This is the big lie that is currently being passed around on the right, and even mentioned by such darlings as that great thinker Ayn Rand Jr. Paul Ryan. The full slur is below:
“Taxpayers are being forced to support half the population of America [alternate figures range up to 60%] who mooch federal subsidies which average $9,000 per person per year. Furthermore, half the population pays no income tax whatever.”
Well, silly me—I tried to actually find out who these people might be.
● Can’t be people on Social Security—that’s an insurance program (the “I” in SSI stands for “Insurance”) so the people benefiting are supported by premiums paid by wage earners. Insurance benefits are not subsidies.
● Can’t be anybody on Medicare either, because those benefits are financed through the FICA premiums working people pay every payday; another insurance program. It is not a subsidy either.
● Is it food stamps (now known as SNAP)? Well, the total number of participants in SNAP is 9.25 million, less than one-thirtieth of the population, and between ⅔ and ¾ of those are children that child-labor laws prevent from earning their own keep.
● Can’t be welfare either, because since the Clinton Administration’s Welfare Reform the federal government does not supply welfare benefits to anyone.
I’ve tried asking various conservatives how they arrived at their numbers on this topic, and get the Paul Ryan treatment in response—you know, simply disregard the question and go off on a totally unrelated tangent. Maybe some of you folks out there in KosLand can help me nail down who these “50% of all Americans” comprise, and how they can manage to snag $9,000 a year in gubmint freebies.
In all seriousness, this “half of all Americans” lie is what fuels and drives right-wing anger more than anything else. Sure, the nuttoverse is rabid about abortion, guns and school-prayer too, but it’s the idea that freeloaders have unfettered access to their money clips that really inflames these people.