The War On Poverty

[Listening]

I just wanted to comment on the stats -- it appears that the "poor" have access to televised, streaming, and video game entertainment. These are all forms of escapism or distraction from reality.

I think it is interesting that we make sure the poor have ample access to video entertainment and gaming -- perhaps to keep them complacent and distracted.

Just a thought.

A very interesting question. Do we do that to them or do they gravitate there because it is a haven from facing life (and the poor are not the only ones who do it).

 

[Intense]

Currently, there is a thread in the political forum on the failure of LBJ's war on poverty.

I've tried to keep up, but to many people are like me...prone to flame instead of debate.

One reason is the frustration of getting an agreeable set of definitions.

I want to know more about what it means to be in poverty.

In a new report, Heritage’s Robert Rector and Rachel Sheffield lay out what the U.S. government’s own facts and figures really say about poverty in the United States. The results might surprise you, especially if your view of poverty is the conventional one, perpetuated by the media–namely, destitute conditions of homelessness and hunger. In reality, though, the living conditions of those defined as poor by the government are much different than that popular image. The following are facts about persons defined as “poor” by the Census Bureau:

80 percent of poor households have air conditioning
Nearly three-fourths have a car or truck, and 31 percent have two or more cars or trucks
Nearly two-thirds have cable or satellite television
Two-thirds have at least one DVD player and 70 percent have a VCR
Half have a personal computer, and one in seven have two or more computers
More than half of poor families with children have a video game system, such as an Xbox or PlayStation
43 percent have Internet access
One-third have a wide-screen plasma or LCD television
One-fourth have a digital video recorder system, such as a TiVo
As for hunger and homelessness, Rector and Sheffield point to 2009 statistics from the U.S. Department of Agriculture showing that 96 percent of poor parents stated that their children were never hungry at any time during the year because they could not afford food, 83 percent of poor families reported having enough food to eat, and over the course of a year, only 4 percent of poor persons become temporarily homeless, with 42 percent of poor households actually owning their own homes. Want an international comparison? The average poor American has more living space than the average Swede or German. You can read even more of those facts in their report, “Understanding Poverty in the United States.”

https://www.askheritage.org/what-does-it-really-mean-to-be-poor-in-america/

**************

I assume that Heritage mixes poor with "in poverty". I've heard some of this before.

So....just how do we define the poor. And have we changed he defintion of poverty such that LBJ's war was on a moving target. Did it really do a good job ?

I'll be looking to flesh this out some more.

I just wanted to comment on the stats -- it appears that the "poor" have access to televised, streaming, and video game entertainment. These are all forms of escapism or distraction from reality.

I think it is interesting that we make sure the poor have ample access to video entertainment and gaming -- perhaps to keep them complacent and distracted.

Just a thought.

It's by design. Same with recreational drug use. Dependency is a tool as much as individuals are slaves to vice and addiction.

 

[Intense]

People, Reminder, This is the CDZ, no flames, no personal insults, no off topic derails. Chronic offenders here, will find themselves barred from this Forum. This Forum is focused on civil discourse, regardless of the subject matter.

 

[TemplarKormac]

The "War on Poverty" in my eyes is nothing but a "War on Unfairness." Because now, instead of being a stopgap measure for those unemployed, it has become a heifer to be milked repeatedly. A means and a motivation to remain sedentary. Where there is poverty, there is a lack of motivation. This War on Poverty doesn't help people out of poverty, it keeps them there. A person can naturally make more than what they get via entitlements.

 

[Interpol]

Currently, there is a thread in the political forum on the failure of LBJ's war on poverty.

I've tried to keep up, but to many people are like me...prone to flame instead of debate.

One reason is the frustration of getting an agreeable set of definitions.

I want to know more about what it means to be in poverty.

In a new report, Heritage’s Robert Rector and Rachel Sheffield lay out what the U.S. government’s own facts and figures really say about poverty in the United States. The results might surprise you, especially if your view of poverty is the conventional one, perpetuated by the media–namely, destitute conditions of homelessness and hunger. In reality, though, the living conditions of those defined as poor by the government are much different than that popular image. The following are facts about persons defined as “poor” by the Census Bureau:

