Current Events > Learned helplessness: multi-generational families on disability

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/local/2017/06/02/generations-disabled/?utm_term=.4ec377ad08e0

The food was nearly gone and the bills were going unpaid, but they still had their pills, and that was what they thought of as the sky brightened and they awoke, one by one. First came Kathy Strait, 55, who withdrew six pills from a miniature backpack and swallowed them. Then emerged her daughter, Franny Tidwell, 32, who rummaged through 29 bottles of medication atop the refrigerator and brought down her own: oxcarbazepine for bipolar disorder, fluoxetine for depression, an opiate for pain. She next reached for two green bottles of Tenex, a medication for hyperactivity, filled two glasses with water and said, “Come here, boys.”

The boys were identical twins William and Dale, 10. They were the fourth generation in this family to receive federal disability checks, and the first to be declared no longer disabled and have them taken away.

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As the number of working-age Americans receiving disability rose from 7.7 million in 1996 to 13 million in 2015, so did the number of households with multiple family members on disability, climbing from an estimated 525,000 in 2000 to an estimated 850,000 in 2015, according to a Post analysis of census data. The analysis is probably an undercount.

A separate Post examination of census data found that households reporting at least one disabled adult are three times as likely to report having a disabled child, too, although most households affected by disability report only one disabled member. Multigenerational disability, The Post found, is far more common in poor families.

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Ruth Horn, director of social services in Buchanan County, Va., which has one of the country’s highest rates of disability, has spent decades working with profoundly poor families. Some parents, she said, don’t encourage their children academically, and even actively discourage them from doing well, because they view disability as a “source of income,” and think failure will help the family receive a check.

“It’s not a hard thing to limit a person,” Horn said, adding: “It’s generations deep.”

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Kathy had been telling Franny to do more around the house, so she’d been trying. She helped the children get ready for school. She cooked meals when they got home. She cleaned and did laundry. But this also meant mistakes. She had recently forgotten to schedule a dental checkup for her older daughter, who, out of frustration, snapped: “Mama, when are you going to make my dental appointment?” On another day, William yelled at her to “learn how to drive.” And when she forgot to secure Bella in a car seat, Kathy scolded her: “You’re a grown woman. You know better than that.”

But some days she wasn’t so sure she did. For as long as she could remember, what she couldn’t do had defined her far more than what she could. She grew up looking like other children but realized she was different when she wound up in special education classes and peers were making fun of her. Then came the rest: the decision to abandon her dream of going to college, the realization that she would never have a job, and the relationship with a man on disability, with whom she had twins she could already tell were beginning to traverse the same path she had.

I do wonder what will happen if/when a Universal Basic Income comes to be. Will parents stop telling kids to not try since they don't need a disability to get a UBI or does it exacerbate it since why try if you are just going to get a check to be poor in the country?
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"Disability" is a state of mind for many folks
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Bootstraps
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There is evidence that a UBI would enable people to start their own businesses, travel, etc, without fear of losing their shitty minimum wage income. So I think it'd help.

But yeah, this is terrible. Literally leeching and teaching their kids to leech.

It reminds me a lot of the abuse cycle. Takes a rather remarkable person to bust out of the learned helplessness like that.
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KILBOTz posted...

It reminds me a lot of the abuse cycle. Takes a rather remarkable person to bust out of the learned helplessness like that.

Yeah, and it doesn't help that leftism enables these people to feel entitled. :/

It's a global apathy problem. Apathy on their part and our part.

Personally I refuse to sign most people's medical disability forms because in my opinion there are very few medical conditions that render you unable to do any type of work, there is typically Something one can do. However, many of my colleagues are apathetic and will sign whatever comes through, and many are threatened by silly patient satisfaction surveys. Society in general has turned a blind eye, hence why we would rather apparently pay people to do nothing rather than get them the help they need or support they need to succeed
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NeuralLaxative posted...

It's a global apathy problem. Apathy on their part and our part.

