Forget about the super wealthy or too-big-to-fail banks. Blame the poor if you're feeling financially stressed.

That's what many in the middle class are doing, according to CNNMoney. CNNMoney reports that many readers responding to its articles about middle class troubles are blaming the poor more than the government, big banks or the rich.

Commenters say they pay the taxes that allow the poor to live on government subsidies.

"It's easy to get assistance and once you do, it's a way of life," said one reader. "We're working, working, paying all of these taxes and they are getting the benefits."

Editor's Note: Prophetic Economist Warns: “It’s Curtains for America.” See Evidence.

"We, middle class people," wrote another, "see people in the grocery stores buying things that we cannot afford, having phones that we cannot afford, and getting health care coverage that we lack ... all from money that is taken away from me."

The number of people receiving public assistance skyrocketed in recent years. Over 46 million people received food stamps in 2012, compared to 28million in 2008. About 52.6 million received Medicaid coverage as of June 2011, compared to 43.6 million in 2008.

Most received assistance for a short time and most are elderly, disabled, or in working families, CNNMoney notes, citing the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

Some comments reveal misunderstandings about public assistance, according to CNNMoney. For instance, one reader wrote: "A good majority of them are just too lazy and sorry to work and pay their own way. The government gives them free food stamps (to buy cigarettes and whiskey), free housing so they can stay home and have more babies so they can get more money."

Food stamps cannot be used to buy alcohol or tobacco.

Les Leopold, director of nonprofit educational groups The Labor Institute and the Public Health Institute, took issue with blaming the poor in an article for Huffington Post. He particularly criticized a proposal to reduce public assistance to parents of children who are not doing well in school.

"Blaming low-income people for chronic unemployment is the next move," he says. "As the rate stays stubbornly high (precisely because all Republicans and even a few Democrats don't want the government in the business of job creation) we hear talk of "structural" unemployment. That's code for the jobs would be there if only the workers were qualified."

Editor's Note: Prophetic Economist Warns: “It’s Curtains for America.” See Evidence.