If
poverty means lacking nutritious food, adequate warm housing, and
clothing for a family, relatively few of the 35 million people
identified as being "in poverty" by the Census Bureau could be
characterized as poor. While material hardship does exist in the
United States, it is quite restricted in scope and severity.
The
average "poor" person, as defined by the government, has a living
standard far higher than the public imagines. The following are
facts about persons defined as "poor" by the Census Bureau, taken
from various government reports:
- Forty-six percent of all poor households
actually own their own homes. The average home owned by persons
classified as poor by the Census Bureau is a three-bedroom house
with one-and-a-half baths, a garage, and a porch or patio.
- Seventy-six percent of poor households
have air conditioning. By contrast, 30 years ago, only 36 percent
of the entire U.S. population enjoyed air conditioning.
- Only 6 percent of poor households are
overcrowded. More than two-thirds have more than two rooms per
person.
- The typical poor American has more living
space than the average individual living in Paris, London, Vienna,
Athens, and other cities throughout Europe. (These comparisons are
to the average citizens in foreign countries, not to those
classified as poor.)
- Nearly three-quarters of poor households
own a car; 30 percent own two or more cars.
- Ninety-seven percent of poor households
have a color television; over half own two or more color
televisions.
- Seventy-eight percent have a VCR or DVD
player; 62 percent have cable or satellite TV reception.
- Seventy-three percent own microwave ovens,
more than half have a stereo, and a third have an automatic
dishwasher.
Overall, the typical American defined as
poor by the government has a car, air conditioning, a refrigerator,
a stove, a clothes washer and dryer, and a microwave. He has two
color televisions, cable or satellite TV reception, a VCR or DVD
player, and a stereo. He is able to obtain medical care. His home
is in good repair and is not overcrowded. By his own report, his
family is not hungry, and he had sufficient funds in the past year
to meet his family's essential needs. While this individual's life
is not opulent, it is equally far from the popular images of dire
poverty conveyed by the press, liberal activists, and
politicians.
Of
course, the living conditions of the average poor American should
not be taken as representing all of the nation's poor: There is a
wide range of living conditions among the poor. In contrast to the
25 percent of "poor" households that have cell phones and telephone
answering machines, ap-proximately one-tenth of families in poverty
have no phone at all. While the majority of poor households do not
experience significant material problems, roughly a third do
experience at least one problem such as overcrowding, temporary
hunger, or difficulty getting medical care.
The
good news is that the poverty that does exist in the United States
can readily be reduced, particularly among children. There are two
main reasons that American children are poor: Their parents don't
work much, and their fathers are absent from the home.
In
both good and bad economic environments, the typical American poor
family with children is supported by only 800 hours of work during
a year--the equivalent of 16 hours of work per week. If work in
each family were raised to 2,000 hours per year--the equivalent of
one adult working 40 hours per week throughout the year--nearly 75
percent of poor children would be lifted out of official
poverty.
As
noted above, father absence is another major cause of child
poverty. Nearly two-thirds of poor children reside in single-parent
homes; each year, an additional 1.3 million children are born out
of wedlock. If poor mothers married the fathers of their children,
nearly three-quarters of the nation's impoverished youth would
immediately be lifted out of poverty.
Yet,
although work and marriage are reliable ladders out of poverty, the
welfare system perversely remains hostile to both. Major programs
such as food stamps, public housing, and Medicaid continue to
reward idleness and penalize marriage. If welfare could be turned
around to encourage work and marriage, the nation's remaining
poverty would quickly be reduced. This is, perhaps, the best news
about poverty in the United States.
Robert E. Rector is Senior Research
Fellow in Domestic Policy Studies and Kirk A. Johnson, Ph.D., is
Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Fellow in Statistical Welfare Research
in the Center for Data Analysis at The Heritage
Foundation.