A good article in the New York Review of Books reviews the book American Dream: Three Women, Ten Kids, and a Nation’s Drive to End Welfare by Jason Deparle.
As the article points out, the existing welfare system during Clinton – Aid for Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) – was severely flawed, and had earned its widespread unpopularity:
Many liberals felt betrayed by Clinton’s decision to sign the welfare reform bill and blamed public hostility to AFDC on racism, which was certainly a factor. About two fifths of AFDC recipients were black, and the proportion was much higher in the large metropolitan areas, where the most influential newspapers and TV networks are located. Nonetheless, racism was not the only reason for the program’s unpopularity. AFDC was at odds with three widely shared American views. First, instead of encouraging unmarried couples to marry if they conceived a child, it seemed to be rewarding them for not marrying, because marriage usually made couples ineligible for AFDC payments. Second, instead of encouraging recipients to work, AFDC reduced their benefits by about seventy cents for every dollar they earned. As a result, an unskilled mother who had to pay for child care if she worked was usually better off staying home. Third, AFDC seldom paid recipients enough to cover even the most basic expenses. As a result, most mothers supplemented their benefits by working “off the books” and getting money under the table from boyfriends or relatives. A program that encouraged unwed motherhood, idleness, and dishonesty was bound to be unpopular, even in places where all the recipients were white. During the Clinton administration, “welfare reform” was implimented to the despair of liberals and the relief of conservatives. Both camp’s expectations were overblown, however: After spending eight years observing the effects of welfare reform, DeParle concludes that it moved a good many single mothers off the welfare rolls but that nearly all are still struggling to live on meager incomes. Every study I have seen supports that view. In retrospect, it looks as if both the proponents and opponents of welfare reform overestimated its likely impact. Daniel Patrick Moynihan warned that abolishing AFDC would lead to large numbers of children “sleeping on grates,” and many other liberals made similar prophecies. Nothing like that has happened. If anything, material hardship among single mothers and their children has fallen slightly. Those who supported welfare reform also seem to have overestimated its benefits. More single mothers have entered the labor force, but because most mothers were already working the increase was hardly a social revolution. Thus far there is little evidence that making more mothers work has had much effect either way on children. Nor has it saved money, at least so far. Deparle’s book also includes in-depth profiles of three mothers and how they deal with welfare reform. From Deparle’s book: So how had the new law changed [Angie’s] life? Had ending welfare worked? While I had posed versions of the question before, they never seemed to grab her, and I was starting to understand why. On welfare, Angie was a low-income single mother, raising her children in a dangerous neighborhood in a household roiled by chaos. She couldn’t pay the bills. She drank lots of beer. And her kids needed a father. Off welfare, she was a low-income single mother, raising her children in a dangerous neighborhood in a household roiled by chaos. She couldn’t pay the bills. She drank lots of beer. And her kids needed a father. “We’re surviving!” is all Angie said. “‘Cause that’s what we have to do.” Were her kids proud that she works? It was a question that often arose when I talked about Angie with middle-class friends, most of whom took it as an article of faith that the answer was yes. Angie paused. “I don’t think the kids think about that,” she said. “They’d like it if I’d just sit around with them all day.” She raised her voice to mimic a squeal: “‘Why you always at work?’ Shoot! Why you think I gotta work? Ain’t none a you got a job!” It was possible, of course, that the kids felt prouder of her than she knew and that the power of the example she set would become clearer with time. I asked her if she thought her struggles to grind out a low-wage living would encourage the kids to stay in school. “Do I think they’re going to finish high school? Hell, no!” Angie said. At the time, like most feminists, I was convinced that welfare reform would be a disaster. By now it’s clear I was mistaken. In retrospect, it’s not surprising that welfare reform didn’t end up making much difference, for two reasons. First of all, AFDC was simply never that generous anyway – at its best, it was still miserly compared to what most wealthy western nations do for welfare. The reduction of a program that was small to start with can’t be expected to make an enourmous difference. Second of all, welfare reform more-or-less coincided with a significant growth in the Earned Income Tax Credit; during the Clinton years, the EITC went from being a $9 billion dollar program to a $30 billion dollar program. So it seems likely that some effects of welfare reform were mitigated by EITC growth. As well as the above-quoted review, I’d also highly recommend this review of American Dreams by David Glenn in Dissent. (Hat tip: Crooked Timber).
They changed some of the system here in Louisiana several years ago, and the changes were most notable in the Food Stamp program. After the changes a person could only remain on food stamps (barring the receipt of SSI) if they had children under six in the household. After that point they would either have to be in school or training or working.
My Mother struggled to raise us on SSI, but she did not quailify for AFDC because my Father paid child support. The system is such that (at least in my area) people either find the loopholes and exploit them, or they remain in poverty unless some private individual helps them pull themselves out of it.
I agree with welfare reform, but I would like to see it such that those on welfare were pain enough to make the bills, receive subsidized childcare, and that they be required to get training so that they can get better jobs. I doubt that they would come out of school in the middle class, but most should be able to make incomes above the poverty line.
