Service Credits: Welfare Reform or Pipe Dream?

Jim Nolan wrote glowingly here last Monday about an American Service Credits proposal.

At the outset, he touts the ASC because "The well-to-do who pay most of our income taxes hate to see their money go to people who don’t do anything for it."

That's the baited hook. He is fishing for suckers. From that lead-in, you would think that he is writing about a new money-saving welfare replacement program. Wrong!


Buried, at the end of his piece, are three paragraphs which candidly state that rather than cutting welfare cost, the ASC increases them.

"Roughly 20 percent of the 150 million in our workforce are un- or underemployed and making less than $25,000 a year. This would make 30 million eligible for at least some service credits.

"If the 30 million drew down an average of $15,000 in credits per year, that would be $450 billion in cost, plus administration.

"Federals spending on welfare, excepting Medicaid, is (presently) about $400 billion. This would include Supplemental Security Income, the Earned Income Tax Credit, food stamps, housing and about 80 more programs."

So, if we are presently spending $400 billion on "welfare," how will implementing the ASC which will cost $450 billion -- exclusive of administrative costs -- save "those who pay most of our income taxes" a nickel? $450 billion is greater than $400 billion.

Under the ASC the unemployed and the underemployed won't be given money. Instead, "This would be a locally administered, federally funded program of credits -- redeemable in money, in return for approved services rendered to others, to one’s community and even to one’s self."

This is nothing more -- nothing less -- than an old-fashioned carnival shell game. The government doesn't pay out cash. Instead it gives a credit redeemable for cash? What difference does it make?

And what "approved services" would allow the unemployed or under-employed to earn such "credits?" Here's his list:

1. Service on a volunteer fire department. (If you are a volunteer firefighter, how would you feel when a new one comes aboard and is paid the equivalent of minimum wage for "volunteering?)

2. Park and highway cleanup;

3. Nursing home visits to the lonely;

4. Growing urban gardens to feed the poor;

5. Playing in a municipal band;

6. Assisting with recreation programs;

7. Smoking cessation;


8. Getting off drugs;

9. Ceasing to be fat. (Who supervises 2-9?]

Mr. Nowlan's ASC is going to be federally funded" but "locally administered at the county level." He opines that a model for the new "administrative units" might be the "local draft boards." That would imply program administration by unpaid volunteers. Or would the county revert to habit, and pay its new administrative board members and provide them with health insurance and pension benefits. What's your best guess?

Mr. Nowlan compares his ASC to the Depression-era Civilian Conservation Corps. But did CCC workers get paid for visiting the poor in nursing homes? Smoking or drug use cessation? Losing 10 pounds? Self-supervising?

The CCC operated work camps. The typical CCC enrollee was a U.S. citizen, unmarried, unemployed male, 18-25 years of age. Reserve officers from the U.S. Army were in charge of the camps. Normally the enrollee's family was on local relief.

Each enrollee volunteered and, upon passing a physical exam and/or a period of conditioning, was required to serve a minimum six-month period, with the option to serve as many as four periods (or up to two years), but only if employment outside the Corps was not possible. Enrollees worked 40 hours a week over five days, sometimes including Saturdays, if poor weather dictated. In return they received food, clothing, and medical care and $30 a month; from that, a $22–25 compulsory allotment was sent to the enrollee's family. (From Wikipedia).

Will our ASC "workers" work in camps under military-like supervision? Or will it be largely a self-reporting honor system to an administrator ensconced in an office?

The intent may be pure. But without a camp under military-like supervision, this is no CCC. It's closer to a pipe-dream.

Posted: QCOline.com April 8, 2017
Copyright 2017, John Donald O'Shea