Krauthammer on Welfare

* In response to Charles Krauthammer’s Column Right, “Pull the Plug on Welfare to Solve Poverty,” Nov. 21:

Decent jobs that provide day care for poor mothers will stop poverty, not denying them and their illegitimate children health benefits, school lunches, and money with which to survive.

Krauthammer’s narrow-minded solution does nothing to solve the real problem of illegitimacy: namely, the lack of a father in the home.

Instead of penalizing children, why not force men to take equal responsibility for the kids they father? This is a nationwide problem, spanning all economic and racial boundaries. Deadbeat dads are the real cause of our “deranged and harmful social culture,” not their innocent children.

DANIELLE WEST

Los Angeles

* Column Right was right on target. It was intelligent, honest and went right to the heart of the matter. Unfortunately, there isn’t a politician that exists today who would be willing to risk reelection with a vote to eliminate welfare.

I have a viable alternative. Let’s keep welfare, but eliminate the cash and food stamps. We would set up depots where welfare recipients would go to receive all the food they need as well as military surplus clothing and blankets, etc. Checks for rent, telephone, and utilities would be paid directly to these accounts by the state.

With no cash or food stamps, the direct advantage to be on welfare would be eliminated. No cash and no food stamps mean no incentive to be on welfare. Yes, it might be inconvenient for recipients to travel to these depots. Something for free is never easy.

Yes, it might cost a bit more to set up these depots; however, the results would soon justify these expenses.

ALAN R. DAVIS

Los Angeles

* Welfare is not the cause of social decay in the inner cities. The social decay is a growing pain of technological changes, which are destroying the entire Second Wave industrial civilization and replacing it with an entirely new Third Wave civilization, in which almost all work will soon be done by machines.

Because of the changes in our industry, jobs are disappearing forever. But our society is based on the assumption that a person’s entire livelihood and personal identity depend on having a job. Welfare is not part of the problem. It is part of the solution, but it is only a part. One of the greatest challenges facing our country is to find ways to live in the rapidly approaching leisure society. Our people are suffering from profound future shock. But weakening the safety net will only make the crisis much worse.

Candidate Clinton promised to bring us jobs, jobs, jobs. In theory we are out of recession and two years into a recovery. Where are the jobs? They are being filled by machines. The middle class is beginning to disappear. When your job is gone, will the safety net still be there to protect you?

With all the new technology, we can build a Utopia. But it will not be a job-based society. We need more innovation in social organization. We need to make economic life more secure in a very insecure age.

RON McMULLEN

Mission Hills