Liberals have sparked conversations about poverty for generations, often making it the centerpiece of election campaigns or of their self-identify. But economic and political realities change. America’s middle class is under assault, and the conversation must change to match the new realities. The shape of the conversation of poverty may determine whether the middle class will ally with the wealthy, putting their faith in efficient markets and going it alone, or whether they may align with the poor to support policies that make economic life more secure for both?
I just returned from a conference at the Center for Poverty, Work, and Opportunity that John Edwards heads up at the University of North Carolina. Many of the people in attendance were long-time advocates on behalf of the poor — community organizers, community legal services lawyers, outreach organizers. These were hard-working, innovative, dedicated people, and I learned far more than I taught.
Because I spoke first at the Conference and because my research is on the middle class, I started with the question of why advocates for the poor should care deeply about middle-class economic issues. Here’s my list of reasons, but this issue is important and I’d like to invite more conversation about it. So I ask TPM Café readers to take issue with me or to add more reasons that I haven’t singled out.
Why care about middle class economic issues? Why not focus energy directly
- Programs for the poor are poor programs. To get the momentum to pass social safety-net proposals — and more importantly, to hang on to them in hard times — such programs need to help a broad swath of society. Look at the difference in constituent support for Medicaid for poor families and Medicare for all seniors.
- The poor need a vibrant middle class to create the opportunities for upward mobility — jobs, housing, schools. If the middle flourishes, the chances increase that there will be room for the working poor and very poor to move up.
- Many in the middle class are the future poor. Careful analysis of the PSID by Professors Mark Rank and Thomas Hirschl show that, from ages 25 to 75, 51% of all Americans have spent at least a year in poverty. The data from Professor Jacob Hacker on the increase in income volatility and my work on the growing risks facing families suggest that the number plunging into poverty may rise in the future.
- The long-term poor present one set of challenges, but the transient poor present a different set of challenges and opportunities that need far more discussion and understanding. Policies aimed to strengthen the middle class are particularly like to help the transient poor.
- Only a secure middle class can afford to be generous. Matt Miller’s terrific book, The Two-Percent Solution, explains how, with only a little sacrifice, the middle class could help the poor. But his book is founded on the idea that the middle has more to give. As income remains flat and expenses for housing, health insurance, and education skyrocket, the typical family making $55,000 a year may not think it has room to help others. If they were under less financial pressure, more such families might be willing to fund programs most needed by the chronically poor.
Lord knows, it’s tough to be poor. And middle-class-and-worried is a lot better than not knowing where your next meal will come from. But preaching the same sermons isn’t getting the job done, and the middle is starting to hurt. Is it time to put the middle class front-and-center in progressive policy discussions?
