America has a massive underclass that lacks the opportunity in most cases to escape from their Sisyphus cycle of dependency on governmental handouts and subsidies. This underclass often does not have the correct toolkit to lift themselves up by their own bootstraps so as to achieve some of the things that we typically take for granted as parts of the American dream such as: self-sufficiency, retirement savings, home ownership, and good health. Over the years, governmental agencies of all sorts have stepped in to help, to which, some of these programs are a real benefit and boon for some, whereas others are so lacking in real effectiveness that they are actually a hindrance to those that they are supposedly setup to serve.
The indigent and the underclass want to see that the playing field is somewhat leveled, and consequently throughout recent history, they have more often than not turned to governmental agencies in order to achieve this worthwhile goal. The problem though with the government, is that unlike private charitable organizations which contribute vital help to poor people often in a personal way which does not typically stigmatize the person receiving such aid, the government on the other hand, appears to want to deliberately stigmatize its beneficiaries.
There are many, many problems with governmental aid, of which a fundamental one is that those that work on behalf of the government, are paid by the citizens of the United States through taxation, but appear to answer to none other than fellow bureaucrats and certainly not to the public in any meaningful way. On the other hand, many charities utilize a significant amount of resources in which the people doing the yeoman work are actually volunteers, of which, their volunteering of such, is typically a reflection of their belief that their mission serves a higher purpose and this gives them the satisfaction of performing their duties with a certain joy.
The thing is that when you make it public policy that the bureaucrats that are ostensibly serving the public and their needs are in actuality making a good, living wage from such social work, the people that are the recipients of such aid, are consequently being cheated from their largess, because of the bureaucratic overhead which first takes care of the bureaucrats before it even considers taking care of its mission. Additionally, the public are often treated as suffering supplicants in which, the bureaucrats of these various social programs make the process of receiving needed aid so circuitous, confusing, and arbitrary, that many times people are denied the very things that they really need and are eminently eligible for.
Additionally, in virtually any governmental program, the established players, that is the actual providers of food, shelter, healthcare, education and whatnot are always served first, and served in a manner by the government and its cronyism so that the program is setup specifically that these enterprises benefit the most from such, followed by the overhead of the program getting its share, and finally, whatever balance is left over is handed out to those agile enough to navigate the paperwork and rules so as to receive what has already been earmarked for them to receive to begin with.
While at some level the government, or at least a few subjects within the government, actually do want to help the unfortunate, that is truly help the needy and poor, in practicality the underclass merely represents the reason for the program's existence, of which the only true winners are the established and consolidated industry players, the bureaucrats that than get their cut while lording it over the weak and poor, leaving the poor only with the detritus of despair.