Work Requirements
Letting Capital off the hook
Regarding recent public statements about requiring Medicaid recipients to find part-time jobs to qualify.
Critical sociology creates and applies theories of social power. The sociological discipline is an ongoing process of demystifying the social world through the application of social scientific methodologies. Social research methods are commonly employed by marketing firms, governments, and social media companies, however without an accompanying theory of power (the state never explicates this) or the intent to freely disseminate the data collected (private entities rarely do this), they are not practicing sociology.
The authoritarian disdain for science in general is exceeded perhaps only by its contempt for the social sciences, in particular.
If we consider social identities to be both internal and external states, something that one is but also what one is made into, then who is responsible for an individual’s importance, moral worth, or some other status? To recognize another as human is to see them also bearing responsibility for a self that they, just like you, do not have full control over. The stigmatized person deemed worthy of being treated as if normal is always worthy in spite of their stigma.
No one chooses an ascribed identity, it is “written on” a person. As well, we do not choose the cultural rules by which our particular confluence of identities may be treated. It is by chance that the individual inheritors of social privilege were among those who would inherit privilege, and not by genetic design or merit. The society that confers privilege, though, is by design. It’s the collective responsibility for the society we design that spurs all sorts of existential bad faith denials of that responsibility.
The moral weight of the responsibility for the present social order is heaviest upon those who hold the most social power. Systemic inequities, it is believed, are due to those holding power under such a system. The hegemonic support for inequity—which these privileged classes produce and promote—seems to universally reinforce the social relationships needed to keep those who have power, in power. Simply put, those who benefit from societal inequities build the means by which their privilege persists.
It is not coincidental that the traditional American public school classroom is arranged in rows and columns designed for teacher surveillance, like a sweatshop work floor. Meanwhile private schools are more likely to seat their students around large tables, were everyone can see each other’s faces, like managers or board members in a meeting.
As part of “ending welfare as we know it,” the Clinton administration added work requirements to federal support programs, creating TANF (Temporary Assistance to Needy Families) which also set lifetime eligibility limits.
The principle behind “Welfare-to-Work” is the recognition that if people are able to secure their basic needs, it becomes much more difficult to coerce them into being exploited. Since those who have secure food and shelter are able to maintain a bare existence, employers (exploiters) lose their most effective means of corralling labor, especially for the lowest-paying, least-desirable jobs. By putting in work requirements, those who have been marginalized out of the labor force can be brought back.
The idea that federal subsidies make people dependent has been promoted by the same folks who believe that the health of the market is the same as the health of the society. If labor-power exists but is not being exploited, then profit is being left unrealized; the same applies to natural resources. Drill, baby, drill.
Ginning up popular resentment against a class of people who do not sell their ability to work, yet are able to survive through a redistribution of value is a longstanding method of turning the working class against each other. Those who would live off others’ labors are leeches.
Add “living off the value produced by others without having to sell one’s labor-power” to the list.
If we were to establish a viable minimum wage (literally, enough to live on), the mean rate of exploitation would be reduced—domestic businesses would become less profitable. Those who would be eligible for social support programs would by definition not be employable on a full-time basis, for if they were, they would not need supplemental food or housing aid. Those receiving WIC, SNAP, Section 8, or Medicaid would qualify because they are not able to participate fully in a labor market that would otherwise ensure they have enough to afford food, housing, and medical care.
The only reason it makes sense to require people receiving public aid to enter the private labor market to be exploited is because we allow the market to pay sub-survival wages. If workers on the whole could not be exploited as much, the drive to exploit them as much as possible—by requiring non-viable labor to cover subsidies—would be lessened. This is the same principle Libertarians have used to argue against government subsidies—for wherever there is an excess of cash, there will be an inflation of prices. See student loans and educational costs. If we make higher education tuition-free, prospective students will be less likely to take out large loans.
Funny how the economics work exactly the same way, but there’s just that little twist when we drop moral assumptions about social classes. If we restrict the rate at which people who do not sell their labor-power (the Bourgeois) are to be subsidized, then the cost of hosting them will drop.