From my own experiences where I live, I’ve seen women who have multiple children due to lack of education and the perceived difficulty in getting birth control. In addition many of the women in my area become mothers while still in their early teens, when they themselves live with their mother’s who also receive AFDC. It seems to be a vicious cycle, and I’m not sure how to break it.
I’ll look around to see if I can find the Louisiana State guidelines for Food Stamps.
Though I can tell you that when I received food stamps the feeling I got from my case workers and others was that I would always be on food stamps. I worked hard and had a bit of luck, and now I’m doing well. I’m not rich by any means, but I have a cushion at the end of the month that allows my husband and I to save for our children’s college and our retirement.
Many liberals felt betrayed by Clinton’s decision to sign the welfare reform bill and blamed public hostility to AFDC on racism, which was certainly a factor. About two fifths of AFDC recipients were black, and the proportion was much higher in the large metropolitan areas, where the most influential newspapers and TV networks are located. Nonetheless, racism was not the only reason for the program’s unpopularity.
Is this supposed to be a logical exposition? “Since the program supported blacks at a higher proportion than in the general population, opposition to the program therefore was based on racism?” Or is it simply an assertion that is not intended to be proved by the detail given?
I think it’s more your second option, Ron. I believe that racism was a factor in opposition to AFDC, but that the evidence you quote does not logically prove that.
—Myca
Thanks for the book tip!
I believe that racism was probably a factor, too, but I wouldn’t say it was proven; that it was the only factor; or that it was even the biggest factor. The term “believe” means that you (or I) hold a position based on intuition, feelings, etc., but that there is no (or insufficient) rational evidence to prove the position. On that basis, I’ll go along with the belief and even share it. But I also believe that there were a number of non-racist beliefs that fueled the desire for welfare reform and opposition to AFDC.
I drove into work today listening to the radio. I didn’t like the tune and I switched to the news station. Some woman was speaking to some government body and talked about what happened to the flooded-out population in Katrina. She said that “it was all about race”; that what happened in New Orleans was a “Holocaust” and was “ethnic cleansing”. Obviously, this was only a portion of her remarks, but she seemed to be saying that since the affected population was mostly black, any deficiencies in the response were due to racism. I was wondering if the same thought process was going on here.
I’m not so stupid as think there’s no racism in America, or that it’s not present in some highly influential politicians and administrators. But I don’t support as a general presumption “if the affected population is more black than the general population, anything bad that happens to them is due to racism.” I don’t think that this is generally true, and this will only stop us from finding out the actual cause of a given problem and from fixing it.
Although I agree with your statement as a general principle (and find it hard to see who would disagree logically), I think that racism does cover perhaps a broader spectrum of decisions than you seem to. The thing is that racism isn’t just thinking “Well, they’re all black in New Orleans, so fuck those guys.”
It’s not just active and direct hostility.
It can also cover passive attitudes, like those which would lead someone to think “well, we only have so much in the way of relief aid, and we only have so much in the way of police and firefighters to distribute, so doesn’t it make more sense to distribute them to the areas that would suffer more monetary property damage? After all, if neighborhood X (a black neightborhood) is already run down, and it gets wiped out, that’s bad, but how much worse woudd it be if it was a really nice (white) neightborhood?” That’s racist. Racism is also looking at the situation and saying afterwards of the refugees, “well, this has worked out very well for them.
—Myca
Minor technical quibble: No, it doesn’t. I believe all sorts of things that have been proven. I believe in gravity, ocelots, the ebb and flow of the tides, and that the earth revolves around the sun. I also believe that racism was a fairly sizable factor behind opposition to AFDC, and I believe that there is sufficient rational evidence to prove this proposition. Of course, I also believe that there were perfectly good anti-racist reasons to oppose it (although I don’t generally agree with them), so I certainly don’t believe that opposing AFDC makes one a racist.
—Myca
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We were on AFDC (and food stamps and so forth) for a year or so, back in the day. We had two small children, toddlers, we had college degrees but few real job skills, all that. (As well as no jobs, of course.) Of course it was a massive hassle (which is as it should be maybe). But it got us past a rough spot, and I think it really needs to be there for that purpose.
When it becomes an inter-generational way of life it’s more problematic. Among other factors, as everyone here as pointed out, public support hardly provides an adequate amount of money, so it’s a prescription for extreme poverty. Would the situation be improved if (which would be impossible politically) payments were more generous? I’m not so sure. My experiences in Europe do not suggest that people “on the dole” as the Brits put it are a positive influence in society, or happy particularly. That population seems vulnerable to pretty much the same pathologies we see operating here.
This is kind of a toughie, because it’s a widely-acknowledged fact that whatever you subsidize you get more of. Thus, if home owners get a tax deduction for mortage interest, there will be more home owners. That was the stated reason for the policy, and it works. If you pay teachers more – would that we did!! – you’d get more and better teachers. If you pay mothers who are not married more every time they have a baby, they will have more babies. That just makes sense. The mothers are no more wicked for taking advantage of that than a businessman is for buying more equipment so that he can get a tax credit.