80 percent of poor households have air conditioning
Nearly three-fourths have a car or truck, and 31 percent have two or more cars or trucks
Nearly two-thirds have cable or satellite television
Two-thirds have at least one DVD player and 70 percent have a VCR
Half have a personal computer, and one in seven have two or more computers
More than half of poor families with children have a video game system, such as an Xbox or PlayStation
43 percent have Internet access
One-third have a wide-screen plasma or LCD television
One-fourth have a digital video recorder system, such as a TiVo
As for hunger and homelessness, Rector and Sheffield point to 2009 statistics from the U.S. Department of Agriculture showing that 96 percent of poor parents stated that their children were never hungry at any time during the year because they could not afford food, 83 percent of poor families reported having enough food to eat, and over the course of a year, only 4 percent of poor persons become temporarily homeless, with 42 percent of poor households actually owning their own homes. Want an international comparison? The average poor American has more living space than the average Swede or German. You can read even more of those facts in their report, “Understanding Poverty in the United States.”

https://www.askheritage.org/what-does-it-really-mean-to-be-poor-in-america/

**************

I assume that Heritage mixes poor with "in poverty". I've heard some of this before.

So....just how do we define the poor. And have we changed he defintion of poverty such that LBJ's war was on a moving target. Did it really do a good job ?

I'll be looking to flesh this out some more.

The Heritage study was debunked 3 years ago, people. What You Need When You?re Poor | Center for American Progress

Heritage's study is terrific spin, but that's all it is.

First, the numbers Heritage sites are well before the economic downturn of 2007-2009.

Yes, poor people have air conditioners in their windows, cell phones, dvd players, a computer or two and the internet, but the problem with poverty in America today is that when you add up those things, that's not what's bringing those people down. What's hurting these people is that they struggle with everyday needs like healthcare, child daycare, and electricity.

People who work 40 hours a week in America for the minimum wage are all poor. They get their hand-me-down stuff from hand-me-down people or hand-me-down stores. Anyone can get a secondhand air conditioner that works real great for $50. Or a used laptop for $50. Or a used ipad for cheap. When you make between $15-17,000 a year, scraping some money together for a few appliances that add up to a few hundred bucks is doable. Buying a cheap car that's 10 years old is doable.

The problem is that they don't have thousands of dollars of any extra income to be able to buy health insurance. Even if they didn't buy a cell phone or have a dvd player or an air conditioner or a 1997 Honda Civic, they'd STILL not be able to afford child daycare.

That's what it means to be poor in America today, and that's a lot of people.

And the suckers are you and me, the taxpayer that has to actually subsidize other companies' full-time workers because those companies refuse to pay their people a living wage.

Walmart and McDonald's are doing fantastic. They're among the largest employers in America today. They're raking in billions but my taxes and your taxes are going into Welfare programs that those companies encourage all their employers to use.

If every 40-hour person making the minimum wage got paid $15 hour, those huge multinational companies would still do great business, we would get to pay less in taxes for subsidizing their workers, and their workers would be able to buy the stuff they need that's really important but too expensive for them, like healthcare.

The Heritage study should not be taken seriously. It simply doesn't understand what it means to be one of the tens of millions of Americans who work hard for rich companies but who no longer advance economically, the way things used to work after WWII and for the next 30 years after that.

 

[Intense]

Guys, regardless of the system, this, or any other, there will always be those that excel, and those that fall behind. Providence is what it is. There are those that want to control it, tax it, deny it, but that does not change it. For those of the Book, we are asked to make a difference, to help, to give, to teach, to be there, not by Government mandate, but conscience. There is virtue and vice. You could give $1,000,000 to a hundred people. I seriously doubt any two would end up with the same end. Some will succeed to various levels of success, some will fail, to whatever degree. We may or may not understand cause and effect, I suspect that it is an exact science, when the blinders are removed, and that there are lessons in it, which don't include scapegoating. Failure or success, we each matter. Taking by force, or compulsion, and having little or nothing to show for it, is not the answer either.

 

[mudwhistle]

b

 

[oldfart]

S.J.

I understand this claim.

But when it comes to economics, the one thing that is missing in all these discussions is numbers and standards.

Are those in poverty really as bad off as those who were in poverty 50 years ago ?

I don't know. That is what I am asking.

We see these charts on % poverty, but it seems the standard for poverty is changing.

Looking for some clean discussion (trying to break the flame habit....in a week or two

Poverty in America is pretty much defined as the bottom quintile. The only way you can eliminate the bottom portion of five portions is to no longer have portions. IOW you can't eliminate poverty without ensuring that every single american is earning the exact same income as everyone else, then and only then will you win this nutty war against individual freedom.

I think you are making too much of a coincidence. In 1965 the portion of Americans under Oshansky's poverty limit was 19%, nearly identical to the lowest quintile, as you noted. But in six years it fell to 10%. Since then it has risen back to 15%. That standard is based on the cost of an Agriculture Department minimally adequate diet. The CPR study I cited indicated that this was very close to a broader measure that included housing, medical care, transportation, clothing, and so forth.

