Kudos to Nona Willis Aronowitz and the sharp folks at GOOD Magazine for shedding light on a study that half of Americans who get government aid swear they don’t. You read that right folks — the very same people who receive Medicare and even welfare benefits, for crying out loud, deny that they benefit from government aid and keep right on repeating those anti-government conservative talking points. As if we needed any more evidence that we have entered a Twilight Zone-esque universe of anti-logic.
Here’s the chart from the Cornell study:
Aronowitz writes:
Half of people getting federal student loans don’t think they’ve ever used a government social program. Forty percent of Medicare recipients have no idea their health insurance is funded by the state. And 25 percent of the people receiving that emblem of All That Is Bad About Big Government, welfare, don’t connect that paycheck to the “enemy.” Given the fact that one in six Americans use anti-poverty programs alone, there’s a hell of a lot of people who are deluded about how much the government helps them out.
Aronowitz rightly argues the point isn’t (just) that these folks are hypocrites (though they are) but the larger cultural and political implications of a mindset that government help is about them not us. Part of the conservative attack on public spending and entitlement programs is to race bait the debate and suggest that only poor black people get help from government, when in fact government is overwhelmingly controlled by and manipulated for the benefit of wealthy white CEOs and big business. But even old grandmas and new entrepreneurs benefit from government.
In fact, I’d challenge anyone to come up with an example of supposedly individual success in America that didn’t benefit in some way from collective, government infrastructure. Go ahead, try me.
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5 Responses to No, No – Government Doesn’t Help *Me*…
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This list is a bit misleading… I admit that many citizens benefit from our very inefficient and ballooning entitlement programs but its very misleading to categorize any sort of tax credits as “Government Aid”. Are you telling me that I should be thanking the govt not taking more of my money in taxes so I am able to save for my child’s education? A tax credit simply provides a small relief from the govt. from taking more of my money… I’m not getting any “AID” from these credits… I’m just getting less screwed….
Aa. That’s right. Also, what is SS, did we not pay into it? Are we not getting a service we paid for? That’s not government assistance. Same with Medicare. Did we not pay into it? Student loans=repayment, albeit at a rate lower than average most likely, but not being paid by the government, being paid back by student, gov’t makes money. The bottom of the list is the list of benefits for which users are NOT contributing. The rest for contributions already made. What a crock this list is. I suppose somehow I should feel bad because I served this country for 25 years and draw disability related to my service. Did I not pay for that also?
Yep, that’s you we are talking about: benefiting from government programs and claiming not to. You draw a government disability pension, you benefit from government help.
And no, you shouldn’t feel bad about it. But you should feel bad if you benefit from government programs while proposing that other people, who have paid their taxes just like you have, shouldn’t.
25% of people on food stamps don’t think they’re getting government aid? I wonder how many of that 25% consider themselves conservative republicans? If it were fewer than 50%, I’d be stunned.
People…
Like driving? Gov’t paid for those roads.
Those drugs you take for your heart or mood swings? FDA is there to prevent them being just shark-cartilage and chalk. They also, along with the USDA, work to help assure you get your food sans e. coli.
Like that nuclear plant to not melt down? Hope the DOE and Nuclear Regulatory Commission aren’t asleep at the wheel.
Prefer that your planes not plummet to a landing? The FAA tries to make sure that airlines actually inspect and repair their planes.
That’s not to mention how you are helped by the government-run-and-funded military (including the Guard,) firefighters, sanitation workers, public-school teachers, snow-plow drivers, police, the National Weather Service people, the FBI, the CIA, Dept. of Corrections, mass transit, or the CDC and local Public Health infrastructure.
To think that you get NO help from the Gov’t is… well, to put it simply, delusional.