A mother from Washington D.C admitted to The Washington Post that she spent over $6,000 of the money she received from a taxpayer-funded program to assist low-income families on a vacation to Miami and luxury items.
The Career Mobility Action Plan (MAP) was designed by the city’s Democrat Mayor Muriel Bowser in 2022 to help struggling families get back on their feet. The program selected 132 mothers to receive either monthly payments of $900 or a lump sum of $10,800.
Canethia Miller, a 27-year-old stay-at-home mother of three, was one of the recipients who chose the lump sum of $10,800.
While most mothers spent the funds on paying down their debt, Miller decided that the money would be better spent on a 5-day vacation to Miami with her children and their father.
“Some of it I just left alone. The other side is, I wanted to blow it. I wanted to have fun,” she told The Post. “[My kids] got to experience something I would never have been able to do if I didn’t have that money.”
Money that was meant to help low-income families get back on their feet was instead spent on a trip to Miami, new clothes, luxury items, and steak dinners.
Lots of people are poor because they are irresponsible and have low IQs. Stealing money from hardworking people to give it to irresponsible people does not solve any problems. https://t.co/oelzvtHb9K
— Adam Lowisz (@AdamLowisz) February 23, 2024
Miller also spent $180 to get her hair and nails done so she would not have to “look like a working stressed mom.”
As she reflected on blowing the money on a vacation and luxury items, Miller said that most people where she lives are broke and have nothing to leave for their children.
“A lot of communities in my area don’t know the financial gain of credit, saving for your kids; that’s why we’re broke, that’s why we don’t have nothing to pass down or no house to give down,” she said.
“I’m trying to get to the level where I’m passing something down that really matters, so I can be set and my kids can be set, and they don’t need to push so hard like I’m doing now,” she added.
Ironically, Miller did the exact opposite. Instead of setting an example for her children and setting aside the money to save, she blew through most of it, except the $50 she put into her savings account. If anything, her children learned to spend money on pleasure and leisure, instead of investing and saving, creating an endless cycle.
Almost $1.5 million in taxpayer money was placed into the program. The women could continue receiving payments for up to five years, allowing a few to misuse the system, like Miller.
