ACCAS2: "I feel guilty, less worthy, denigrated."

That is what I must perhaps feel according to minders leaving such like me just this sort of existence-because of being not Anglos.

Head up, you can speak English with local accent -at least!

Paul, you irritate me monumentally.

Where did I 'moan' that the government should retrain me for free?

In fact, it sounds like my taxes paid for your single, immature life style for a while when you were stupid enough to think it was a lifestyle choice to be anti-social. How does that give you authority to comment on the meaning of paternalism? You just gave yourself as a prime example of how the system we have creates dependency and rewards immaturity.

Why a kid who finishes school should at any stage go 'bludge of the dole' beggars belief. If a kid out of school cannot get a job, that kid should be trained in something. There's a shortage of skilled employees remember.

So it was OK for you. Why should you get Austudy by the way? Didn't you, or your parents, insure you enough or save enough for further education after you finished being anti-social? Why should my taxes pay to support you through Uni? Can't you get part time work? Supplement your income by joining the army reserves? Can't you live with your parents?

It is not OK that a company is rewarded MORE for placing a long term unemployed to a short unemployed. Speaking of incentives to make MORE money! It is a tax payer funded gravy train. That's why Unemployment Offices are flashier in those areas with lowest employment prospects.

The longer somebody is out of the work force, the harder it is to get a reasonable job. Skills do not improve or keep up to date. Ask any woman who has stepped out for a year or so when having a baby.

If a person cannot get employment within a short period of time, options need to in place to address this. Being 'unemployed' for a year shouldn't be one of them and it certainly should not be rewarding third parties if this does happen.

Yvonne “Welfare is not an alternative life-style. Your ex-wife clearly had no personal experience. It is a poverty trap par excellence. To my mind not at all an assistance to help anybody through a situation.”

I think this you are addressing me and I would agree with you completely, in the end, despite her threats she did not go ahead with the idea.

As to your husbands accident. I hope he has recovered and is fully functional again.

Hindsight is no comfort but I have, for the past 20+ years paid for income protection insurance (it is tax deductible) and during that time it has paid out twice, when I suffered some grave events.

I got that policy going before “trauma insurance” became available. Either is worth looking into and a better option than relying solely on government.

I like your tee shirt idea.

Acass2 re your post. A couple of things

The welfare which has been discussed on this thread has been predominately the sort designed to relieve some of the hardship associated with acute events which may befall anyone and help them in those periods whilst they find employment.

You said you son is disabled. For him, assuming his disability is permanent and inhibits him from becoming self-sufficient, a different sort of “welfare” is needed which reflects anyone’s natural compassion commonly expressed as “there for the grace of God go I”.

To yourself, developing a plan to move from where you are, through training and study to somewhere better is the best thing you could do.
That you “decided I needed to increase my opportunities.” Is the first step. I wish you well on your plan and path.
Keep taking those bold steps toward self-sufficiency, that is what will help you overcome any feelings of “guilty, less worthy, denigrated.”

I wish you well.

Yvonne, your last post. I agree with you again. The benefit of someone working versus on welfare are multiple

it saves the expense of welfare

they become a tax contributor.

sense of self worth and self esteem and opportunity for social interaction are all enhanced.

>> “Anybody who wants to upskill ..should … not [be] told they'll need to be unemployed for a year … first.”

There is where you suggest that the gov’t should retrain you for free. You only have to wait through that one year if you want gov’t funded training. You can do it yourself anytime.

Your moronic suggestion that the gov’t is trying to keep people on welfare is annoying me, when they are so obviously trying to make welfare an unattractive option to all but the most needy. The fact that you would so willfully misquote me with such a nasty little story also annoyed me. ( Ie the suggestion that I thought you should be raped )

I don’t have to defend my Austudy payments. I have already paid back in tax any money the gov’t gave me. In any case I believe in free health care and education as the best way to ensure everyone has an equal opportunity to succeed. I will more than cover my expense to the nation during my career.

As for my dole payments, the story was only offered to counter your nonsense that most of the people on the dole have just fallen on hard times and with a little help will be on their way again. That may be true for you but it is not broadly true of the range of people on benefits.

Welfare should not be an alternative lifestyle but unfortunately for many, many people it is. It might not be to those who have a large mortgage and no income but then that’s their problem.

Last night on Four corners I watched people in huge debt trying to blame the banks for giving them loans they couldn’t afford. But the bank didn’t decide you needed a McMansion on a 100% loan filled with furniture bought on 27.5% store credit. One woman actually suggested she deserved the expensive house she bought on her pitiful $230pwk income. It was her RIGHT to have such a home whether she could pay for it or not.

Yvonne:

“It is not OK that a company is rewarded MORE for placing a long term unemployed to a short unemployed.”

Warm, warm, warm, Yvonne, you are nearly reaching a very core of Aussie economics, “mateship” and paternalism, where funding mates pay their “environmentally aware” ”comrades for
-“conserving a nature” by keeping majority, of non-Anglo-Saxons/Celts predominantly, in a stable pool of unemployment, looked after for simply economical reasons,
-and own financial benefits (JobNetwork is a diabolic police-style national-liberal neo-nazi feudal-UK-copy-cat-style Howard government's legacy, a fruitful piece of a cake for too many “employed” at and paid for).

“The longer somebody is out of the work force, the harder it is to get a reasonable job. Skills do not improve or keep up to date.” Which skills? Which date? Was maths improved dramatically upon last 50 years? Applied science and medicine have their basics-that is what local universities taught only- unchanged neither so dramatically as particular technological processes did in situ.

No job-no upgrading skills because “Experience is mother of wisdom”. And "work for dole" is denigrating humiliation, not skills upgrading. Denying jobs for long-term unemployed just contradicts own postulates.

“If a person cannot get employment within a short period of time, options need to in place to address this. Being 'unemployed' for a year shouldn't be one of them and it certainly should not be rewarding third parties if this does happen.” – they are addressed already by benefiting bureaucrats privileged as anything in Australia does.

Welfare is not paternalism. Taken miserable dole from pockets of needy dole recipients to boom an army of bureaucrats paid for factually making decisions for adult concerned people is paternalism.

Spell checking has shown no discrepancy in this message.

Michael K,

Please tell me, is where ever you came from better than Australia? I would really like to know where it is you think you would be treated more fairly?