Personally I refuse to sign most people's medical disability forms because in my opinion there are very few medical conditions that render you unable to do any type of work, there is typically Something one can do. However, many of my colleagues are apathetic and will sign whatever comes through, and many are threatened by silly patient satisfaction surveys. Society in general has turned a blind eye, hence why we would rather apparently pay people to do nothing rather than get them the help they need or support they need to succeed

Are you a doctor?
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poor pup :(
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the pup is dead :-(
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btw they mention a map of the disability belt but I didn't see one so: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2016-12-16/mapping-the-growth-of-disability-claims-in-america
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I have students that come from absolutely worthless trash parents and families. And parts of me wonders why they don't just say "I'm sick of this, I want better for myself." But they rarely do. They just follow in their parents footsteps.
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The easiest thing to do for anyone is nothing. The studies about UBI encouaging people to start business may be true for a tiny fraction of the people, but untrue for the majority. Over time, people learn to take advantage of the system more and more.

Laziness doesn't happen overnight, it happens over time. This year, 20% may be lazy. Next year, it'll be at 25%. The year after, 35%. The number will rise over time, like disability, like welfare, like food stamps. More and more people will become dependent on it and it becomes learned helplessness.
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NeuralLaxative posted...

It's a global apathy problem. Apathy on their part and our part.

Personally I refuse to sign most people's medical disability forms because in my opinion there are very few medical conditions that render you unable to do any type of work, there is typically Something one can do. However, many of my colleagues are apathetic and will sign whatever comes through, and many are threatened by silly patient satisfaction surveys. Society in general has turned a blind eye, hence why we would rather apparently pay people to do nothing rather than get them the help they need or support they need to succeed

I don't have a problem with this

needs to be encouraged to keep the shitty and lazy workers out of the workforce.

I'd rather have some fat lazy slob be on disability than having their lazy ass working along side with me making everyone else's job harder cos we gotta carry them.

I'd rather jobs go to people who actually wanted to apply for them. not ones who are forced to do it.

QuantumScript posted...

There is evidence that a UBI would enable people to start their own businesses, travel, etc, without fear of losing their shitty minimum wage income. So I think it'd help.

But yeah, this is terrible. Literally leeching and teaching their kids to leech.

why the fuck am i agreeing with quantumscript
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GreatEvilEmpire posted...

The easiest thing to do for anyone is nothing. The studies about UBI encouaging people to start business may be true for a tiny fraction of the people, but untrue for the majority. Over time, people learn to take advantage of the system more and more.

Laziness doesn't happen overnight, it happens over time. This year, 20% may be lazy. Next year, it'll be at 25%. The year after, 35%. The number will rise over time, like disability, like welfare, like food stamps. More and more people will become dependent on it and it becomes learned helplessness.

I think most people would still keep busy. So they would stop pursuing typical industrial/productive type jobs and a lot of what they would do would be stuff like bad fan fiction or shitty paintings.

I do think the country would become a lot more stratified, though. The UBI probably wouldn't be enough to live in a city where the production still happens, because that would all concentrate I think, so the rural areas would probably get a lot of the non-productives. So I do think over time it would really be killing rural areas for the laziness creep you mentioned.
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KILBOTz posted...

NeuralLaxative posted...

It's a global apathy problem. Apathy on their part and our part.

Personally I refuse to sign most people's medical disability forms because in my opinion there are very few medical conditions that render you unable to do any type of work, there is typically Something one can do. However, many of my colleagues are apathetic and will sign whatever comes through, and many are threatened by silly patient satisfaction surveys. Society in general has turned a blind eye, hence why we would rather apparently pay people to do nothing rather than get them the help they need or support they need to succeed

Are you a doctor?

Yep
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Soviet_Shurima posted...

QuantumScript posted...

There is evidence that a UBI would enable people to start their own businesses, travel, etc, without fear of losing their shitty minimum wage income. So I think it'd help.

But yeah, this is terrible. Literally leeching and teaching their kids to leech.

why the fuck am i agreeing with quantumscript

because you're finally woke

The antithesis of natural selection lol
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sad
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NeuralLaxative posted...

KILBOTz posted...

NeuralLaxative posted...

It's a global apathy problem. Apathy on their part and our part.

Personally I refuse to sign most people's medical disability forms because in my opinion there are very few medical conditions that render you unable to do any type of work, there is typically Something one can do. However, many of my colleagues are apathetic and will sign whatever comes through, and many are threatened by silly patient satisfaction surveys. Society in general has turned a blind eye, hence why we would rather apparently pay people to do nothing rather than get them the help they need or support they need to succeed

Are you a doctor?

Yep

What's your opinion of a person who has Type 2 Lupus, a minor learning disability, and short term memory loss, do you think they should be on disability?
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