The US has a long history of shaming poor people in exchange for borderline bare subsistence. Anyone who's ever been poor would know. Glad to see New Mexico is taking some actions to change that.
I don't really think anything could be more motivating than not being able to give your family the life you want them to be able to have or even for just yourself - having to look your child in the eye and tell them they can't do the things everyone else in school is doing because it costs too much. The humiliation just lowers self esteem and makes people less likely to feel like they can succeed. I do understand that we just disagree on what motivates people though. The thing is, the social stigma over "welfare" goes so far that lots of people that need it
don't even use it. Something like less than half of eligible people for SNAP participate in the program. It's these kinds of degrading and humiliating practices that causes that, so for many people, they don't even get the chance to get fired up into doing something. They're too afraid to even try, and part of that is because the institutions aren't really designed to help them.
I knew this girl once that was so anti-welfare that when I tried to tell her that any kind of government assistance is welfare and that she was using it just like lots of other people, she tried to tear my hair out. My beautiful hair!
Just a small anecdote, but an example of how far people will go to say they aren't on welfare.
