The Economic Opportunity Act of 1964 included the Job Corps, the
college Work-Study Program and Head Start, but the following two
year period also saw the creation of cornerstone programs such as
Food Stamps, Medicare/Medicaid, HUD and others that today remain
integral parts of the U.S. safety net.
This special podcast report describes a new study by center
director Ann Stevens and graduate student affiliate Chloe East
that examines how many workers at or near the minimum wage still
rely on safety net programs to help their families get by.
Listen now.
Some safety net programs, such as unemployment insurance (UI) and
food stamps (SNAP), have shown to automatically stabilize income
during financial downturns. The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC)
raises millions of American workers out of poverty, but its
impact in times of crisis has not been explored.
Jan. 8 marks the 50th anniversary of legislation launching
America’s War on Poverty. The story of that war is often told
with a sort of reverse Hollywood ending: oversimplified and
wrapped up neatly as a failure. No one can claim that the war on
poverty has been won, but the failure narrative is just as wrong.
The real story with some fundamental facts highlighted is more
complex than simple wins and losses, and long overdue.
The War on Poverty began in 1964 with a stream of legislation that in two years would build the foundation of today’s social safety net. Today’s safety net includes means-tested programs, which require proof of low income to qualify, as well as major benefit programs which are not based on income, such as Social Security and Medicare.
In this presentation, Gavin Wright discusses Martha Bailey’s
paper, “How We Fought the War on Poverty: A Quantitative
History.”
Wright is the William Robertson Coe Professor of American
Economic History at Stanford University and a Senior Fellow at
the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research.
In this presentation, Thesia Garner discusses James Sullivan’s
paper “Winning the War: Poverty from the Great Society to the
Great Recession.”
Garner is a Senior Research Economist in the Division of Price
and Index Number Research with the Bureau of Labor Statistics,
where she has served since 1984.
In this presentation, Martha Bailey discusses a quantitative
history of the War on Poverty.
Bailey is an Associate Professor of Economics and a Research
Associate Professor at the Population Studies Center at the
University of Michigan. She is also a Research Associate with the
National Bureau of Economic Research.
In this presentation, James Sullivan discusses the successes of
U.S. safety net programs from President Lyndon Johnson’s Great
Society program of the 1960s to the most recent economic
recession.
Sullivan is an Associate Professor of economics at the University
of Notre Dame, and a research affiliate of the National Poverty
Center at the University of Michigan.
In this presentation, Kent Germany discusses the War on Poverty,
the United States budget, and president Lyndon Johnson’s economic
vision.
Germany is an Assistant Professor of History and African American
Studies at the University of South Carolina and co-host of
For The Record, a PBS interview program on politics and
history.
Transitions into and out of poverty often happen after major
events such as marriage, divorce, or changes in income. They are
also associated with economic factors, such as unemployment rates
or wages.
The 1996 welfare reform led to sweeping changes to the central
cash safety net program for families with children. Along with
other changes, the reform imposed lifetime time limits for
receipt of cash welfare, effectively ending its entitlement
nature for these families.
Despite dire predictions, previous research has shown that
program caseloads declined and employment increased, with no
detectible increase in poverty or worsening of child well-being.
This study reevaluates these results in light of the severe
2007–09 recession.
In this October 2013 seminar, Center Faculty Affiliate Sasha
Abramsky discussed his work researching and writing about today’s
poor for his new book The American Way of Poverty: How the
Other Half Still Lives.
In this May 2012 seminar, Visiting Scholars Katherine S.
Newman and Rourke O’Brien discuss the way we tax the poor in the
United States, particularly in the American South, where poor
families are often subject to income taxes, and where regressive
sales taxes apply even to food for home consumption.
Unemployment Insurance is generally considered an individual
benefit for a displaced worker. Yet that income makes a
difference for a displaced worker’s family as well, especially
for children.
In 2012, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that around 46 million
or one in seven residents lived in poverty. However, the
very term “poverty” continues to evoke debates on what it means
to be poor.
Linking income and health has been a notorious challenge for
researchers. With multiple sources of income such as earnings,
cash transfer and near cash transfer programs, it is difficult to
isolate their effects on health. The 1993 expansion to the Earned
Income Tax Credit (EITC), the largest and most recent of federal
expansions to date, provided researchers a unique opportunity.