So, racism or no racism, who cares, how do we protect and take care of the vulnerable in our society without encouraging the behavior which will create more poverty and more vulnerability? This is for wiser heads than mine. All I can say is that the massive changes in welfare, which were widely predicted would bring about the End of Civilization As We Knew It have had a surprisingly small impact, for good or for ill.
Minor quibble, Susan: I would have agreed with your point about mortgage subsidies causing more homeowners, because until very recently I took it for granted that that was true. It is actually not. Since mortgage subsidies were introduced, the percentage of homeowners in this country has stayed consistently in a band of something like 63-68%. That is, the introduction of the mortgage subsidy has not increased the rate of home ownership in the U.S. Unfortunately I can’t reference the study I read that showed that fact, but I’ll look and see if I can find it.
Even if that were true, however, I think your extrapolation that therefore if you pay unwed mothers more for each baby, they will have more babies, does not take into account the fact that babies are not like equipment, and having babies is not like buying equipment. All other things being equal, yes, if you pay someone to do something, they will probably do it, but in this case, all other things are certainly not equal.
Found it! It was in a New York Times article.
hmmm. I’m wonder how much this “conclusion” is influenced by Bushie’s desire to trim the interest deduction (instead of, say, pulling out of Iraq or raising the top income tax brackets).
True enough about babies….but. The fact that a teenage girl can look forward to her own apartment and a stipend if she has a child, no matter how bad a deal this may be in the long run, may influence her.
There are always other influences on any behavior. People are not so simple as all that. If the IRS institutes a tax credit for new equipment, not every single business will run out and buy some. What the government is hoping is that the credit may tip the scales in some cases.
So, what you subsidize you get more of, usually. Not EVERY SINGLE CASE. Just some more.
That would make a smidgeon of sense if the extra amount mothers got for each child made having a child worth it, but it usually only added up to about $50 per month, hardly worth the enormous expense of raising another child. To say that moms on welfare had extra kids to get that extra $50 welfare money is akin to saying that middle class or working parents have extra kids simply to take advantage of the added tax break.
I also take exception to the oft-repeated idea that moms on AFDC were idle. Anybody who’s ever raised kids, whether they held an outside job or not, knows that there is little chance to be idle when you are responsible for the well-being of another person.
There are an enormous amount of problems with TANF, which most people aren’t aware of because they aren’t dealing on a regular basis with the effects it has had on families. I’ve done welfare rights advocacy in Wisconsin for the past 8 years, and from speaking one-on-one with moms who’ve tried to survive the system I can tell you that the promised reform has only benefitted the politicians, the social workers, and the professional poverty pimps. Moms have to deal with aggressive punishments that range from partial sanction of their monthly checks to “full family sanctions”that leave them without a penny to survive on. Whole industries have sprung up around the welfare deform scam, from daycare centers on every block to privatized welfare agencies whose profits increase for every family they boot out of the system. Evictions have soared. As of 2001 the African American infant mortality rate increased 37% for every year since 1997. Wisconsin’s 2005 Legislative Audit found that 3 years after leaving welfare 81% of the moms were making below-poverty wages. And on top of that the workforce is able to keep wages low because so many moms leaving the system are competing for the same low-wage, low-skill jobs.
This is hardly a success story. Poverty in Wisconsin increased faster than in any other state in 2003 and 2004, according to the U.S. Census Bureau , and Milwaukee climbed in 2004 into the top 10 of the nation’s poorest cities, reaching seventh. And it’s especially distressing when you consider that Wisconsin’s welfare deform plan, Wisconsin Works, is considered to be a model of welfare reform for the rest of the country, and is being exported to the rest of the world.
So is it worth it to get moms off the welfare rolls if it only means that they’re going to continue to be poor and struggling? Does snatching away a family’s safety net do any good for that family in the long run?
After all, if neighborhood X (a black neightborhood) is already run down, and it gets wiped out, that’s bad, but how much worse woudd it be if it was a really nice (white) neightborhood?” That’s racist. Racism is also looking at the situation and saying afterwards of the refugees, “well, this has worked out very well for them.
True enough. Now look at this. In every town near water that I’ve seen, the areas highest out of the water were settled first, and are the most expensive parts of town. On that basis, they’re usually white. The areas that are the lowest are the least desirable, were settled last, and tend to have high concentrations of poor people. On that basis, they tend to be more non-white.
So. Now. New Orleans floods. The low lying neighborhoods get flooded out, and are ruined. The way things look, they’ll probably flood again unless billions are spent. From a civil engineering viewpoint, the smart thing to do is to turn those neighborhoods into flood plains and not rebuild them.
If someone says, “It makes no sense to rebuild those neighborhoods – the city is sinking half an inch a year in some areas, it’s not practical to keep building the levees higher and higher. Let’s make those areas flood control,” is that racist?