It is certainly possible to reduce the portion in poverty by such definitions well below 20%, we have done so before. But you are correct that the lowest quintile by definition must always be the lowest 20%. To some extent, it can be a slippery slope using quintiles, as this is always a relative measure. We have used quintiles because that is the metric we have used for decades and we have long time series data, but I don't think it presents the information we want anymore. For income inequality I would use the Gini coefficient derived from the Lorenz Curve or a metric comparing the top 2% or less to the bottom 50% or 80%. For deprivation, I would use public health statistics.

 

[Listening]

Currently, there is a thread in the political forum on the failure of LBJ's war on poverty.

I've tried to keep up, but to many people are like me...prone to flame instead of debate.

One reason is the frustration of getting an agreeable set of definitions.

I want to know more about what it means to be in poverty.

In a new report, Heritage’s Robert Rector and Rachel Sheffield lay out what the U.S. government’s own facts and figures really say about poverty in the United States. The results might surprise you, especially if your view of poverty is the conventional one, perpetuated by the media–namely, destitute conditions of homelessness and hunger. In reality, though, the living conditions of those defined as poor by the government are much different than that popular image. The following are facts about persons defined as “poor” by the Census Bureau:

80 percent of poor households have air conditioning
Nearly three-fourths have a car or truck, and 31 percent have two or more cars or trucks
Nearly two-thirds have cable or satellite television
Two-thirds have at least one DVD player and 70 percent have a VCR
Half have a personal computer, and one in seven have two or more computers
More than half of poor families with children have a video game system, such as an Xbox or PlayStation
43 percent have Internet access
One-third have a wide-screen plasma or LCD television
One-fourth have a digital video recorder system, such as a TiVo
As for hunger and homelessness, Rector and Sheffield point to 2009 statistics from the U.S. Department of Agriculture showing that 96 percent of poor parents stated that their children were never hungry at any time during the year because they could not afford food, 83 percent of poor families reported having enough food to eat, and over the course of a year, only 4 percent of poor persons become temporarily homeless, with 42 percent of poor households actually owning their own homes. Want an international comparison? The average poor American has more living space than the average Swede or German. You can read even more of those facts in their report, “Understanding Poverty in the United States.”

https://www.askheritage.org/what-does-it-really-mean-to-be-poor-in-america/

**************

I assume that Heritage mixes poor with "in poverty". I've heard some of this before.

So....just how do we define the poor. And have we changed he defintion of poverty such that LBJ's war was on a moving target. Did it really do a good job ?

I'll be looking to flesh this out some more.

The Heritage study was debunked 3 years ago, people. What You Need When You?re Poor | Center for American Progress

Heritage's study is terrific spin, but that's all it is.

First, the numbers Heritage sites are well before the economic downturn of 2007-2009.

Yes, poor people have air conditioners in their windows, cell phones, dvd players, a computer or two and the internet, but the problem with poverty in America today is that when you add up those things, that's not what's bringing those people down. What's hurting these people is that they struggle with everyday needs like healthcare, child daycare, and electricity.

People who work 40 hours a week in America for the minimum wage are all poor. They get their hand-me-down stuff from hand-me-down people or hand-me-down stores. Anyone can get a secondhand air conditioner that works real great for $50. Or a used laptop for $50. Or a used ipad for cheap. When you make between $15-17,000 a year, scraping some money together for a few appliances that add up to a few hundred bucks is doable. Buying a cheap car that's 10 years old is doable.

The problem is that they don't have thousands of dollars of any extra income to be able to buy health insurance. Even if they didn't buy a cell phone or have a dvd player or an air conditioner or a 1997 Honda Civic, they'd STILL not be able to afford child daycare.

That's what it means to be poor in America today, and that's a lot of people.

And the suckers are you and me, the taxpayer that has to actually subsidize other companies' full-time workers because those companies refuse to pay their people a living wage.

Walmart and McDonald's are doing fantastic. They're among the largest employers in America today. They're raking in billions but my taxes and your taxes are going into Welfare programs that those companies encourage all their employers to use.

If every 40-hour person making the minimum wage got paid $15 hour, those huge multinational companies would still do great business, we would get to pay less in taxes for subsidizing their workers, and their workers would be able to buy the stuff they need that's really important but too expensive for them, like healthcare.

The Heritage study should not be taken seriously. It simply doesn't understand what it means to be one of the tens of millions of Americans who work hard for rich companies but who no longer advance economically, the way things used to work after WWII and for the next 30 years after that.

