the.com/dole

means Unemployment or welfare payments handed out by the state (or, in its older sense, any small, grudging share doled out to someone).

from From Old English 'dal,' meaning a share or portion, the same root behind 'deal' (as in dealing cards) and 'ordeal.' It originally just meant a part given out, often charity for the poor. The specific sense of government unemployment benefit hardened in 20th-century Britain, with 'on the dole' becoming the stock phrase for drawing that weekly portion from the state.