Matt Yglesias, speaking once again on the subject of suburban sprawl, links to this article in the LA Times about California's attempts to balance its budget, which includes this line:
The plan passed by the Assembly cuts $124 million in welfare payments to the elderly and disabled and scales back drug treatment programs for prisoners.This seems to go on every year in California. Sacramento grows frantic to balance its budget (especially if they're passing out some of those oh-so-needed tax breaks for the wealthy) and one of the first groups to feel the effects are the elderly and disabled. The cost-of-living adjustment on SSI payments are cut, and those least able to (according to the conservative work ethic) just "work harder" to make up for the rising cost of living are left without.
I've blogged on this issue before:
Monday, December 26, 2005
A government for the people…
— Amanda @ 07:16 pmIt amounts to this: SSI-SSP recipients don’t attend fundraising dinners and write big checks for the campaign coffers of politicians. So they’re relegated to the end of the line when the budget’s divvied.
"For State’s Aged, Blind, Disabled, a Lump of Coal for Christmas"
LA Times, Dec. 22, 2005To save the state budget without increasing taxes, our governor and legislature decided to cut SSI, aid to the poor, to match the COLA the federal government requires every year—in effect denying the COLA to the people to whom that average $33 increase means the most.
Says Chris Brown, who suffers cerebral palsy, “It’s getting harder and harder for people like me to lead independent and productive lives.”
Indeed.
