Joseph O. Patton: End unemployment compensation! (So that more people can be on welfare.)

  We hear the refrain almost hourly: “People shouldn’t get unemployment payments! It’s a handout! They don’t deserve it! They should find a job! Grumble, grumble, grumble.”

  Invariably those who spew such sentiment are in jobs they feel are secure with ample pay and reasonable benefits… but they’re only a layoff, a catastrophic accident or medical problem away from having to pick up the phone and file for unemployment compensation themselves.

  Nor does it take into account the false premise that one can simply skip along doling out resumes and expect a job to magically appear. The current rate of hopelessness appears as such: There is only one job opening on average for every five applicants. Math sucks, eh?

  But what is most telling… if not deliciously humorous… is that the cold-hearted and short-sighted among us who ignore the facts and readily comprehensible labor statistics are actually clamoring to harm their own wallets by reducing or eliminating unemployment benefits.