Reducing poverty is one of the biggest issues that TPOH discusses, with good reason. The expression that “a rising tide lifts all boats” is especially true in a liberal democratic society that values a free market. However, despite a vast array of government assistance programs, it doesn’t seem the tide is lifting the poverty blues.
For many Americans, the elusive path to success has not been found, and the promise of upward mobility has not felt like a reality for many families stuck at the bottom of the economic ladder. Various polls show that efforts to reduce poverty and expand opportunity are lacking. In an AEI/Los Angeles Times poll, 70 percent of Americans said they believe the conditions for the poor had either stayed the same or gotten worse over the past 10 or 15 years. A study by Pew Charitable Trusts found that 43 percent of Americans born in the bottom fifth of the income distribution remain there as adults.
Sadly, more than 20 percent of children lived in poverty in 2014.
Of course, the poverty rate is a flawed metric because it does not consider a significant amount of government-provided assistance that raises families’ incomes above the poverty line. On top of that, people in poverty are living with less material hardship than 50 years ago. The poor today are better off materially than in the past.
But as Robert Doar, the former commissioner of New York City’s Human Resources Administration, the city’s agency for managing 12 public assistance programs, notes in the introduction to a new volume of essays on reducing poverty in America, government assistance has helped people live with more stuff, but government has not created the outlets to get people working or earning on their own.
This is the cause of that swirling dissatisfaction even among those recipients of government benefits. More than half of people living in poverty surveyed in The AEI/Los Angeles Times poll said that the main purpose of welfare programs should be to help the poor get on their own two feet.
Able-bodied adults need to work because steady employment almost always leads a family out of poverty, provides opportunities for upward mobility, and is a source of dignity and purpose. Children are best off when they are raised by two committed parents, which is most likely to happen in marriage. And society must maintain a safety net that reduces material hardship, ensures that children can be raised in healthy environments, and rewards individuals who work.
The volume of essays offers ways to turn good ideas into legislative reform. The volume covers poverty assistance programs from housing and child support to food stamps and welfare. Doar acknowledges that none of the authors present all the answers, but he notes that the analyses and proposals can help move America toward finally living up to the goals of the War on Poverty, a war that needs to be won if everyone is going to do better.
Of course, not all of the problems facing low-income Americans will be solved by federal antipoverty programs. But political reality dictates that these major programs are not going to disappear anytime soon, meaning leaders who are serious about helping poor Americans should learn how they work and develop an agenda for improving them. Moreover, many of these assistance programs do reduce poverty and, with thoughtful reform, could be even more effective in helping struggling Americans move up. This volume intends to help policymakers understand how each program functions—its strengths, as well as its weaknesses.
