Collectively, programs that offer financial assistance to extremely low income persons or families for needs such as food, housing, healthcare and sometimes cash are referred to as the social safety net. Generally the United States is considered to have a relatively weak social safety net compared to other developed nations, though some say that is not true and count private sector programs as part of the social safety net in the United States. Regardless of ranking social safety net programs are controversial in the U.S. Though the programs have helped many subsist through temporary hardships, the social safety net has become part of daily life and the culture for many families. Some have parents, grandparents and even great-grandparents that utilize social safety net programs for most if not all their daily needs, sometimes referred to as generational poverty.
The U.S. is a wealthy nation. So how, in a wealthy nation, do consecutive generations of families live in poverty, relying on the social safety net to exist? Think about this scenario: as a child growing up when mom needed to get food she went to the welfare office and got food stamps, when we needed a place to live she went to the Public Housing Authority, mom got a check on the 3rd day of every month that she called her welfare check, our healthcare came from the clinic that accepted Medicaid, and we would spend hours every month in the offices of these places waiting to complete forms that allowed us to maintain the benefits. If this is the experience you had as a child when you become an adult and need food, housing, medical care etc. where would you go to get it? Just like mom, you would go to the appropriate social services office and fill out the multitude of forms to get your needs met.
In the 1930’s President Roosevelt’s endorsed “New Deal” legislation passed congress and became the United States’ first large scale social safety net programs. In the 1960’s President Johnson’s “Great Society” programs greatly expanded social safety net programs. It has been about four generations since the beginning President Johnson’s Great Society programs. Today’s youth that are born into poverty will most likely follow the path they experience growing up and their children will also be born into poverty. Though well intentioned, the social safety net that our leadership created decades ago has created a “welfare class” of families that live in poverty with little hope of escape.
Safety net programs are both loved and hated by the American public. Those that love them include the political far-left, faith based and other charitable organizations, social workers and, of course, the recipients. People that hate the programs include the political far-right, working class and middle class folks that are resentful of handouts to people that are perceived as choosing not to work even though they are able. One thing is clear. The system we have does not work. The intent was not to create a welfare class of people stuck in a cycle of poverty.
Two stories come to mind from my experience working with people caught in the social safety net. The first story is about a mom who had come into the housing authority where I worked to complete her annual recertification. She had her daughter with her and asked if she could have her daughter fill out an application so she could get on the wait list for her Section 8. Her daughter was turning 18 in a few days and she did not want to have to make another trip to the housing authority. Well the answer was no, you had to be at least 18 years old or an emancipated minor to apply, the waiting list was closed anyway which saved me having to explain the regulations. Afterwards though, a couple thoughts occurred to me. First, applying for Section 8 housing was treated like a rite of passage when the daughter turned 18. And second, the family had no other thought for the daughter than that she would live in public housing of some sort.
The second story should be a success story but the participant did not feel that way. I was speaking with her during a home visit and congratulating her on how well she had done. She was a single mom with two kids and she had recently finished a Certified Nurse Assistant (CNA) program and landed a pretty good job. She began telling me that because her income had gone over the eligibility threshold she was no longer receiving food stamp assistance. She said that she could no longer afford to go to the grocery store and was having to get McDonalds everyday to be able to afford to feed her family. I told her it had to cost more to go to McDonald’s everyday than to get groceries at the grocery store and make meals for the family. I discussed it with her at some length and discovered she had never seen anyone use their cash at a grocery store. Her mom used food stamps, grandma used food stamps and she had always used food stamps. Growing up, when the family got the rare treat of going to McDonalds it was paid for with cash. It was all she knew, it really never occurred to her to use her earned income to purchase groceries.
The Great Society programs were intended to lift families out of poverty. Statistically, the programs have lifted a lot of families to just above the poverty line but that is only if you count non-cash benefits. In reality, the poor are still poor and generational poverty has caused the creation of a welfare class. That was never the intent of the programs; for the most part the programs are a failure. So, what can be done to reduce or eliminate the cycle of poverty?
Start with the adults that are able but chose not to work and treat the social safety net as a hammock. As a society we have to decide whether we are going to provide for them or accept a larger homeless population. There has always been resentment by those who work against those who choose not to, especially by those who work hard and struggle to make ends meet but get no assistance from the government or anyone else.
Many claim that they are disabled when they really are just lazy; at least that is how they are perceived. Let’s face it, laziness is not a disability. Many of the working class would just allow those who refuse to work to live on the streets – homeless. That is not a good idea though. Humans have a survival instinct just like any other animal. They will do what they have to in order to survive. The result would be an exponential increase in the crime rate. Most would agree that an increase in crime is not an acceptable outcome.
There are plenty of assistance programs available. There is no need for any new program to address poverty; the need is to enhance the most successful current programs to better serve the poorest in society and eliminate expensive programs. In the previous example of the mom that was going to McDonald’s daily because she could not afford to go the grocery store without food stamps. She was victim to what is known by social workers as the off-the-cliff effect. It means that when income goes over the qualifying threshold a family loses all benefits and ends up with a net loss when comparing their earned income to the loss of benefits when the household income went over the eligibility threshold. There is an easy solution that never seems to be considered. Simply exempt all income equal to the amount that would be earned by a person working 40 hours per week at minimum wage. Not only would it eliminate the off-the-cliff effect it would encourage many low wage earners to enter the job market.
Easy access and free birth control would help reduce future need. It’s not popular to say, but a lot of the pregnancies that result in single parents were not planned. A young couple that wants sex is going to have sex. The pregnancy is unplanned side effect. The cost of birth control is substantially less than raising a child to adulthood.
Another step required to eliminating the cycle of poverty is the most important and expensive, education. The education system in low income areas is an ongoing failure. Programs such as “no child left behind” punished schools with lower test scores by cutting their funds for not meeting some arbitrary testing threshold when the opposite is what should happen. Struggling schools need more resources, not less. Schools in low income areas should change the curriculum to address what students are not getting at home. Classes that focus on self-sufficiency, economics, ethics and personal responsibility should become part of the curriculum. Inner city schools should also be year around. The two or three months off for summer was based on an agrarian based economy that hasn’t existed for decades and never existed in the urban areas.
Previously, I spoke of the need to eliminate expensive programs. Many programs that provide services to low income persons are labor intensive, requiring many social workers and case managers which make the programs very expensive. If the real problem any person or family has is financial then no amount of social workers is going to make a difference. If you eliminate the ineffective and expensive programs and put the resources more directly toward the families the overall costs of the programs collectively would likely not change much and the modifications to the curriculum of inner city schools should reduce the number of families entering the cycle of poverty. It will take many years to realize the results but it has taken decades to create the welfare class; it should be expected that it will take many years to realize a reduction or elimination of the cycle of poverty.
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