The States Have Perverse Incentives, Too

One of the big news stories of the last half dozen years is the startling growth in the number of people on disability. That doesn’t seem to have happened because people are getting sicker or older.

As it turns out the states have powerful incentives to move people from the welfare rolls, where they pay a big share of the tab, to disability where they pay none of it. The incentives are so powerful that they’re willing to pay companies to get the job done.

7 comments… add one
  • Drew Link

    Anyone surprised……….no soup for you!!

  • Icepick Link

    I’ll take a Captain Renault for this one.

  • jan Link

    An adaptation from a Shakespeare line:

    ” Oh what a tangled web we weave” between the state and federal governments!

  • Drew Link

    Look at that. jan, being classy, quotes Shakespeare……………….and I’m quoting the soup Nazi.

  • Andy Link

    A few times over the last several years I’ve heard what amounts to advertisements for assistance programs. When I was in Colorado last summer, for example, there was a radio interview of a local civil servant talking about how, by their calculations, there were a lot of people who qualified for various benefits, but weren’t taking advantage of them. He went on to basically advocate that people take advantage of those programs and the program hosts couldn’t seem to understand why people wouldn’t take “free” benefits.

  • sam Link

    Yeah, but that’s Walter Scott, not Shakespeare.

  • jan Link

    Very good Sam. While that line is attributed to Shakespeare (I have), it was duly written by Walter Scott in an 1808 poem titled Marmion. Aren’t google searches wonderful!

Leave a Comment