I'm not against public assistance in principle, but I'm still inclined to prefer private charity where it can be made to work. You will certainly find issues of the kind that Fabio's concerned about (c.f. http://www.ncregister.com/blog/making-poor-people-pray/), but one of the things that really amazed me some years ago, when my father went on unemployment for a time, was how invasive and demanding the terms of the assistance were.

That being said, Fabio's been on government assistance before himself, but in the UK. It might be instructive if you two were to compare your respective experiences.