I read your article (and thank you for posting it...it is a good perspective:

I found it thought provoking, but hardly a "debunking" of the Heritage article. Even Heritage states in the article I cited:

None of this is to say that the poor have it easy. Sadly, one in 25 will become temporarily homeless during the year, and one in five poor adults will experience temporary food shortages and hunger at some point in a year. But exaggerating the conditions of poverty does not do America any good, as Rector and Sheffield explain:​

A couple of comments:

First, it would good if they cited some links to support their claims.

Second, to call the Heritage article mean shows a clear bias. Read the entire article and you'll see (as cited above) that Heritage isn't saying the poor are living in luxury.

Third, Heritage also points out something that needs to be addressed:

Those exaggerations about the symptoms of poverty don’t solve the root causes of the problem, either. As Rector and Sheffield write, “Among families with children, the collapse of marriage and the erosion of work ethic are the principal long-term causes of poverty.” In order to truly benefit the poor, they say, welfare policy must require able-bodied recipients to work or prepare for work as a condition of receiving aid. And it should strengthen marriage in low-income communities, rather than ignore and penalize it.​

Which is something I've heard for decades (so I say it needs to be addressed...Heritage points to the original article (they are summarizing)....hopefully that had stats), and that is that divorce tends to send women (and often the children they will take custody of) below the poverty line. Like it or not....if this holds...it says that marriage is an economic efficiency.

Finally, this is something of an opinion piece. It really does little to dispute the Heritage article (or the article they cite which I don't believe they even acknowledge...), a group they don't seem to like.

Both articles close by saying we need real solutions. However, I would say there is nothing in what we currently discuss that addresses poverty in a way that isn't what we've already tried.

So the question comes back to.....what are the poor (Heritage never said they were not classified as poor) and are they really poor ? That is why I started this thread.

Again, thanks for the article. I think it is helpful to the discussion.

 

[Listening]

And the suckers are you and me, the taxpayer that has to actually subsidize other companies' full-time workers because those companies refuse to pay their people a living wage.

Walmart and McDonald's are doing fantastic. They're among the largest employers in America today. They're raking in billions but my taxes and your taxes are going into Welfare programs that those companies encourage all their employers to use.

If every 40-hour person making the minimum wage got paid $15 hour, those huge multinational companies would still do great business, we would get to pay less in taxes for subsidizing their workers, and their workers would be able to buy the stuff they need that's really important but too expensive for them, like healthcare.

The Heritage study should not be taken seriously. It simply doesn't understand what it means to be one of the tens of millions of Americans who work hard for rich companies but who no longer advance economically, the way things used to work after WWII and for the next 30 years after that.

There is nothing in the Heritage article that is wrong. You may not like the underlying message, but you should really try to understand what that message is.

However, the part of your post I quoted above is a entirely different subject. I would suggest a separate thread on this. Yes, they are doing wonderfully and as was pointed out on another thread, wealth continues to concentrate at the top.

That isn't the topic of this thread.

 

[BillyZane]

Guys, regardless of the system, this, or any other, there will always be those that excel, and those that fall behind. Providence is what it is. There are those that want to control it, tax it, deny it, but that does not change it. For those of the Book, we are asked to make a difference, to help, to give, to teach, to be there, not by Government mandate, but conscience. There is virtue and vice. You could give $1,000,000 to a hundred people. I seriously doubt any two would end up with the same end. Some will succeed to various levels of success, some will fail, to whatever degree. We may or may not understand cause and effect, I suspect that it is an exact science, when the blinders are removed, and that there are lessons in it, which don't include scapegoating. Failure or success, we each matter. Taking by force, or compulsion, and having little or nothing to show for it, is not the answer either.

Of course that's true, there are people who will fall short no matter what you give them. But they are a minority, there are MANY more who fail simply because they don't have the means to succeed. In other words, if you gathered up 100 people who are currently "poor" and gave them $1M each, I believe that in one year's time more of them would be doing well than would be poor again.

It's easy to maintain wealth, it's nearly impossible in today's climate to begin wealth.

Now, i don't know about giving every person $1M, but we should be demanding a return to wages which allowed even the lowest employee on the pole to have a chance at building wealth. By my calculations, $10 an hour for full time employees would be a start.

