(2017/05/02) Building a strong society and an innovative economy (Earned Benefits)
Best of the Left - Leftist Perspectives on Progressive Politics, News, Culture, Economics and Democracy
Jay Tomlinson
4.5 β’ 3.4K Ratings
ποΈ 2 May 2017
β±οΈ 79 minutes
ποΈ Recording | iTunes | RSS
π§ΎοΈ Download transcript
Summary
Edition #1100
Today we look at the myriad benefits of earned benefits and why we should be looking to greatly expand our social benefits programs rather than cut them
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Show Notes
Ch. 1: Opening Theme: A Fond Farewell - From a Basement On the Hill
Ch. 2: Act 1: Fox News: Starve The Poor, Feed The Rich - @theyoungturks - Air Date: 12-30-16
Ch. 3: Song 1: βLet's Eat the Poor - alan ross haynes
Ch. 4: Act 2: David Dayen On Social Security Expansion - Majority Report (@MajorityFM) - Air Date: 06-20-16
Ch. 5: Song 2: βSocial Security - Tallia Storm
Ch. 6: Act 3: Ikea and the family leave we all deserve - Economic Update w @profwolff - Air Date 12-15-16
Ch. 7: Song 3: βFamily Values - Johnossi
Ch. 8: Act 4: Economics: How Scandinavia Got it Right - @DavidPakmanShow - Air Date: 11-05-16
Ch. 9: Song 4: βTurtle (Bonobo Remix) - Pilote
Ch. 10: Act 5: Defending Social Security from those who would dismantle it - The Zero Hour w: @RJEskow - Air Date 4-15-17
Ch. 11: Song 5: βBills - LunchMoney Lewis
Ch. 12: Act 6: Call Congress to Demand they Stop the Budget Cuts & Invest in Human Needs via @CoalitiononHN - Best of the Left Activism
Ch. 13: Song 6: βActivism - Shihan
Ch. 14: Act 7: Taxes, defense and public insurance programs - Economic Update w @profwolff - Air Date 4-24-16
Voicemails
Ch. 15: Responses to Alan from Georgia re: Louisiana abortion laws - Dave from Olympia, WA
Ch. 16: Framing universal health care as an American value - Annie from Alabama
Ch. 17: My first 100 days - Romulo from Miami, FL
Voicemail Music: Loud Pipes - Classics
Ch. 18: Final comments on Stance, my new favorite way to contact congress
Closing Music: Here We Are - Everyone's in Everyone
Activism:
TAKE ACTION
Tell Congress to pass a spending bill that invests in basic living standards and fundamental human needs via Coalition on Human Needs (@CoalitiononHN)
Leave Congress a direct voicemail with Stance
Check out stats and data on the National Priorities Project (@natpriorities) and spread the word
EDUCATE YOURSELF
Federal Budget TipSheet - Social Insurance and Earned Benefits (National Priorities Project)
Federal Budget TipSheet - Health Care Spending (National Priorities Project)
Trump's Budget Cuts (National Priorities Project Blog)
Under Trump, coal communities are stuck between a rock and a hard place (Think Progress)
Remember When Donald Trump Promised to Save Social Security? (The Nation)
HEAD SMACKER: Trump Plan Slashes Taxes on Companies Already Dodging Taxes (Coalition for Human Needs Blog)
Written by BOTL Communications Director, Amanda Hoffman
Produced by Jay! Tomlinson
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The genius of what economists call the Nordic model is that it keeps looking out for the well-being of the whole at the same time as it supports creativity and innovation. |
| 0:16.0 | This program is made possible by the members and donors to the show to support the work we do get commercial free versions of every episode and occasional members only bonus content to visit the Contributes tab at BestOfAleft.com. |
| 0:26.0 | Now welcome to the award winning BestOfAleft podcast with clips today from the Young Turks, the majority report, economic update with Professor Richard Wolfe, the David Pakman show, and the Zero Hour. |
| 0:36.0 | Fox News is not overly concerned with the fast-spending, the trillions of dollars we wasted in Iraq and Afghanistan, but they found that one part of our budget that is unacceptable. |
| 0:56.0 | We're giving too much money to the poor. But wait a minute, how about the trillions in tax cuts to the rich and corporations that especially the ones that Trump and the Republicans have done? |
| 1:05.0 | The Trump and the Republicans are promising now. So the tuna possibly $10,000,000 over the next decade. Yeah, now we're giving the poor too much money. All right, let's let Fox News explain. |
| 1:16.0 | Well, food stamp fraud is at an all-time high and it has estimated $70 million of taxpayer money was wasted on food stamp fraud. So is it time to end the program altogether? |
| 1:27.0 | Oh my gosh, $70 million. That sounds like a lot of money. I'm going to give you contacts on that in a second and you're going to see what a little money is and a lot of money is when it comes to the federal government. |
| 1:37.0 | But you notice what you just said, is it time to end the program altogether? Well, there's a little bit of wasting a program that we kill it. |
| 1:43.0 | Can we apply that same standard to the Pentagon? Probably not. |
| 1:47.0 | Again, let me get to those numbers in a second, but I want to give you one more clip here. |
| 1:50.0 | This program, the SNAP program, the reincarnation of the food stamp program has been ripe with problems since almost its inception. |
| 1:57.0 | Bob Dull said in 1977 that we have finally eliminated the need, eliminated the greed and fed the need. And unfortunately, 40 years later, we still see the same problems with fraud, with abuse and really just overspending on this particular program. |
| 2:11.0 | A fraud and abuse. I mean, we found it the one thing helping poor people in this government, we got to get rid of it. Right. Now let's give you the facts. First of all, they said record amount of fraud in 2016 this year. |
| 2:24.0 | We don't even have the numbers for this year. So let me give you the reality. Their on screen graphics cited 2016 USDA as the source of this information. However, according to the Department of Agriculture website, the most recent data available is from 2015. |
| 2:38.0 | So this look, you can say, hey, that's a small mistake 2015 2016. That's the latest numbers they have. Right. First of all, it's that sparks news claiming those numbers, but, but it's not a small mistake. |
| 2:49.0 | Think about why they're doing it. They have created a false urgency to breaking news. Oh my God, the latest numbers from this year is all this abuse. We're going to end this food stamp thing as soon as Trump gets into office. |
| 3:02.0 | See, that's the fake urgency. It's actually last year's numbers. Okay, but we're not anywhere near done. Let's keep going. Okay. Now let's give you context for this food stamp program. Maybe it sounds like a giant program. Oh my God, it's bleeding. The budget dry. We got to end it. We got to end it. |
| 3:18.0 | I quote, snap overall compromise is about 0.1% of the federal budget. Not 1% 0.1% of the federal budget. So other stuff is 99.9% of the budget. Okay. Now the question is, is there fraud and abuse? |
| 3:38.0 | Which by the way, there's fraud in almost every department of the government to some degree as you're about to see and in private corporations and the list goes on. So if you want to attack anything, it's pretty easy to do it. So context is important. Let me give it to you. |
| 3:57.0 | As I think of progress points out in fiscal year 2016, the supplemental nutrition assistance program that snap. And otherwise known as food stamps is expected to cost about 70.8 billion dollars. |
| 4:11.0 | If Fox News claim of 70 million dollars in Wases correct, that would still mean that less than one 10th of 1% of snap dollars are spent fraudulently. |
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