What assistance do long term unemployed get in the US?

[August]

Since over a million people lose unemployment this week, I was wonering if anyone knows what assistance they'll get from now on?

Food stamps, yes. Housing, almost certainly not due to closed waiting lists. Health insurance? Where do they get cash from, and how much?

[stacyf]

It really depends on the state. In the state I am in you do not receive many benefits (medicaid/food stamps) unless you have dependents. Food stamps here also depend on assets unless you fall under a certain income level. Not sure about health insurance but with the new health care you would qualify for assistance so it would at least be "affordable". Most people will end up taking low wage jobs $8-$10/hr so that they can afford to live. There are also various local assistance programs for food/heat etc.

[Stephanie66]

They can get food stamps, but if they do not have dependents, they will be required to go through a job program and take anything that is offered (that is at least 20 hours a week.) I would imagine that long term unemployed (around two years) would not have many resources left.

They can get insurance through Obamacare, but if they live in a state that did not expand Medicaid, they might be screwed on that, too. (Although they might still be able to buy insurance, it is my understanding that if they otherwise qualify for Medicaid but their state chose not to expand coverage, they also don't get tax credits.)

And yeah, unless they were already on housing assistance, they are SOL. I actually WAS a single parent and somewhat poor, and never got off the waiting list in three years.

[Mama Mia]

Since over a million people lose unemployment this week, I was wonering if anyone knows what assistance they'll get from now on?

Food stamps, yes. Housing, almost certainly not due to closed waiting lists. Health insurance? Where do they get cash from, and how much?

Like virtually everything in the U.S. It varies greatly by State. Generally, in my state, they would qualify for food stamps ( now called SNAP ...they aren't " stamps" anymore, it is benefits loaded on a debit type card) , that can only be used for food. They would generally qualify for Medicaid. This is new starting Jan.1, previously only some disabled adults or households with children could qualify.

Some can qualify for General Assistance, but this is very limited and short term, about $300 a month. General Assistance is considered a loan, not sure how the people pay it back. I think it's only for 3-6 months, but could be wrong. Students are in eligible. After that is used up, or if they don't qualify, there isn't anything. If there are minor kids, or the person is disabled there are other programs.

[August]

So, seriously nothing but food, and that isn't even guaranteed? It makes me feel ill. How is this supposed to be civilization?

[RosyDaisy]

If you live in Alabama you are basically SOL unless you are pregnant or have kids. Our wonderful Gov. Robert Bentley decided not to expand Medicaid and opted Alabama out of the ACA. Oh, and Gov. Bentley is a a doctor. Disgusting!:mad:

[Mama Mia]

So, seriously nothing but food, and that isn't even guaranteed? It makes me feel ill. How is this supposed to be civilization?

This would be why we have so many homeless people.

There is huge resistance in the U.S. to providing enough food and money and housing and health care to keep little children alive.

So you can imagine all the fucks many people give about an able bodied adult not starving to death in the street.

[Anny Nym]

There is huge resistance in the U.S. to providing enough food and money and housing and health care to keep little children alive.

So you can imagine all the fucks many people give about an able bodied adult not starving to death in the street.

All above I just read is simply very, very bad and I can´t relate to that in any way possible.

But I happen to have a discussion on the Upworthy FB page, regarding the extreme low salaries for Fast Food workers in the US, with alot of people who just think it´s absolutely okay to pay this workers such a low wage they don´t even could satisfy basic needs as rent, health care or enough food and clothing for them, let alone a family!

I really don´t get it: Why is it average Joe&Jane against average Joe&Jane ? Why do people really have the mindset to say, it´s just jolly fine to have someone working 60 hours at one of the main industries of a country - and then paying this worker not even enough to survive because "this is a low class job/he just should go to college/ but I AM not paid good too!"

Seriously, what the fuck?!

[Mama Mia]

All above I just read is simply very, very bad and I can´t relate to that in any way possible.

But I happen to have a discussion on the Upworthy FB page, regarding the extreme low salaries for Fast Food workers in the US, with alot of people who just think it´s absolutely okay to pay this workers such a low wage they don´t even could satisfy basic needs as rent, health care or enough food and clothing for them, let alone a family!

I really don´t get it: Why is it average Joe&Jane against average Joe&Jane ? Why do people really have the mindset to say, it´s just jolly fine to have someone working 60 hours at one of the main industries of a country - and then paying this worker not even enough to survive because "this is a low class job/he just should go to college/ but I AM not paid good too!"

Seriously, what the fuck?!

I think it's largely because the dominant belief in the U.S. is that if you are low-income it is due to some sort of personal flaw or being less than. In conservatives it is expressed as people should sink or swim based on how successfully ambitious they are. In liberals it's expressed in a more paternalistic and subtle way of " these poor people just don't know any better".