 

[Intense]

Guys, regardless of the system, this, or any other, there will always be those that excel, and those that fall behind. Providence is what it is. There are those that want to control it, tax it, deny it, but that does not change it. For those of the Book, we are asked to make a difference, to help, to give, to teach, to be there, not by Government mandate, but conscience. There is virtue and vice. You could give $1,000,000 to a hundred people. I seriously doubt any two would end up with the same end. Some will succeed to various levels of success, some will fail, to whatever degree. We may or may not understand cause and effect, I suspect that it is an exact science, when the blinders are removed, and that there are lessons in it, which don't include scapegoating. Failure or success, we each matter. Taking by force, or compulsion, and having little or nothing to show for it, is not the answer either.

Of course that's true, there are people who will fall short no matter what you give them. But they are a minority, there are MANY more who fail simply because they don't have the means to succeed. In other words, if you gathered up 100 people who are currently "poor" and gave them $1M each, I believe that in one year's time more of them would be doing well than would be poor again.

It's easy to maintain wealth, it's nearly impossible in today's climate to begin wealth.

Now, i don't know about giving every person $1M, but we should be demanding a return to wages which allowed even the lowest employee on the pole to have a chance at building wealth. By my calculations, $10 an hour for full time employees would be a start.

We disagree. The majority would probably blow the $1,000,000 in a year. The real test would be who did what, 5 years, 10 years down. You either learn to control indulgence or it controls you.

The movers and shakers are the minority. There are more than a fair share of parasites to go around. The best of us get back up when they are knocked down, no matter how many times that happens. The worst of us remain dependent, squandering whatever they receive. You can choose to either blame others for your fate, or you can effect change. It starts with personal responsibility. When you don't have direction, do you waste what you have, or seek clarity of purpose? Paying someone $10, $20, $50, an hour all depends on what you get in return, doesn't it? If you are struggling in trying to keep a small business afloat, how much would you pay employees. Either your investment is returned or you lose. How does that help everyone effected by poor outcome here.

 

[whitehall]

In 1965 unwed Black mothers were about 25%. Today the rate is around 80%. Not only did LBJ's failed "war on poverty" create a Black society dependent on government assistance it also ruined the family structure in the Black community. The only thing LBJ's "war on poverty" succeeded in doing was to create a plantation of Blacks who automatically vote for democrats.

 

[RKMBrown]

In 1965 unwed Black mothers were about 25%. Today the rate is around 80%. Not only did LBJ's failed "war on poverty" create a Black society dependent on government assistance it also ruined the family structure in the Black community. The only thing LBJ's "war on poverty" succeeded in doing was to create a plantation of Blacks who automatically vote for democrats.

I suspect our "war on drugs" and the resulting gang banger culture also play a hand in the restructuring of family structure in poverty stricken communities. I believe I read that over half of all black men spend some time behind bars. Hard to be a father figure when you are seen as a criminal by the mother.

Maybe if we go back to allowing plural marriages we can reduce the number of unwed, by increasing the likely-hood a woman can find a good man.

 

[RKMBrown]

S.J.

I understand this claim.

But when it comes to economics, the one thing that is missing in all these discussions is numbers and standards.

Are those in poverty really as bad off as those who were in poverty 50 years ago ?

I don't know. That is what I am asking.

We see these charts on % poverty, but it seems the standard for poverty is changing.

Looking for some clean discussion (trying to break the flame habit....in a week or two

Poverty in America is pretty much defined as the bottom quintile. The only way you can eliminate the bottom portion of five portions is to no longer have portions. IOW you can't eliminate poverty without ensuring that every single american is earning the exact same income as everyone else, then and only then will you win this nutty war against individual freedom.

I think you are making too much of a coincidence. In 1965 the portion of Americans under Oshansky's poverty limit was 19%, nearly identical to the lowest quintile, as you noted. But in six years it fell to 10%. Since then it has risen back to 15%. That standard is based on the cost of an Agriculture Department minimally adequate diet. The CPR study I cited indicated that this was very close to a broader measure that included housing, medical care, transportation, clothing, and so forth.

It is certainly possible to reduce the portion in poverty by such definitions well below 20%, we have done so before. But you are correct that the lowest quintile by definition must always be the lowest 20%. To some extent, it can be a slippery slope using quintiles, as this is always a relative measure. We have used quintiles because that is the metric we have used for decades and we have long time series data, but I don't think it presents the information we want anymore. For income inequality I would use the Gini coefficient derived from the Lorenz Curve or a metric comparing the top 2% or less to the bottom 50% or 80%. For deprivation, I would use public health statistics.

Inequality is a poor word to use in discussing poverty, and as a measure also a poor tool to use in general, as the measure makes the incorrect assumption that wealth distribution is a zero sum game. For example, if I build ten houses and you build one house, does that mean I worked ten times harder than you, took 5 houses from you, somehow made you less equal, or maybe I just wanted more houses than you did?

