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I was something like $250 over the annual income threshold to qualify for Medicaid for my first son’s birth. My employer was “kind” enough to allow me unpaid time off long enough to get me under the threshold, but having an “all or nothing” threshold just to qualify was a little frustrating.
It is ridiculous that assistance programs are all or nothing. No, it is moronic. It damn near acheives the opposite of its intended purpose, to be a safety net or lift up so people can get back on their feet and prosper. Instead, it incentivizes people to remain poor if they can’t manage a big enough jump in income to make up for the loss of assistance. You can pick up an extra shift here and there, or get a modest raise, and end up LOSING income as a result. That’s absurd.
Those programs should gradually taper such that when you make more income at work, you always also still net more income overall. Past a certain point, instead of dropping to nothing, the assistance lowers gradually the more you make from other income. Progress is a bit slowed that way, but it is still progress, not a pit.
The purpose of a system is what it does
If a fisherman is paid to catch fish, and a dolphin gets caught in the net and dies, is the fisherman’s purpose to kill dolphins?
If the fisherman has made no efforts, and placed no structure to avoid killing dolphins?
Yes. Because they structured things in such a way that it will happen, so its part of the design of the system. Being a byproduct doesn’t make it any less intentional if there is no effort to alter the design.
No, then it’s his porpoise.
