Unemployment is Welfare

I may need to work up a better-documented rant about this. But I have had enough of people proudly proclaiming their extended unemployment benefits. Getting laid off is not an invitation to twiddle around working on your novel. YOU NEED A JOB!

Twiddling on a novel is not a job. It will not lead to a job. You need to develop a new skill that someone will actually pay you to practice.

If people are afraid to take a job because it pays less than the job they lost and choose to spend another six months on the dole, they are parasites. GET OFF THE PUBLIC TEAT!

I have come across several instances of this. The people could have been back in the workforce, but “I would only make a hundred more a week working, so I would rather have the summer off.” Not an exact quote, but a very honest characterization. The policy that supports this attitude is not compassionate. It’s an opiate deluding people about their economic worth. If you can afford to decline a job that pays more than your benefits, you’re getting too much help.

The first months of unemployment may not be so much direct welfare. Workers do pay into an unemployment insurance pool. And I accept there are benefits to providing a cushion for the laid-off. But after six months, either what you can do just isn’t that special anymore, or you have to move to somewhere where your skills are needed.

Yeah, you might have to move. You will have to adjust to a lower standard of luxury. But you will be contributing instead of consuming. And there’s no promise of perpetual comfort in the American Dream.