As far as using public health statistics, ... 1) a millionaire who has no income, is an alcoholic and refuses to see his doctor... why should we consider him as living in poverty? 2) A family living in the country, with very little income, living on food they grow and hunt, in a home their grand parents built, rarely visiting the doctor and instead choosing to use family remedies and holistic medicine,... why should we consider them as living in poverty?

 

[BillyZane]

In 1965 unwed Black mothers were about 25%. Today the rate is around 80%. Not only did LBJ's failed "war on poverty" create a Black society dependent on government assistance it also ruined the family structure in the Black community. The only thing LBJ's "war on poverty" succeeded in doing was to create a plantation of Blacks who automatically vote for democrats.

I suspect our "war on drugs" and the resulting gang banger culture also play a hand in the restructuring of family structure in poverty stricken communities. I believe I read that over half of all black men spend some time behind bars. Hard to be a father figure when you are seen as a criminal by the mother.

Maybe if we go back to allowing plural marriages we can reduce the number of unwed, by increasing the likely-hood a woman can find a good man.

Oh yes, blame the "war on drugs" rather than the blacks. Ridiculous.

 

[oldfart]

Poverty in America is pretty much defined as the bottom quintile. The only way you can eliminate the bottom portion of five portions is to no longer have portions. IOW you can't eliminate poverty without ensuring that every single american is earning the exact same income as everyone else, then and only then will you win this nutty war against individual freedom.

I think you are making too much of a coincidence. In 1965 the portion of Americans under Oshansky's poverty limit was 19%, nearly identical to the lowest quintile, as you noted. But in six years it fell to 10%. Since then it has risen back to 15%. That standard is based on the cost of an Agriculture Department minimally adequate diet. The CPR study I cited indicated that this was very close to a broader measure that included housing, medical care, transportation, clothing, and so forth.

It is certainly possible to reduce the portion in poverty by such definitions well below 20%, we have done so before. But you are correct that the lowest quintile by definition must always be the lowest 20%. To some extent, it can be a slippery slope using quintiles, as this is always a relative measure. We have used quintiles because that is the metric we have used for decades and we have long time series data, but I don't think it presents the information we want anymore. For income inequality I would use the Gini coefficient derived from the Lorenz Curve or a metric comparing the top 2% or less to the bottom 50% or 80%. For deprivation, I would use public health statistics.

Inequality is a poor word to use in discussing poverty,

I would agree that poverty and income inequality are different concepts. Income inequality is by definition a relative concept and applies no matter how rich or poor a society is. Poverty is a measure against a defined standard. It should be close to a concept of "deprivation" so that it shows up in public health statistics and similar measures.

and as a measure also a poor tool to use in general, as the measure makes the incorrect assumption that wealth distribution is a zero sum game. For example, if I build ten houses and you build one house, does that mean I worked ten times harder than you, took 5 houses from you, somehow made you less equal, or may just that I wanted more houses than you did?

I'm not sure exactly what you mean here, but I would agree that economic growth is not a zero sum game. In most cases, when the economy grows, all income groups see some progress. America in the last thirty years has been a borderline exception, especially in the last fifteen years, and that is alarming.

Measures to redistribute income or wealth can be zero sum, negative sum, or positive sum for the economy as a whole. In severe economic downturns, measures to distribute income to lower income groups is positive sum as it supports demand while austerity in such conditions is negative sum as demand goes down. The reverse would be true in a full-employment, high inflation economy.

As far as using public health statistics, ... 1) a millionaire who has no income, is an alcoholic and refuses to see his doctor... why should we consider him as living in poverty? 2) A family living in the country, with very little income, living on food they grow and hunt, in a home their grand parents built, rarely visiting the doctor and instead choosing to use family remedies and holistic medicine,... why should we consider them as living in poverty?

For 1) I was not aware we considered millionaires as being in poverty. Public health statistics by their nature are aggregates. For example, your alcoholic may die early and increase the mortality rate overall, but because he is not in the poverty classification, that actually makes the comparative mortality rate for those in poverty look better! (Their mortality rates remain the same while the overall mortality rate increases). If we were comparing a society with high rates of extreme alcoholism (like Russia circa 1995) with say Sweden circa 1995 or Russia circa 2010, the mortality rates for 1995 Russia would be higher, but that says nothing about income or poverty.

