McDonalds doesn't exactly care about "credentials", so that argument is pretty much worthless. Self-esteem issues sounds really pretty and very enlightened, but like I said earlier at some point you've got to get over yourself and show some responsibility for yourself. And really, if you're so screwed up in the head that you are basically non-functional over a 15 year period, you need to head for the happy home and get some help (which means you aren't needing cash payments from welfare). All this psychobabble crap about building habits is the same excuses used to justify ongoing failure in addicts, so it comes as no surprise to me that you'd find yet another group that you're willing to relieve of the slightest hint of personal responsibility.
To be fair, as you said, the welfare restructuring being proposed in Michigan is only a small part of the total welfare package, and so it's not as if hundreds of thousands of people are simply being tossed out into the harsh Michigan winter, and we need to keep that in mind. In terms of the larger welfare discussion, I'd be willing to wager that you probably haven't worked with a lot of schizoaffectives, bipolars, or borderline personalities. Discounting decades of sociological and psychological research as "psychobabble" leads to legislation based on prejudice instead of science, which, in turn, leads to situations like
this. Are you going to tell a veteran that their diagnosis of PTSD, based on their survivor's guilt, hypervigilance, paranoia, nightmares, and depression is simply "psychobabble" and that they need to "get over themselves?" If you've never stood a post at a vehicle or personnel checkpoint, then you probably would have a hard time understanding why someone who has would have a hard time holding a job that requires them to stand in an exposed position, in front of hundreds of strangers - like working the counter at McDonald's. Even if we limit the discussion to able-bodied adults without any mental disorder, when we do the math, does a job at McDonald's, as fulfilling as that might be from a sense of self-responsibility and reliability, provide comparable wages and benefits compared to the welfare system? What about day care and vehicle ownership and maintenance? You'd do anything for your family, and so would I, and we're both fortunate enough to have acquired education and skills that make us competitive in career paths that offer wages and benefits that far outstrip the welfare system, so it would be easy for us to say, "Man, I gotta get off my lazy ass and get a job. Get off welfare." But without those skills, with WalMart, McDonald's, and manual labor as our only options, I'm gonna go with what's going to get me the most for my family, and if that happens to be welfare, then my sense of responsibility, and middle / upper-middle class indignation can get bent.
). Under normal circumstances (in U.S.) if a Lefty tried to do it, the Right would cry for days about big government stealing jobs from private sector. If a Righty tried it, the Left would cry for days about pseudo-slavery and class warfare. It's an untenable situation, to say the least.
