who tells you it is is simply wrong.

I am that person, I had a thriving video production business, was working in independent production in the film and commercial industry, and had many other pursuits, chief among them Ultimate Competition, Ultimate Tournaments and a training camp, and an acting career doing Pirate Treasure Hunts on the beach and Murder mysteries on the Savannah Riverboat.

I was working on five different productions the week I went into the hospital. I left a production meeting for a checkup, and had to call in due to the brain tumor.

I can assure you, it was a far easier life when I was working 50-55 hours a week, was buys all the time and had money to do things with than it is to try to manage on the meager money people receive on benefits, especially with some of these ailments listed below (like the segue to the chart?)

What about the Children? I don't know, what about them? Here's a chart about them as well.

I guess you could say they are getting good training for when they grow up and are on adult disability. No, don't say that! (and let's pretend I didn't say it either, ok?)

 All of this brings us to the question that has been begged all along, What to do about it?

With 2020 Vision, we can clearly see that it is preferable for the government to receive some kind of return on the money spent to assist our fellow citizens.

Everyone can do something, most people would prefer being productive, especially if it brought in a little extra money to ease the stress of affording food, healthcare and other basic family costs without endangering the benefits they receive.

With 2020 Vision, we can clearly see that a program such as the WPA (Works Progress Administration) is a viable plan that would bring many benefits: we put the large work force that is currently idle to work rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure, and we utilize the disabled and displaced for part-time and less strenuous tasks in support of the program. We further steer as many of our safety net recipients as we can into productive, contributing 'jobs', providing childcare, cooking, shopping, many of the things they do now for themselves could be organized into service for those who need it, reducing the cost to government elsewhere in the system.

The money spent doing this will reduce unemployment and disability costs, and will provide us with a market of consumers that will have the ability to buy things.

Stimulus investment can even be outsourced if the seed money can be guaranteed a profitable return down the line, if the investors know that a return is certain, they will gladly pout up most of the money, and the actual cost to government may never materialize.

Regardless how the investment is funded, Demand will then have the resources to push Supply to perform. The guaranteed markets for the materials to run the program, along with a stronger & resurgent middle class will pry lose the trillions of dollars currently sitting idle waiting for a better investment climate to appear.

That is how the cycle gets started, prime the economic engine and give it some gas (with some solar shining on it's face and some wind at it's back, to stretch the metaphor) and it will roar to life chewing up products and services like dirt under a dune buggy (adding an alliterative simile to the linguistic imagery) until our debt disappears under a white cloud of smoke as credit cards rip through readers generating heat from the friction of an economic drag race as consumerism and capitalism race side-by-side down the drag strip of our financial future without a caution flag. (to jump right over the top in a wheelie of linguistic - oh, never mind)

 2020 Vision gives us a clear view of the changing weather on the economic front (returning to the original metaphor of two paragraphs ago)

Conservatives will be satisfied that the 'free-riders' no longer have a free walk in the park on a sunny day, while Liberals will be pleased that we aren't allowing the weakest and least fortune among us to suffer unnecessarily under storm clouds of economic uncertainty

Moderates will be overjoyed that common sense, logic and rational thinking are being brought to the service of our country once again after a long hiatus, and that I am out of metaphors at long last.