As for 2) I know some of the families you are referring to. We are talking about a very limited number of people here in essentially a rural population, so I don't think they could move the public health statistics much. They are considered among the poor. I guess we have a classification problem with the Jerry Clower's and hippie communes of the world!

 

[Asclepias]

In 1965 unwed Black mothers were about 25%. Today the rate is around 80%. Not only did LBJ's failed "war on poverty" create a Black society dependent on government assistance it also ruined the family structure in the Black community. The only thing LBJ's "war on poverty" succeeded in doing was to create a plantation of Blacks who automatically vote for democrats.

Sometimes people are so focused on others they simply miss the fact that their own stuff is not in order.

http://spectator.org/articles/35377/generation-unwed-motherhood

Between 1917 and 1965, rates of unwed motherhood in white America were well below 5 percent. Between 1965 and 2010, that figure spiked by over 25 percentage points.

Shit frequently rolls down hill. Also if you count the deliberate destruction of the Black family no wonder the Black rate is so high. If you noticed the police presence in the Black neighborhoods went up as well during the same time. This was done since it was no longer legal to keep Blacks under control any other way. Never look at a stat and draw a conclusion without looking under the hood.

Now if the LAPD was promoted as the best police force you know other cities patterned themselves after LAPD.

In the 1960s, the LAPD was promoted as one of the best police forces in the world.
Despite its reform and having a professionalized military-like police force, William Parker's LAPD faced heavy criticism from the city's Latino and black residents for police brutality. Police beat black and Latino residents, assaulted women, and governed by fear and intimidation in a similar manner to the South.

Chief Parker, who coined the term Thin Blue line, made it a policy for officers to make sure they engaged as many young black teens and pre-teens as possible. His philosophy was to establish a presence and dominance while they were still young and let them know who was boss.

 

[BillyZane]

Guys, regardless of the system, this, or any other, there will always be those that excel, and those that fall behind. Providence is what it is. There are those that want to control it, tax it, deny it, but that does not change it. For those of the Book, we are asked to make a difference, to help, to give, to teach, to be there, not by Government mandate, but conscience. There is virtue and vice. You could give $1,000,000 to a hundred people. I seriously doubt any two would end up with the same end. Some will succeed to various levels of success, some will fail, to whatever degree. We may or may not understand cause and effect, I suspect that it is an exact science, when the blinders are removed, and that there are lessons in it, which don't include scapegoating. Failure or success, we each matter. Taking by force, or compulsion, and having little or nothing to show for it, is not the answer either.

Of course that's true, there are people who will fall short no matter what you give them. But they are a minority, there are MANY more who fail simply because they don't have the means to succeed. In other words, if you gathered up 100 people who are currently "poor" and gave them $1M each, I believe that in one year's time more of them would be doing well than would be poor again.

It's easy to maintain wealth, it's nearly impossible in today's climate to begin wealth.

Now, i don't know about giving every person $1M, but we should be demanding a return to wages which allowed even the lowest employee on the pole to have a chance at building wealth. By my calculations, $10 an hour for full time employees would be a start.

We disagree. The majority would probably blow the $1,000,000 in a year. The real test would be who did what, 5 years, 10 years down. You either learn to control indulgence or it controls you.

The movers and shakers are the minority. There are more than a fair share of parasites to go around. The best of us get back up when they are knocked down, no matter how many times that happens. The worst of us remain dependent, squandering whatever they receive. You can choose to either blame others for your fate, or you can effect change. It starts with personal responsibility. When you don't have direction, do you waste what you have, or seek clarity of purpose? Paying someone $10, $20, $50, an hour all depends on what you get in return, doesn't it? If you are struggling in trying to keep a small business afloat, how much would you pay employees. Either your investment is returned or you lose. How does that help everyone effected by poor outcome here.

Of course people's pay should be relative to what they give you in return. And those who are calling for a $15 or higher min wage are way overestimating what the min worker is worth relative to what they give in return, HOWEVER that doesn't automatically say that the current rate is okay either.

When a man can't work a job, ANY job, and earn enough to sustain himself for the day, there is a problem.

Let's figure $58 a day before taxes. So that's around $38 after taxes, give or take. Is that doable? Well, no actually it is not, not if you consider housing, clothing transportation, food. Etc etc. I see SO many people saying stupid things like let them get 10 roommates, let let them walk everywhere, let them wear hand me downs, let them eat ramen noodles every day.

Why on Earth should a person who is WORKING have to resort to such measures so that another person doesn't have to pay them a decent wage? There is of course no reasonable answer to this question. You can spout off about how "they aren't worth more " all you want, doesn't make it any less of a lie. The current minimum wage is ENTIRELY too low and does NOT reflect what a minimum pay should be. I mean for God's sakes, it's worth 77% of what it was just 20 years ago, and let's not forget that taxes have also risen in that time making the effective minimum wage even lower.

