Project Empowerment: Inside the District's most expensive job-training program

[Anonymous]

I think it's totally awesome that DC funds these job-training programs so that a) we can get MD residents back on their feet so they can have a chance of become contributing taxpaying residents of MD once again; and b) we can somehow provide folks who've been collecting welfare from DC their entire lives with a chance to move out to the suburbs of MD and start paying taxes too.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/07/AR2010120705639.html

You're welcome suburbs! We do it because it's the right thing to do.

[Anonymous]

Did I miss something in the article, or do your MD references depend on other facts at your disposal?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Did I miss something in the article, or do your MD references depend on other facts at your disposal?

Sure, I'll expound: there were exactly two subjects in the program who were singled out for an extended background. The first:

As Perkins tells it, his downfall came not because he didn't work hard enough, but because he worked too hard. He was a registered nurse for 17 years and at one point had everything he desired: nice cars, designer clothes, a big house - a property in Upper Marlboro that was tied to his name is valued at more than $1 million.

Not really any argument that this guy was a contributing member of MD's local economy, and a significant taxpayer. What happened the second he became an unemployed crackhead, then homeless? He took the first bus into DC, and got on welfare at DC taxpayer's expense. And of course, if he manages to climb back into the middle-class, the first thing he'll do is drive his car out to Upper Marlboro and start paying MD taxes again.

The second:

Short-term, her goal is to pass the test and find a job. Long-term, she wants to move out of a subsidized, rundown house in Northeast. "When I hit 30, I want to have everything my own," Taylor says - her own house, car and steady income.

The odds are approximately 99.999999999% in favor that when Ms Taylor moves out of her (DC taxpayer subsidized) house in Northeast, she'll be moving out to a nice, bigger house in MD or VA, and start dutifully paying taxes in either jurisdiction. Hopefully that'll happen, but when it does, it will free up a spot in the program for DC taxpayers to pick up the tab once again, for another troubled individual. Hopefully, they too will be able to fulfill their dream of moving out of the city and never paying back any of the money they were given.