There are a lot of people suffering right now. Poverty in the U.S. is at a 20-year high, with 46.2 million Americans living below the poverty line (earning less than $11,170 for an individual, or below $23,050 for a family of four). Conditions are even worse among African-American and Latino children, of whom one in three lives in poverty. Along with this economic hardship comes hunger, homelessness, instability, illness and day-to-day challenges that most of us cannot imagine. Nevertheless, we hear very little about the struggles of America's poor in campaign speeches and policy debates -- or, most notably, from our president.
Like those before him, President Obama enjoys one of the perennial perks of the office: a bully pulpit from which to focus the nation's attention on the most pressing problems of his people. Many thought that alleviating poverty would be an explicit priority for our 44th president, a former community organizer, our nation's first black president and a self-declared "lifelong advocate for the poor," but it was not. Now, with a second term, President Obama has another opportunity to advance the issue of poverty on the political agenda. Many are calling on him to do so. But he should not.
Now is not the time to undertake a second "war on poverty," despite the depth of need and suffering. Focusing on the 15 percent of Americans living in poverty could simply fuel conflict and resentment between those on each side of the poverty line. In fact, the potential for backlash is particularly high at a time like this, when the nation is focused on scarcity, debt and uncertainty and polarized by conflicting notions of the role of government.
Most importantly, there is absolutely no need to incite an "us vs. them" dynamic between poor and middle-class Americans. Instead, these two groups must join together in shared outrage at the limited opportunities for social mobility in this country. There are simply not enough ways to move up and far too many ways to fall down. More can be accomplished -- for the poor and for everyone -- by focusing instead on how our broken ladder of opportunity and shredded safety net make it so hard to rise out of poverty and beyond the middle class.
This is the cross-cutting problem that President Obama should (and seems likely to) tackle in his second term. It does not require a national discourse on poverty but a shift in attention away from disadvantage toward an examination of the concentrated advantages provided to those already flourishing in our society. It then becomes clear that it is not only poverty but inequality -- of income, economic growth and political influence -- that plagues the poor.
In a country so unequal, the distance to travel from poor to rich is very far, and the road is hard. Making this road easier requires repairing each rung of the ladder of opportunity that spans this vast distance. This requires -- as the president often states -- allowing "all Americans to grab the first rung on the ladder to the middle class." But that is not enough. We must also bring each subsequent rung closer to the last.
When we frame the problem as one of concentrated advantage at the top rather than as one of disadvantage at the bottom, we can identify a broader set of policy solutions. It is here, in debates over the fiscal cliff, monetary policy, health reform, hidden tax expenditures, union protections and campaign finance reform, that the ladder of opportunity will get repaired -- or further dismantled.
It is on these "non-poverty" issues that President Obama has spent much of his first term -- and is likely to devote his second term. As a result, his legacy will not be as a president who waged a second "war on poverty" but as one who made the ladder of opportunity a little sturdier and more structurally sound.
Of course, the problem is that slowing the cycle of concentrated advantage is a messy business. Many of the policies fueling the concentration of advantage are hidden from view -- part of the "submerged state" -- fiercely defended by those who benefit from them and poorly understood by everyone else. Even small changes are hard-fought, leaving the president's political capital depleted and his powerful opponents further mobilized to defend their advantage in the next round of the policy fight. Politically, there is very little for the president to gain by choosing to fight on this battlefield, but there is so much that could be lost if he surrenders.
This blog post is part of a series produced by The Huffington Post and the George Washington University that closely examines the most pressing challenges facing President Obama in his second term. To read the companion article by HuffPost's Sabrina Siddiqui and Tom Zeller, Jr., click here. To read the companion blog post by David Beckmann of Bread for the World, click here. To read all the other posts in the series, click here.
David Beckmann: President Obama, Set a Goal to End Hunger
The upcoming deficit debate will effectively be a debate over the role of the federal government, particularly regarding antipoverty programs. It only makes sense to use this opportunity to lay out a genuine alternative for the future, with an emphasis on promoting full employment, that effectively addresses the causes of our economic woes.
The point is, the major economic debates can't be viewed in a vacuum. We're now at a point where a full third of the population lives at or below 200% of the poverty level and needless to say, they're incapable of meaningful participation in the economy. We're squandering human talent and creating a drag on growth by maintaining a system that excludes so many people.
