Michael Dubose

SW 4710
Journal 8
October 26, 2014

What surprised me about myself this week was completing all the assignments that are
due. It is a lot of pressure and I didnt know how I would get it done. With the support of some
of my wise classmates I pulled through. Well I completed about 80% of the work. It just seemed
unfeasible and the work pulled me in all directions.
By far this has been my worst week in the program yet. Im a bit disappointment in
myself and the structure of the program at this point. I feel as though Im so close to achieving a
goal I set I to do but my vision is very blurry at this point. Hopefully this week will be better.
Two things I learned in chapter 5 are that poverty is a political and social issue and that
employment is the best remedy for poverty. Politicians use poverty to promote their campaigns
and yet fail to address the social problem once elected.
The social issue is that poverty creates stigma among the public and then discrimination
rears its ugly head shorty after which places sometime good people in a certain class and once
placed in for example a low class status its very hard almost impossible to crawl your way out
of this class because the opportunities arent there for those individuals (Karger & Stoesz 2014) .
The two things I learned in chapter 6 are that politicians loosen the regulations on
campaign contributions which results in private groups using non-profit companies to donate
unlimited amounts of funding to get their favorite candidate elected to get laws passed that will
further their cause.
The second thing I learned in chapter 6 is that some religions claim non-profit status to assist
those in need based on their faith and have terminated services because they discriminate on
some who dont hold their same belief system or values. Catholic churches refuse to assist gays
but their very leaders are homosexuals but they get a pass. Which they shouldnt merge poverty
and religion. If they truly value their faith they would be non- judgmental and do as Jesus would
do show empathy and seek to help those who are lost, impoverished and helpless. Thats just my
opinion (Karger & Stoesz 2014).
Chapter 7 the two things I learned there are many obstacles and challenges that privatization of
governments services. Those challenges include the quality of services and the worry of private
companies fulfilling their obligations and not filing bankruptcy or closing its doors.
Another worry about privatization is that only the wealthy would receive the best services and
that less influential non-profit provides would receive the so called junk of the consumers to
provide for (Karger & Stoesz 2014).
Chapter 8 I learned that social workers are becoming are of the political area to institute change
and advocate for the public which they know very well. Social workers understand the changes
that people are experiences and what is needed to change the system on a Macro level.
I learned that changing social welfare policy is a daunting task with many different barriers
because you have class and theory differences and no one seems to be able to come to an
agreement about what should be done to fix the problems that surround social welfare and we the
people continue to make them rich as we live in poverty or are surrounded by unnecessary
poverty (Karger & Stoesz 2014).

















Bibliography
Karger, H. J., & Stoesz, D. (2014). American social welfare policy: a pluralist approach
(Seventh ed.). Upper Saddle River: Pearson.