Not necessarily - one issue facing poor USA is the Financial Cliff of coming off of welfare. In some tax and unemployment environments, working that 2nd job actually nets less cash, because at a magic number ~27k, unemployment benefits kick out , and a little bit higher and income tax burdens raise ( there was one deduction in particular the last few years)
So, to make working a second job "worth the jump" it needed to bring in $5k+ more, which very few jobs do on the outset.
It's not only the cliff itself, but threat of the cliff and qualification hysteresis. For some benefits, if it's determined that your categorization changes, then getting accepted into the former level of benefit can take a long time. E.g. if you're told that more than X dollars in your checking account will result in a reduction of benefits, and getting your old status back might take a year, then it's logical to be risk averse and stay well clear of any jobs that could take you over the limit even for a day.
The actual numbers are far worse with children, between $20K and $60K there's a no (wo)mans land for single moms where they'll make more money off .gov at $20K than off .com at $60K. Its pretty sick.
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Not necessarily - one issue facing poor USA is the Financial Cliff of coming off of welfare. In some tax and unemployment environments, working that 2nd job actually nets less cash, because at a magic number ~27k, unemployment benefits kick out , and a little bit higher and income tax burdens raise ( there was one deduction in particular the last few years)
So, to make working a second job "worth the jump" it needed to bring in $5k+ more, which very few jobs do on the outset.
It's not only the cliff itself, but threat of the cliff and qualification hysteresis. For some benefits, if it's determined that your categorization changes, then getting accepted into the former level of benefit can take a long time. E.g. if you're told that more than X dollars in your checking account will result in a reduction of benefits, and getting your old status back might take a year, then it's logical to be risk averse and stay well clear of any jobs that could take you over the limit even for a day.
The actual numbers are far worse with children, between $20K and $60K there's a no (wo)mans land for single moms where they'll make more money off .gov at $20K than off .com at $60K. Its pretty sick.