Maggie's Farm

There are probably some scammers out there, but the article you linked to mentions nothing about disability except people's resentment at the idea that people who cannot work full time (ie: so as to get health insurance) because of their disabilities receive some financial support.

News Junkie, I hope that you NEVER have to eat your words the way you will when one of your children is diagnosed w a disability. And you discover the cruelty, prejudice and plain ignorance you must battle to protect them from. The disability is the least of their problems. The prejudice and mean spiritedness of people who accuse them of faking it or being dependent by choice is far worse.

One reason why many middle aged people go on disability is not to scam the system but because their exhausted parents have died and there is nobody to help them any more. Nobody would choose to be born with a disability, and you usually have to live in a slum and very badly on a disability check if you don't have parents to live with.

Furthermore, most parents of kids with disabilities have to scale back their careers because of the huge demands at home of caring for the kid. So they can't always make millions to set aside in a fund for the kid after they die.

My own spouse was laid off from a lucrative job in his profession because his employers' insurance company threatened to double their premiums if they kept him on staff (our kiid's diagnosis unnerved the insurer, tho they never had to pay a single claim). Illegal, immoral but most people with healthy kids never experience such things so we are told our kids are moochers and a burden.

Most people with a disability want nothing more than to work and escape the contempt and condescension of those people without disabled relatives who complain about them. Hitler and the American eugenics pioneers were in perfect harmony with much that I read here about how people on disability are a burden and taking advantage of healthy others. It just ain't so.

My disabled kid shovels snow for free for the elderly in our neighborhood, holds a regular part time job as a civilian employee of the National guard, volunteers to help whenever he can at our church. He has issues, but he is faithful, honest and true. Hardly a moocher. But employers would rather hire a smooth talking, hard drinking, manipulative neuro typical kid. Because they look better.

We suffer more from moral blindness and unintended cruelty in our country than we do from an abuse of disability status.

Go to a support group for parents of newly diagnosed special Ed kids and see if your stony heart is softened. The parents there don't want your money so much as they want you to give their kid a chance. Employ one, coach them. Or just go to church and reflect upon Jesus' parable of the Sheep and the Goats: Matthew 25: 31-46. Those who are fortunate and healthy are called to be generous and merciful, not prejudiced and cruel. Believe me, the disabled would rather be treated like human beings and given work than mooch from you.