There's growing evident that robots and AI really are producing more leisure time. we can either embrace this, or we can just let leisure become poverty.
Please consider resigning your post. Quite obviously, you've lost the faith. Public policy is all about progress, an individual who simply supports the status quo has really just given-up.
You advocate no action on poverty...due to political backlash. You say it isn't the right time. Do you imagine that by taking no action, America's long neglected poverty problem won't get worse?
What evidence have you for a future where the current income gap grows smaller? Realize that there will not be a 'right time' next year or for the next president. The number of Americans living in poverty will continue to worsen and the degree of their poverty will become more desperate.
Politically, the plutocrats aren't going to go away. Wall Street executives already gift themselves with bonuses far exceeding those given themselves prior to this Great Recession. The GOP isn't about to make an about-face and begin championing the needs of that 47% of us whose income is so low we don't even qualify to pay federal income tax.
Taking action to mitigate poverty will always be a political hot potato. Yes, it would be much less frustrating to take-on this issue at a time when both chambers of Congress are solidly democratic. But what progressive issue wouldn't be? and is that really reason enough to stop governing in the interests of the people?
The machine flows more fuel when the machine gets hot. A second machine flows more fuel when the machine gets cold. Adding fuel to a fire makes it hotter. Adding water to a fire makes it colder. If, the hotter a fire gets, the more fuel is added, we have POSITIVE feedback. If, the hotter a fire gets, the more water is added, we have NEGATIVE feedback. There are variations, as you can imagine, and there are more and less as well as all and none.
Our capitalist economy does have some problems that only a government can solve. In fact the economy flies into pieces from time to time (Lynx and Hare boom-bust problem), creates impossibilities (most monopolies), and creates unfairness (King of Mountain/No Room at the Top problem). But it has many advantages over a "pretend to work/pretend to be paid" economy.
But capitalism's main problem is the "it can be manipulated" problem. We see market manipulation in lobbying and with practice in larger, more resourced, businesses. So, it can be manipulated, but it requires reigning in, too. This is a setup for political fluctuation and deal-cutting. It requires cooperation and compromise, or it does not work and the country suffers. The Tea Party either is using this to damage the economy or the Tea Party does not understand why a half-parliamentary system is unworkable.
Then we fill the city schools with teachers who cannot be fired unless they literally stop showing up or commit a felony. We allow the illegal drug trade to present the only opportunity for young people to accumulate wealth. The democrats have been in charge of the major cities for the vast majority of the last 30 years. This is their legacy and it is a miserable failure.
I have worked for LESS than minimum wage during high school, at an amusement park.
I have a patented product in Walmart that has sold millions for my employer. It pays my bills. Believe me, if you forced them to pay $15/hr, then all the prices in the store would rise accordingly. Same with all other retail. Our sales would go down. We would lay off here. We need to let the free market do its job and set prices, not artificially fix them.
Look what happened when restaurants had to start implementing obamacare. Darden tried to raise prices, and even a $1-2 price increase failed miserably. Imagine that across the entire economy, which is already struggling. You would see actually less min. wage jobs available.
You might google "falling rate of return" -- that's where the profits off of producing goods falls relative to the price it costs to produce them. And it's cheaper to hire robots and computers than to pay even minimum wages.
So what to do about the fact that only a portion of the population is needed to produce goods for the total population?
You're confusing money tokens with real wealth in so many ways.
If we were going to have a national conversation on poverty, as Ms. Rigby suggests, we should begin by analyzing every application for benefits. I expect that we would find that the same 70% rate would apply. Fraud is so much a part of the "poverty racket" that Ms. Rigby's 46.2 million figure probably represents an actual 13.9 million Americans who need and are eligible for help. The money spent on poverty could easily provide for these people if it wasn't already supporting a bloated army of corrupt civil servants, frauds, and cheats.
The 46.2 million figure is not in dispute. There are 16 million children in poverty -- the second highest rate of the industrialized world (only Romania is higher.) Is your suggestion to ignore it?
Poverty is not an enemy, it's a social illness and like all illnesses the cure is research, education, and determining ways of preventing and curing. Poverty results when wages aren't high enough, when education and/or training isn't strong enough and when selfishness and greed override decency and real patriotism.
And why has it been necessary for the banks to make profits off of investing in financial instruments rather than real assets?