I dislike the term living wage. In my opinion it waters down the debate and leaves the door open for too many fools who think that minimum wage earners should be able to buy a home, drive a new car, raise a family , and buy out Best Buy on said minimum wage , when what they SHOULD be focusing on is getting the minimum wage raised high enough so that no full time worker has to rely on government assistance just to eat.

 

[RKMBrown]

I think you are making too much of a coincidence. In 1965 the portion of Americans under Oshansky's poverty limit was 19%, nearly identical to the lowest quintile, as you noted. But in six years it fell to 10%. Since then it has risen back to 15%. That standard is based on the cost of an Agriculture Department minimally adequate diet. The CPR study I cited indicated that this was very close to a broader measure that included housing, medical care, transportation, clothing, and so forth.

It is certainly possible to reduce the portion in poverty by such definitions well below 20%, we have done so before. But you are correct that the lowest quintile by definition must always be the lowest 20%. To some extent, it can be a slippery slope using quintiles, as this is always a relative measure. We have used quintiles because that is the metric we have used for decades and we have long time series data, but I don't think it presents the information we want anymore. For income inequality I would use the Gini coefficient derived from the Lorenz Curve or a metric comparing the top 2% or less to the bottom 50% or 80%. For deprivation, I would use public health statistics.

Inequality is a poor word to use in discussing poverty,

I would agree that poverty and income inequality are different concepts. Income inequality is by definition a relative concept and applies no matter how rich or poor a society is. Poverty is a measure against a defined standard. It should be close to a concept of "deprivation" so that it shows up in public health statistics and similar measures.

and as a measure also a poor tool to use in general, as the measure makes the incorrect assumption that wealth distribution is a zero sum game. For example, if I build ten houses and you build one house, does that mean I worked ten times harder than you, took 5 houses from you, somehow made you less equal, or may just that I wanted more houses than you did?

I'm not sure exactly what you mean here, but I would agree that economic growth is not a zero sum game. In most cases, when the economy grows, all income groups see some progress. America in the last thirty years has been a borderline exception, especially in the last fifteen years, and that is alarming.

Measures to redistribute income or wealth can be zero sum, negative sum, or positive sum for the economy as a whole. In severe economic downturns, measures to distribute income to lower income groups is positive sum as it supports demand while austerity in such conditions is negative sum as demand goes down. The reverse would be true in a full-employment, high inflation economy.

As far as using public health statistics, ... 1) a millionaire who has no income, is an alcoholic and refuses to see his doctor... why should we consider him as living in poverty? 2) A family living in the country, with very little income, living on food they grow and hunt, in a home their grand parents built, rarely visiting the doctor and instead choosing to use family remedies and holistic medicine,... why should we consider them as living in poverty?

For 1) I was not aware we considered millionaires as being in poverty. Public health statistics by their nature are aggregates. For example, your alcoholic may die early and increase the mortality rate overall, but because he is not in the poverty classification, that actually makes the comparative mortality rate for those in poverty look better! (Their mortality rates remain the same while the overall mortality rate increases). If we were comparing a society with high rates of extreme alcoholism (like Russia circa 1995) with say Sweden circa 1995 or Russia circa 2010, the mortality rates for 1995 Russia would be higher, but that says nothing about income or poverty.

As for 2) I know some of the families you are referring to. We are talking about a very limited number of people here in essentially a rural population, so I don't think they could move the public health statistics much. They are considered among the poor. I guess we have a classification problem with the Jerry Clower's and hippie communes of the world!

As for (1) they do exist and we do provide many forms of welfare aid to said millionaires. 1a) low tax rates for income paid to millionaires, where people living week to week on middle class income pay high tax rates; 1b) many forms of welfare are paid to people without performing a means test, as such there are always reports in the papers of millionaires receiving welfare checks.

As for (2) there are a lot more people in this classification than you might think and they make up a large percentage of the so called poor of this country. Many in this group live by bartering (legal and illegal). Bartering is not measured in our system. Further, this is just one group of folks that just don't fit our mold of 4.3 people living in a house or apartment with 1.6 of the people earning an income for the household. For example, my father retired at 53. By the measure of current income and sell-able assets one might say he's living in poverty. However, he owns his home cars, boats, rec vehicles, ... and barters for any extras he wants. The guy lives like a king and seeks no welfare, cause frankly he doesn't need help.