Fifty years after the inception of the Lyndon B. Johnson’s legislation against poverty, America is still battling the war.
The legislation unofficially called the “War on Poverty” was introduced during Johnson’s State of the Union address on Jan. 8, 1964. According to The Huffington Post, after the war on poverty in 1973, poverty rates were an all-time low: 11.1 percent. The popularity of the war on poverty decreased after the 1960s. Some may be eager to find out if the war on poverty has changed in 50 years.
Since then, according to census.gov, the annual poverty rate has risen to 14 percent as of 2011.
“Not since the Great Depression have so many people been beaten down by vast, destructive forces,” said Sasha Abramsky, a freelance journalist and author of The American Way of Poverty.
Many safety net programs such as food stamps have been implemented to combat poverty. There are at least 92 federal programs designed to help lower-income American families. There are dozens of education and job-training programs, 17 different food-aid programs and over 20 different housing programs. The federal government spent $799 billion on these programs in 2012. Some view these as beneficial, while others do not.
Ron Haskins of the Brookings Institution said that such programs are only a partial solution.
“To mount an effective war against poverty, we need changes in the personal decisions of more young Americans,” Haskins said.
Lauren Bennett, an Agriculture communications major, believes that only those who truly need benefits should receive them.
“I believe that people in poverty need food stamps if they actually have a reason to need them. It’s one thing to be a single mother working three jobs to support her children and be in poverty. She is working hard for her family, but it is another thing to be a family with no one employed, receiving disability because of the circumstances that could potentially be prevented,” Bennett said.
Bennett sees food stamps as a beneficial program for those in Weakley County.
“Weakley County is no different than any other county in the U.S. … Students and residents here are just as poverty stricken as they would be in any other county. For students, food stamps help, especially when they have student loans and other essential bills they have to pay,” she said.
Dr. David Barber, a UTM History professor, believes the “War on Poverty” does not exist, but the war has shifted.
“There is no War on Poverty now. It is more so the War on the Poor. Poverty has been escalating for the past 25-30 years,” Barber said.
One aspect that doesn’t help the poverty rates is the rising rate of single parents.
“More parents are raising a child alone, with more infants born out of wedlock,” according to a The New York Times article.
The article said 30 percent of single mothers live in poverty.
“Today in this area, about a quarter of the children live in poverty. By poverty, I mean they don’t get nutritional food, they don’t have clothes or nice houses, and they stay cold in the winter and hot in the summer. Weakley Co. schools have a free breakfast and lunch waiver, and 20 percent of the population in Weakley County is on food stamps. Tennessee representative, Steven Fincher, voted to reduce the food stamps allocation. Martin and Union City population alone are 10.4 percent unemployed,” Barber said.
“Food stamps are a product of the War on Poverty in 1964, but Medicare is also a product of the war. The elderly make up a large population of the poor, and are also the ones that use Medicare the most. Today there is an ongoing attack on Congress about Medicare being too expensive. A large portion of our population here would benefit from the [Affordable Care Act.]”
As for statistics for how the safety net programs have influenced those in poverty, many of the programs have helped families. According to the same The New York Times article, in 2011 the earned-income tax credit has increased employment for single mothers and kept six million Americans above the poverty line. Also in 2011, the article states that food stamps have kept four million Americans out of poverty.
Raising employment rates is a place to start in combatting the “War on Poverty.” According to The New York Times article, the poverty rate for full-time workers is 3 percent, which is much lower than the 11 percent recorded through census.gov in 2011.
