In his 1964 State of the Union address President Lyndon B. Johnson declared a “War on Poverty.” Fifty years later, America is still fighting the battle.
As Johnson spoke to the nation, he acknowledged the challenge of improving the economic situation of poor Americans.
“It will not be a short or easy struggle. No single weapon or strategy will suffice, but we shall not rest until that war is won. The richest nation on earth can afford to win it. We cannot afford to lose it,” Johnson said.
Drew DiSilver, senior writer at the Pew Research Center, calls Johnson’s proposal and the efforts that followed “the most ambitious domestic policy initiative since the Great Depression.” However, there is no agreement as to the success of anti-poverty efforts.
“For decades politicians and social scientists have argued about whether Johnson’s anti-poverty programs have lifted people out of destitution, trapped them in cycles of dependency or both,” DiSilver wrote in the Pew analysis, “Who’s poor in America? Fifty years into the ‘War on Poverty,’ a data portrait.”
Looking back
The history of poverty especially in the South requires a look back at the economic development of the United States. In the 1800s the poorest of the poor in the industrialized northern United States were often orphans, widows and people too old or sick to work. In contrast the southern United States was rural, agrarian and on the whole very poor. In 1938, President Franklin Roosevelt called the South the “nation’s No. 1 economic problem,” a condition that improved only slightly as the demands of World War II brought the U.S. out of the Great Depression.
When Johnson declared the War on Poverty the rates of poverty were actually declining, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. However, the Johnson administration enacted several education, housing and health-related programs including college work-study, Head Start, the Food Stamp Act and Medicare/Medicaid aimed at helping improve economic conditions for the poor.
These programs were and continue to be expensive, according to Joe Carter, director of communications for the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC) of the Southern Baptist Convention.
Welfare programs
“From the beginning of the War on Poverty until 2012 local, state and federal spending on welfare programs has totaled [$15 trillion]. Currently the United States spends nearly $1 trillion every year to fight poverty. That amounts to $20,610 for every poor person in America or $61,830 per poor family of three,” Carter wrote in a January blog post for the ERLC.
Despite programs and spending, however, the rate of poverty has remained virtually unchanged since 1965, fluctuating between 10 and 15 percent nationally, according to Census data.
Historically the South has been the poorest region in the U.S. In 1969 almost half of all poor Americans lived in the South though the southern population was only 31 percent of the U.S. population at the time. At that time the South’s 17.9 percent poverty rate was “far above other regions,” DiSilver wrote.
Today poverty is more evenly distributed throughout the U.S. though it is still highest in the South, according to Census data. The South now has 37 percent of the U.S. population, the highest population percentage of the four regions and the highest poverty rate as well at 16.5 percent.
In Alabama poverty continues to be a major concern. While the U.S. poverty rate decreased from 2012 to 2013 Alabama’s rate has increased in each of the last three years, according to Census data. In 2011, 15.4 percent of Alabamians lived in poverty. In 2012 the rate was 16.2 percent and in 2013, 16.7 percent.
Though poverty is a concern statewide, some of the poorest counties in Alabama have rates much higher than the state average. In Wilcox, Sumter, Dallas, Greene, Perry, Bullock and Macon counties more than a third of the population lives in poverty. Only one county in Alabama — Shelby — has a poverty rate in the single digits at 8.7 percent, according to the 2014 Alabama Poverty Datasheet, published by Alabama Possible, an advocacy group that seeks to reduce poverty in the state.
Gov. Robert Bentley has called Alabama’s poverty statistics “sobering,” noting in his 2014 State of the State Address that 1 in 4 Alabama children live in poverty.
Bentley blamed dependence on government programs for the continued poverty in the state and asserted that increasing such programs will hurt, not help, poor Alabamians.
“We will never see an end to the plague of poverty by offering a deeper dependence on a flawed government system. We will never help our poorest citizens or our future generations by casting over them the net of federal government giveaway programs. We can break the cycle of poverty but not with programs that drag our communities and our people into the downward spiral of dependence,” Bentley said.
However, advocates for the poor say that safety net programs can make all the difference in lifting Alabama families out of poverty.
Carol Gundlach, policy analyst for tax and budget issues for Arise Citizens’ Policy Project (ACPP), said, “Look at the number of people who are working full- or part-time in the state and still have to be on Medicaid, Children’s Health Insurance Program and food stamps. Someone could work full-time at minimum wage and still not be able to support their family.” ACPP is a statewide, nonpartisan coalition that promotes public policy benefiting low-income Alabamians.
‘Safety net’
Gundlach said the “safety net” of government-funded health and housing programs is critical to helping low-income Alabamians escape poverty. Critics who argue against efforts to help the poor such as increasing the minimum wage often assume an individual or family is taking advantage of multiple assistance programs, which is usually not the case, Gundlach said. Even in those families who do receive multiple benefits the money often runs out before the end of the month, creating a burden especially on children.
“Poverty is terrible on children,” Gundlach said.
Policy changes can make a difference, said Melanie Bridgeforth, executive director of VOICES for Alabama’s Children, a statewide group that works to promote advocacy for children’s issues. She points to programs like Social Security and Medicare, which were aimed at helping poor seniors. The result is that poverty among seniors has declined in the last 50 years, she said. Programs aimed at helping children in poverty could have a similar effect on future generations of Alabamians, she said.
“It is evident that policy change can change the trajectory of a subset of the population,” Bridgeforth said. “From a policy perspective, moving forward we need the same robust effort into changes for children. We absolutely have come a long way, but there’s still much to be done.”
142,000
Low-income working families with children in Alabama (in 2012)
(Source: Annie E. Casey Foundation KIDS COUNT)
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