Despite spending more than enough to pull everyone across the poverty line, the War on Poverty has failed at reducing the causes of poverty and hurt many of the people it was intended to help. Poverty in America is overwhelmingly linked to the absence of fathers and a lack of work, but welfare payments have had the destructive effects of eroding marriage and work ethic in low-income communities. Welfare reform of 1996 transformed one program to dramatic effect, significantly reducing welfare rolls and lowering child poverty. But today that reform is in jeopardy, and some 70 other federal means-tested programs are in need of similar reform.
In 1935, President Roosevelt (D) said: “Continued dependence upon relief induces a spiritual and moral disintegration fundamentally destructive to the national fibre. To dole out relief in this way is to administer a narcotic, a subtle destroyer of the human spirit.” Read More.
Marriage: America's greatest weapon against child poverty. A Heritage Foundation book of charts. Read More.
Despite spending almost $16 trillion since the War on Poverty began in 1964, welfare programs have failed to reduce the causes of poverty, and instead have hurt many of the people they were intended to help. Read More.
Child poverty is an ongoing national concern, but few are aware that its principal cause is the absence of married fathers in the home. Read More.
Means-tested welfare is likely to equal or exceed $10.3 trillion over the next decade. Much of this spending will be financed by massive government deficits, placing financial burdens on future generations. Read More.
Robert Rector discusses poverty. … Read more
Robert Rector discusses poverty in America. … Read more
In this week's Heritage in Focus pocast, Rachel Sheffield discusses poverty in America. David Weinberger hosts. To get regular updates on Heritage in Focus podcasts, visit our RSS feed or subscribe on iTunes. To listen to more Heritage in Focus podcasts, return to the Podcast… Read more
Brian Darling discusses food stamps. … Read more
Health, education, welfare ... the federal government spends more than $630 billion annually on hundreds of social programs. How many of them work? No one knows. And that's a problem. Most federal programs have never been evaluated for true effectiveness. And most evaluations that are conducted –… Read more
The Census Bureau reported last fall that 43 million Americans, one in seven of us, were poor. But what is poverty in America? The most recent government data show more than half of the families defined as poor… Read more
More than 35 million Americans live in poverty, according to the Census Bureau. Imagine what kind of life they must have. Actually, you don’t have to imagine. Their federal government conducts numerous surveys that contain detailed information about the living conditions of those classified as poor - information that comes… Read more
Behold poverty’s Catch 22: The Left wails about poverty, demands ever more trillions of dollars in government spending to fight it and then ignores that spending when it counts the poor. How did we get here? To the average American, the word… Read more
This key research from 2004 has been updated in Robert Rector's new paper, How Poor Are America's Poor? Examining the "Plague" of Poverty in AmericaEach year, the U.S. Census Bureau counts the number of "poor" persons in the U.S. In 2005, the Bureau found 37 million "poor" Americans. Presidential… Read more
This lecture was held at The Heritage Foundation on March 13, 1998. Welcome to our panel discussion on the 30th anniversary of the publication of the Kerner Commission Report. The Heritage Foundation has a number of goals. One is to roll back the liberal welfare state. A prerequisite to understanding what happened to create the… Read more
What causes poverty in America? If you’re like most people, you are concerned about poverty—but probably not your own. By historical standards, most Americans are quite wealthy. And that’s part of what bothers us.… Read more
Political debate on income in the United States often has been characterized as competition between two schools of economic thought: one that focuses on the long-term increase in general prosperity and one that focuses on the equalization of existing incomes. Proponents of the first approach have much to hearten them; the long-term increase in economic… Read more
President Obama’s budget seeks to overturn the fundamental principles of welfare reform. To accomplish this, his budget would: Create a new funding system to reward states for increasing the size of their welfare caseloads; and … Read more
Early initiation of sexual activity and higher numbers of non-marital sex partners are linked in turn to a wide variety of negative life outcomes, including increased rates of infection with sexually transmitted diseases, increased rates of out-of-wedlock pregnancy and birth, increased single parenthood, decreased marital stability, increased maternal and child poverty, increased abortion, increased depression, and… Read more
On March 16, 1964, President Lyndon Johnson declared war on poverty in the United States. He created large-scale national programs aimed at helping the poor and needy that consumed nearly 1.2 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product (GDP). The programs were meant… Read more
Six years ago, President Bill Clinton signed legislation overhauling part of the nation's welfare system. The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (P.L. 104-193) replaced the failed social program known as Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC)… Read more
Introduction The Stand for Children rally, held in Washington on June 1, called attention to the plight of the nation's children. However, the unstated, underlying goal was to defend the continuing growth of the welfare system and implicitly to criticize those in Congress who have sought to reform it. Thus, while the Stand for Children event… Read more
The recently passed U.S. House of Representatives stimulus bill contains $816 billion in new spending and tax cuts. Of this sum, $264 billion (32 percent) is new means-tested welfare spending. This represents about $6,700 in new welfare spending for every poor person in the U.S. But this welfare spending is only the tip of the… Read more
Read the full text here Each year for the past two decades, the U.S. Census Bureau has reported that over 30 million Americans were living in “poverty.” In recent years, the Census has reported that one in seven Americans are poor. But what does it… Read more
Read the Executive Summary Abstract: For decades, the U.S.… Read more
Abstract: Federal social programs are rarely evaluated to determine whether they are actually accomplishing their intended purposes. As part of its obligation to spend taxpayers’ dollars wisely, Congress should mandate that experimental evaluations of every federal social program be conducted. The evaluations should be… Read more
Abstract: For tens of thousands of endangered children, foster care has become a trap door rather than the safety net they need to help them succeed. In particular, federal financing policies have favored foster care over other child welfare approaches, leading states to overuse… Read more
Abstract: The number of Americans who pay taxes continues to shrink—and the United States is close to the point at which half of the population will not pay taxes for government benefits… Read more
THE ISSUE: Despite spending almost $16 trillion since the War on Poverty began in 1964, welfare programs have failed to reduce the causes of poverty, and instead have hurt many of the people they were intended to help. Poverty in… Read more
Abstract: Year after year, The Heritage Foundation’s Index of Dependence on Government documents the ever-growing number of federal aid programs and the ever-growing number of Americans who rely on government subsidies for their existence. The number… Read more
Abstract: The growth of welfare spending is unsustainable and will drive the United States into bankruptcy if allowed to continue. President Barack Obama’s fiscal year 2011 budget request would increase total welfare spending to $953 billion—a 42 percent… Read more
The mainstream media, liberal politicians, activists, and academia bewail child poverty in the U.S. But in these ritual lamentations, one key fact remains hidden: The principal cause of child poverty in the U.S. is the absence of married fathers in the home. According to the U.S… Read more
No class of American professionals will be more negatively impacted by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act than physicians. Third-party payment arrangements already compromise the independence and integrity of the medical profession; Obamacare will reinforce the worst of these features.… Read more
My fellow conservatives, The stakes couldn’t be higher for our nation at this moment. In the coming months, Americans...… Read more
Our newest video highlights a recent paper on welfare reform by Heritage's Robert Rector and Kiki Bradley. In the...… Read more
In New York, facing a $9 billion deficit, state legislators put welfare on the chopping block to head off a government...… Read more
The European economic model is dead. Don’t believe us? – Ask The Washington Post. Yesterday's front-page story reported...… Read more
“So my whole goal over the next four years," President Barack Obama said Monday night at the end of his first...… Read more
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