>I'm not sure of the logic that says that anyone who earns less than you (or I) doesn't work as hard. There are jobs where people work very hard for much lower salaries. There are people out there who work more than one job to make ends meet and still earn less than you or I.
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>This still begs the question, why does this make them entitled to some of what I have earned?

Sounds like you need to quit paying any kind of taxes. Then you can keep everything you've earned. Or do you still consider it 'yours' after you've paid your taxes, for someone's skill or service (and any kind of sales tax on top of that).

Are there people out there who will milk the system for all they can get? Yes. Laziness exists. Are there people out there who haven't had the opportunities that many of us take for granted and are busting butt just to survive? Yes. Can the government assist one without assisting the other? Personally, I wish that were the case but it's not.

Perhaps if would be different if basic human need costs (housing, food, transportation) worked on a sliding scale so that, by percentage, everyone paid the same amount. That's not reality. While I might spend 10% of my take-home salary on food for the household, someone making 30-50K ends up spending 15-20% on food. Last I heard, child-care costs aren't on a sliding scale and if you can find that gas pump that lets you tell it how much you make and it charges accordingly...well, let us know where it is.

While we're on the subject, why don't you go to a 'lesser income' area of Akron and check things like gas prices, or prices in the grocery store. I think you'll find they're higher there than an 'upper class' area store.

Supposedly, that was to be taken care of with the 'trickle down' economics of the Reagan/Bush I era - but it just didn't happen, did it? Those that had more, kept it - for the most part - and those that had less, lost more.