As a follow up to last night’s post, my conservative friend responded, arguing that my monthly number was too low. “That number is per PERSON, not for entire families, and that’s not taking into consideration all the other benefits they get.”
Except according to the state of Florida, $240/month is the average benefit payout per family. While, yes, there are families who do get more—the maximum payout is $303 per eligible person—in many families, only the children are beneficiaries, because their parents or guardians are social security recipients. And because there is a lifetime limit when people can qualify for cash assistance, most people don’t stay on it for long. The average length of time an adult is on TANF is around 4 months. Most people who apply for TANF won’t receive it for an entire year. Sometimes they’re just getting one-time assistance.
I think the reason this is so unbelievable to conservatives is because they genuinely believe folks out there are living the good life on cash assistance and food stamps, even though both pay remarkably little (and with food stamps, there are a lot of restrictions on what you can buy), especially when you consider the income people have to qualify. Nobody’s out there rolling in a bed of welfare checks. It’s emergency survival income and barely even that.