There seems to be very little realization that millions of people are unable to find jobs, or that you have to have jobs that aren't high skilled and/ or high paying and you need millions of people to fill them. Or that those jobs are every bit as necessary as higher status jobs. And that the people who do those jobs need to either make enough money to live decently or the government needs to provide financial supports to make life livable despite a low wage.-- without a ton of stigma and time limits and shame and an assumption that if someone's working and needs help with food or housing or childcare they also need social services.

It's so ingrained to think poverty is a personal character flaw that even many very poor people are constantly bitching about how all these other poor people are a bunch of grifters.

And of course you do always get some people who are lazy, scammy grifters, and people assume everyone getting any kind of help is like that.

This attitude is getting much worse I think. Look at all the huge fight over "Obamacare" . Which basically just expands who and what private, for profit, insurance companies have to provide, expands free coverage to a fairly small number of people, gives a partial subsidy to others and mandates that everyone has to buy some coverage from insurance companies. Hardly what most of the world would see as Universal Health Care, but you have people absolutely rabid over how evilly socialist it is.

[duplessis3]

It is Calvinism. If you need help you are unworthy and God is just sending you to he'll a bit earlier.

[Maggie Mae]

Because a few decades ago, it was possible for many people to live on minimum wage. Those people who DID "pull themselves up by their bootstraps" now have money and influence. However, they don't seem to grasp the concept that minimum wage has not risen with inflation. Put another way - sure, in the 60s and 70s, it was possible to get a job washing dishes or whatever to pay rent, and if you worked hard you could save a little bit of money and eventually work your way up to a better paying job. Today, a dishwasher makes maybe $9 an hour. In my location, the least expensive apartment/house on craigslist right now is $1200/month. At $8/hour, you might make 1400 a month. That's $2000 left over, and this is pre tax and and assuming that you can get 40 hours a week (not likely). In the 50s, minimum wage was $.75, but rent was also only $42. So someone making 75 cents an hour only has to work 56 hours to pay average rent, where as today, they have to work most of the month. I honestly and truly believe that most people don't realize (and don't care) exactly how bad our economic policies are. They think that since they managed and struggled as a young adult that the young people today will do the same, and as long as they work hard, everything will be okay. Except that's not true.

Also, in the 50/60s, food was the most expensive part of a household budget. Today it's shelter.

[RainbowSky]

*Warning-long rant ahead! I started on just being unemployed and ended up on working poor using my own situation as an example*

I've mentioned this before here. I'm living the low income bs so ill put it out there.

Up until very recently, I made minimum. As in 7.25. After taxes, it was 5.70 or 5.80 something. I can't get the people who do our payroll to fix my withholding, so now I make 9 and bring home 7 ( I have kids. This would be really, really helpful to have fixed! :snooty: ). I also got my hours cut because of something about 30 hours and healthcare.

It is SUPER fun trying to pay bills! Constant threat of things being turned off, or being turned off. We have low income asst. On electricity. It is 14% of my largest check. This "is fair because at least it isn't 20%!"

When unemployed last year, I had worked at a temp agency just to have something before and it didn't qualify me for unemployment. (?? Never gotten it, don't know how it works.)

We get food stamps. We get Medicaid now. The limit for our household was almost THREE TIMES what I could make if I maxed allowable hours every single week the entire fucking year. That's it. That's all we got when I had no job as well. My vehicle is broken

I walk a mile to catch a bus 2 hours earlier than I have to be at work and sometimes walk up to 5 to get to work if I can't catch a bus if they aren't running or can't get someone to come get me somewhere.

I know others live this and worse. I've lived in a truck with my kids. We have had no heat in a house that had no electricity when it was January (a few years ago)

I'm just actively trying to put a face on this. I don't think I should be handed everything, but this is crazy. I work my ASS off. My boss has a boss who calls 5 or more times a day to bitch that we don't do his job for him well enough, and its our fault he is getting bitched at, blah blah. He makes over 65,000 a year.

I just feel horrible for him!

I had a bus driver tell me he knows how hard it is to live on a low income, he makes 17.00 an hour like we do and only gets 40 hours most weeks. I laughed at him! Like straight up laughed at him. At work. Because I couldn't help myself. Like omg, what fucking world do people live in? Are people really that oblivious, or just being dicks? It isn't the first time I have had someone reference my making over 15 recently, either.

And people think people like me are supposed to...what? Die? If I had rent anymore, we would be living in a parking lot in our non-mobile truck because there is literally nothing to help except homeless shelters. None hat you can stay in for more than 3 days near here. Been there, done that. So....what? I've been trying to get a new, second job. Without a vehicle, timing is going to almost impossible. Trying really hard is getting nowhere for so many people!