If It Doesn't Work, Why Try to Fix It?

The current unemployment insurance system is too easy to manipulate and rewards wrong behaviors.

I have a few friends taking advantage of the system. They make more money from unemployment benefits than if they were to take an actual job. The reasoning was that their cost of living is lower because they are not spending money on gas (environmental?) and money on eating out for lunch. And because they have more time, they are living a healthier lifestyle. As Penn and Teller would say, BULL SH-T.

Now, having spent about 6 months sitting in a hot tub, surfing Friendster (yeah, now you know how long ago that was), and chatting with fellow unemployed Americans on the cell phone, I realize that this may seem like the pot calling the kettle black. Hey, this is my dais and I'll whine if I want to.

If anything, the pickling in the hot tub taught me how easy it is take milk our system. Perhaps that's why they call it the "Government Cheese"....from milk, comes cheese.

It bothers me when people say there are no jobs out there. What people are really saying is that there are no jobs out there they are WILLING to do. So the jobs that we want aren't available, and the jobs we don't want sit unfilled. That "now hiring" sign at the coffee shop never seems to go down.

Recently a friend moved far away because the only job she could get was picking fruit. When I eat a California orange, I think about a trained professional who decided to not utilize the welfare system, instead choosing to find her own solution to the unemployment problem. She is an American hero in my eyes.

When a person works, he/she contributes to unemployment insurance - which will pay him/her if she needs it later on. Once the unemployment "balance" is used, further benefits are paid through other tax payer dollars. At that point, there is no further entitlement to the weekly benefits checks. Instead, the money comes through what Congress decides to give.

I say if someone wants to collect unemployment insurance, he/she should be working at least part time in a job the contributes to the betterment of this country (New Deal?). We don't need to reward lazy-ass people sitting at home surfing the internet to "show" they applied to a few jobs. Maybe we need to send some people to go work for BP cleaning oil-soaked beaches.