Maybe he's talking about cocaine!
Personnally I think he is being a bit cheeky having a rant on the "working class" like this, given that fact that it is often the well-educated university types who got us into the financial mess the nation is in, via leading the banks or the incomptent regualtors.
Yes indeed, state welfare has always and everywhere failed. I have not found one shred of evidence that welfare programs actually reduce poverty levels and numbers. And it is plainly due to the fact that welfare programs are a total discouragement to trying to better your situation. A few months ago I heard a single mother interviewed, who was living in free social housing and came out with €350 a week; that's more than someone on minimum wage eanrs. So why on earth would you go to work?I would partially agree with his comments on education though. There is a mob of feral children out there in every town in Ireland, running out of control because their parents don't give a monkey about their future and see no future beyond the next social welfare payments. Why work when the state provides?
I'm not sure the issue though is the parents attitude to education, I think it is more to do with their attitide to work. I came from a small farming background, my Dad held a full time job as well. He worked 12-14 hours a day, every day of his working life and yet was also heavily involved in the community. That attitude rubs off on kids in the right way, in the same way as the attitude of many of our professional social welfare claimants rubs off on theirs. Never ceases to amaze me that there was over 100000 people on the dole during the boom years, yet all the Eastern Europeans could come over and get jobs easily. Why wouldn't the unemployed Irish take those jobs when they could have if they wanted to?
A few months ago I heard a single mother interviewed, who was living in free social housing and came out with €350 a week; that's more than someone on minimum wage eanrs. So why on earth would you go to work?
People refusing jobs that pay 25K.
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I take massive exception to this comment...
1 - Are you suggesting the "working class" don't go to university then?
2 - Are you suggesting the bubble was solely created from the top down?
3 - Are you suggesting that it wasn't a class-bridging national attitude of conspicuous consumption that lead to the bust?
4 - Are you suggesting the banks are the only ones responsible for the "financial mess"?
Yes indeed, state welfare has always and everywhere failed. I have not found one shred of evidence that welfare programs actually reduce poverty levels and numbers. And it is plainly due to the fact that welfare programs are a total discouragement to trying to better your situation. A few months ago I heard a single mother interviewed, who was living in free social housing and came out with €350 a week; that's more than someone on minimum wage eanrs. So why on earth would you go to work?
I think you make a very good point here. My father is a self employed business man who has spent a life time creating a medium sized manufacturing business. Like your dad, 12 hours days were/are normal. My dad's and granddad's generation would rather work for less money than accept a wellfare cheque. This was the right social attitude to have, not this sense of entitlement that has been created by ever increasing, disfunctional welfare programs.
I suppose this depends on your measure of success/failure. If your sole measure of success is 'get people back to work' (usually in minimum wage roles with little or no effective employment rights), then perhaps they have failed. If your measure of success include stopping people from being hungry and providing families with basic light and heat that would otherwise be not there, then perhaps they could be considered to be more successful.Yes indeed, state welfare has always and everywhere failed. I have not found one shred of evidence that welfare programs actually reduce poverty levels and numbers.
People refusing jobs that pay 25K.
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Well that's great, they're going to sit down and figure it out. Is this guy, and his colleagues, so inept and ignorant of what's going on that he is taken by surprise about this?!?"I met 25 representatives of small business there, and there are real concerns that jobs being offered at €25,000 a year are not being taken up, and Eamon O'Cuiv and myself are sitting down and looking at how we can achieve this," he said.
Now there is some optimism, actually it isn't optimism; he claims that it is certain that we will not only have growth, but 3% growth. Do people actually still believe a word that these prevaricators come out with?"Growth will be about 1 per cent of the economy this year - you're not going to get an immediate lift with the number of jobs to be created. Into next year, we're hoping that there will be an impact on jobs because we're going to have about 3 to 3.5 per cent growth in the economy."
I suppose this depends on your measure of success/failure. If your sole measure of success is 'get people back to work' (usually in minimum wage roles with little or no effective employment rights), then perhaps they have failed. If your measure of success include stopping people from being hungry and providing families with basic light and heat that would otherwise be not there, then perhaps they could be considered to be more successful.
That's just not true. You get to keep your medical card for two years. You will still qualify for FIS as long as you are in a low-paid job.Actually neither. My claim is that welfare programs have not reduced the amount of people living below the poverty line, because the rules of welfare programs are such, that as soon as you work you lose your entitlements.
I don't come across many people who 'learn new skills' in their minimum wage jobs or manage to build a career from minimum wage jobs. The great 'American dream' is a myth, in America and in Ireland.Unless you have a job you will not learn new skills or even be able to get a carreer off the ground.
I don't come across many people who 'learn new skills' in their minimum wage jobs or manage to build a career from minimum wage jobs. The great 'American dream' is a myth, in America and in Ireland.
That's just not true. You get to keep your medical card for two years. You will still qualify for FIS as long as you are in a low-paid job.
What about all those people with no kids, what happens to them? And the FIS provides a disincentive to earn above the threshold for family sizes, and usually only paid for 1 year.That's just not true. You get to keep your medical card for two years. You will still qualify for FIS as long as you are in a low-paid job.
Not every unemployed person, but there are plenty of people from so-called disadvantaged backgrounds, who have little or no education and skills. Unless they take any kind of job or undergo some training courses, they will not learn any/new skills. And if you are in a low or minimum wage job, you have an added incentive to increase your skills to get a better job.I don't come across many people who 'learn new skills' in their minimum wage jobs or manage to build a career from minimum wage jobs. The great 'American dream' is a myth, in America and in Ireland.
I don't come across many people who 'learn new skills' in their minimum wage jobs or manage to build a career from minimum wage jobs. The great 'American dream' is a myth, in America and in Ireland.
What happens after 2 years?
I didn't mention kids, so I'm not sure I get your question about kids?What about all those people with no kids, what happens to them?
Not true. FIS has no poverty trap. If you earn more, you do indeed lose the equivalent FIS, but you don't end up worse off. If you do have the opportunity to earn more (through overtime or promotion or whatever), there is no disincentive to progressing.And the FIS provides a disincentive to earn above the threshold for family sizes, and usually only paid for 1 year.
Not every unemployed person, but there are plenty of people from so-called disadvantaged backgrounds, who have little or no education and skills. Unless they take any kind of job or undergo some training courses, they will not learn any/new skills. And if you are in a low or minimum wage job, you have an added incentive to increase your skills to get a better job.
The term "American Dream" is a total cliché. But it is not true that people cannot overcome any disadvantage and make good careers or businesses out of nothing. What people just don't realise is that it is not something that just falls in your lap.
When I finished school I had just enough money to share a tiny apartment while working a minimum wage job. The only skill I had was being fluent in German which allowed me to take a call center job at slightly above minimum wage. I learnt some basic skills and invested some money in courses before I went on to do a degree by night. I'm far from being the "American Dream" millionaire, but none of this would have happened unless I had put in the work, time and money, all of which was my own. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I got my work ethic from my father, so accepting welfare was not an option I was willing to take. That left me with only one option, which was to work and find a way to build a career.
My father and brother set up businesses out of nothing. It's damn hard work but this is the only way. If you take away the incentive to even try and improve your situation then you end up in the situation where thousands of people get stuck in the "poverty trap".
Just think of communities where every other 17 year old girl is pushing a pram, claiming the lone parent allowance (or whatever it's called) and is hoping to get a council house soon.
Less than 3 per cent of people on the lone parents allowance are under 20 years of age.
Another pointless, mean-spirited article from Myers, allowing him and others to indulge their prejudices.