NYTimes | Lagging
wages — actually declining in real terms for half of working men — and
work instability have been followed by sharp declines in marriage,
rising births out of wedlock, and more.
As
Isabel Sawhill of the Brookings Institution writes: “Blacks have faced,
and will continue to face, unique challenges. But when we look for the
reasons why less skilled blacks are failing to marry and join the middle
class, it is largely for the same reasons that marriage and a
middle-class lifestyle is eluding a growing number of whites as well.”
So
it is, as I said, disheartening still to see commentators suggesting
that the poor are causing their own poverty, and could easily escape if
only they acted like members of the upper middle class.
And
it’s also disheartening to see commentators still purveying another
debunked myth, that we’ve spent vast sums fighting poverty to no avail
(because of values, you see.)
In
reality, federal spending on means-tested programs other than Medicaid
has fluctuated between 1 and 2 percent of G.D.P. for decades, going up
in recessions and down in recoveries. That’s not a lot of money — it’s
far less than other advanced countries spend — and not all of it goes to
families below the poverty line.
Despite
this, measures that correct well-known flaws in the statistics show
that we have made some real progress against poverty. And we would make a
lot more progress if we were even a fraction as generous toward the
needy as we imagine ourselves to be.
The
point is that there is no excuse for fatalism as we contemplate the
evils of poverty in America.
Shrugging your shoulders as you attribute
it all to values is an act of malign neglect. The poor don’t need
lectures on morality, they need more resources — which we can afford to
provide — and better economic opportunities, which we can also afford to
provide through everything from training and subsidies to higher
minimum wages. Baltimore, and America, don’t have to be as unjust as
they are.
