Bill Clinton’s overhaul of the welfare system, which was passed in conjunction with a Republican-controlled Congress, replaced a major federal welfare program with block grants to states, required adults to find a job within two years of receiving aid, placed a five-year limit on aid, blocked future legal immigrants from welfare assistance, and cut $24 billion in food stamps. It was denounced by many Democrats, including Peter Edelman, who resigned from his post at the Department of Health and Human Services, arguing that the law would do “serious injury to American children.”The rest of that article is a series of snippets in which Hillary is being the worst person to families her husband was cutting off of welfare. My favorite parts are when later Senator Clinton starts talking about "deadbeats."
In an April 2002 interview with the Gettysburg Times, then-Senator Clinton reiterated the impetus behind her husband’s effort to “substitute dignity for dependence.” At the time, Congress was considering the reauthorization the 1996 law.To put it bluntly, Hillary Clinton doesn't care about poor people. She doesn't care how many she has to throw to the wolves to get elected.
“There were people in the White House who said, ‘just sign anything,’ you know,’ the New York senator said in an interview. ‘And I thought that was wrong. We wanted to do it in a way that kept faith with our goals: End welfare as we know it, substitute dignity for dependence, but make work pay.’”In that same interview, Clinton also said that people who had moved from welfare to work were “no longer deadbeats.”
“Now that we’ve said these people are no longer deadbeats—they’re actually out there being productive—how do we keep them there?”
Today, she was asked some pointed questions about the emergence of the "gig" economy where wolves like Uber and Taskrabbit take advantage of the desperation of underemployed people with no social benefits. These over-capitalized start-ups are sinking a lot of money into political advertising this year so candidates may be wary of offending them. Her answer, predictably, was a dodge.
Today @HillaryClinton got asked if she supported the idea of a #basicincome due to automation. This was her response. pic.twitter.com/QMHsLks3gV
— Scott Santens (@2noame) July 21, 2015
The question really wasn't about the ACA. But it's important to emphasize that the "innovation" she doesn't want to stifle is these companies' ability to exploit vulnerable and therefore pliable and cheap labor. That's what the "gig" economy is. And that scheme can't operate if we get too many "deadbeats" running around with no imperative to feed it.