I don't want to learn to fish..
A few years ago I sat alone in a crowded lunchtime restaurant in Leavenworth, Kansas. A stranger stepped up and asked if he could share my table. I motioned for him to sit down and we struck up a conversation. The conversation migrated from the weather to the economy and then to welfare. We both agreed that there are people who truly need help but that many people take advantage of the system. It was then he related his tale of woe.
He was a small construction contractor willing to tackle any job if the scale of the project was within his company’s abilities. He had need of a common laborer but had been unable to find one. When he remembered he knew a fellow named Joe who was out of work, he went to his house and offered him a job as a hod carrier. To give him further incentive, he bought him a good pair of work gloves. The next week Joe arrived for work. He learned fast and was a good worker who got along well with the other employees. Things went well all week until the end of the day on Friday. That’s when Joe said he was quitting. My lunch companion asked why and was stunned by the answer. Joe explained, “I can make almost as much money on welfare and I can fish and hunt whenever I want. I gain back most of what I lose in income with fewer expenses so I can live almost as well on welfare as I can by working.”
Infuriated, my lunch companion took action. He went to the unemployment office and told them Joe had quit his job for no reason and should not be entitled to welfare since the job was still there. He was informed by the bureaucrat in charge that it made no difference whether someone quits a job or is fired; he is still entitled to welfare payments. Disgusted, and with nowhere to appeal, he turned and walked out.
Joe is one of the legions of nonemployed in this country. I do not consider him unemployed because that implies he wants to work but is unable to find employment. Clearly, Joe does not fall in that category. He is the perfect example of the growing number of people who live by the creed, “I don’t want to learn to fish. I just want someone to give me the fish.”
It was Joe and others like him, who put Barack Obama back in office in 2012. Romney talked of giving people jobs but Joe and his friends don’t want jobs. They want the welfare, food stamps, and government handouts that Obama promised – and they voted to get it. Unfortunately we have now reached the point that the Joes of America can outvote the working people. Those who pay no taxes are now in the majority and their free handouts can only come from the sweat of those of us who are still willing to work. Think of that when the next tax increase hits your paycheck.
A. Nonymous