Opinion: New Year Starts Poorly for Unemployed

The confetti has been swept up and the annual wishes for a happy and healthy new year have been uttered. Now is the time that most people must return to work and get back to the business of life.

This is true only for those who actually have a job. But the ever-multiplying number of Californians who live on the razor’s edge of poverty, have reason to fear the calendar moving forward. They also must continue to endure the public scorn of some state legislators who have built their political careers by name calling and stepping on the bodies of those less fortunate.

State Senate Bill 72, signed into law by Governor Jerry Brown last spring, is further reducing the funds for what remains of a welfare program. Aside from cutting the CALWORKs benefits by eight percent, the new law has shortened the time someone can collect benefits while looking for work from the typical 60 months in most states down to 24 months—this, at a time when long-term unemployment is so intractable that it has become a distinct underclass.

Before the cuts, a mother of two looking for work received a maximum of $638 a month, the same level of benefits that were in force in 1989. Unfortunately, prices have gone up quite a bit in the past 23 years.

Still, a Moorpark resident who is a member of the state Human Services Committee insists that it is too much money and only saps the will to work. State Sen. Tony Strickland (R-Moorpark) said, “We’re a magnet for people who can get more for not working.”

What, did Strickland not get the memo from the U.S. Department of Labor declaring that there are currently 6.1 million fewer jobs than there were four years ago? Or does that fact get in the way of his feeling superior to others who want to work but can’t find the jobs that don’t exist? Where is his civility and respect for his own constituents? The unemployed are still voters last time I looked.

Most of California’s CALWORKs recipients are children. Of the 1.4 million Californians who get financial aid, 1.1 million are children. That’s because this state is one of just eight states that keeps children on welfare once their parents’ benefits have run out. The program ends for children when they reach age 18.

So is Strickland suggesting that children are not looking hard enough for work?

What Strickland does feel mighty proud about is the legislative easing of environmental rules for building a football stadium in downtown Los Angeles. A bill was passed last year which will expedite the environmental review process for the stadium developers in a city that still, after decades, does not even have a pro football team.

Strickland called the victory for wealthy developers “a classic example on how we can work together on a bipartisan basis to create jobs.” Wonder how many poor children will get those jobs.

Useless stadiums aside, another state legislator from Palm Desert is also displeased with how much money is being given out in welfare and plans to introduce a bill that will cut the aid by another $100 million.  Assemblyman Brian Nestande (R-Riverside) said that poor people here should learn from those in other states where all aid has nearly been eliminated.

Homelessness is the inevitable outcome when you can’t afford to pay rent. But Nestande insisted that they can learn to live with less.

“Do they (the other states) have rampant homeless problems? I don’t know, but I don’t think so,” said Nestande. “The point is, people adjust.”

And this, my friends, is how people who are not visible nor relevant to our elected officials began the new year. I don’t remember our state ever being so generous to those who have made careers out of being so cruel.