stimulus
"We were poor and we're still poor"
Published June 14, 2009 @ 08:23AM PT
I have to wonder if the presence of Barbara Ehrenreich in the NYT talking about the working poor and the recession will finally get people to pay attention to this notoriously invisible population:
...the outlook is not so cozy when we look at the effects of the recession on a group generally omitted from all the vivid narratives of downward mobility — the already poor, the estimated 20 percent to 30 percent of the population who struggle to get by in the best of times. This demographic, the working poor, have already been living in an economic depression of their own. From their point of view “the economy,” as a shared condition, is a fiction.
And as racial justice advocate Gihan Perera points out, our stimulus policies are not exactly poised to change anything.
How's Your State's Unemployment Insurance Doing?
Published June 10, 2009 @ 03:00PM PT
And more Firefox tabs I need to close - on a new high school for foster students, the recession's impact on kids, how we're spending stimulus funds, and the California showdown:
"Fourteen states have...run out of money to pay [unemployment] benefits and been forced to borrow from Washington a total of more than $8 billion. That number is almost certain to grow as more states reach the brink." Handy interactive map included!
Recession May Have Lasting Impact On Kids: According to the Foundation for Child Development,
"through 2010, virtually all the progress made in family economic well-being since 1975 will be wiped out because of the recession, taking a lasting toll on children...Along with the direct impact of the decline in families' economic well-being, children will likely suffer from a range of indirect effects of the recession, the report forecasts. Obesity may rise from parents' reliance on cheap meals, behavioral problems could increase if adolescents who are not in school cannot find jobs, and state and local budget cuts could limit the availability of pre-kindergarten programs."
At least we're spending most of the stimulus money on social programs, right? In fact, check this out: "one of every six dollars of Americans' income is now coming in the form of a federal or state check or voucher."
We're going back to Cali for a second: think this is all a ploy to get a federal bailout?
Sigh. Let's end on a high note: Philly is about to open the first charter school for foster kids in the nation.
"Enrollment at the school is strictly voluntary and is designed to provide additional support and a stable education for teens who otherwise would be forced to switch schools when they move to other foster families or facilities...more than 75 percent of Philadelphia students in foster care between 2000 and 2004 dropped out of school."
Best of luck to these kids and their new high school!
(Photo of Arise Academy Charter High School from Philadelphia Department of Human Services)
"A Work-Based Safety Net With No Work"
Published June 09, 2009 @ 06:51AM PT
How can we reconcile our "work-first" public assistance efforts with the nationwide joblessness of this recession? It's unlikely we'll ever go back to our pre-1996 welfare days, and yet, we know job training programs often fail, and that low-wage work, while usually plentiful, doesn't lift people out of poverty. And now we can't even turn our backs on legions of struggling, working poor Americans, as more and more of us are out of work. Sadly, it's an interesting time to be an anti-poverty policymaker.
Being Broke
Published June 07, 2009 @ 09:05AM PT
And so, as I try to put the furniture back where it was, and wake up a couple of sleeping party guests, we can return this site to Leigh pretty much as we found it (along with a note promising to replace the broken lamp). Since Greg and Diane and I couldn't apparently solve the poverty problem in a week, there will still be plenty for Red to write about.
Just to get Leigh started, I'll hand it back to her with a pressing issue Diane touched on yesterday - the growing sense that our economic crisis has become a state-level problem, bankrupting state budgets, and causing them to cut services... often to the neediest populations, at just the worst moment.
Race and the Recession
Published May 29, 2009 @ 11:30AM PT
Photo of murals under I-10 at Claiborne Ave in New Orleans. On Claiborne was a thriving black business district in Treme in New Orleans that was destroyed by the development of highway I-10. Urban renewal and federal highway projects repeatedly destroyed thriving black neighborhoods throughout the 1950s and 1960s.
Race & the Recession is the title of a new report out by the Applied Research Center, subtitled "How Inequity Rigged the Economy and How to Change the Rules." I find it especially timely to cover here given the conversation on race, racism, right-wing politics and Reagan unfolding below. I'd also recommend hightailing it over to Ta-Nehisi today, who is just repeatedly nailing this topic with eloquence and erudition, not an easy thing to accomplish.
Race and the Recession mixes stories and data to demonstrate the disproportionate impacts on people of color in this recession. This does not mean that whites/Anglo-Americans are not also suffering - what it means is that given our respective demographic populations in the US, we are likely to see outsized numbers of stories of layoffs, foreclosures, low-wages, lack of health coverage, etc. among non-white Americans. The report details the way disparities in lending, in wealth accumulation, in hiring and employment practices, in wages, etc. create cumulative, downward effects on people of color that makes recessionary periods especially difficult to weather and overcome.
After the jump are highlights from the report, and the policies we need to reduce this inequality - recommendations include universal healthcare, raising the minimum wage, updating decades old community investment policies, assessing the racial impacts of proposed policies, and expanding our emergency relief for the time being.
Hinterlands...New Wastelands?
Published May 29, 2009 @ 04:14AM PT
Last Wednesday I hit a milestone: I entered my 48th state since I began cross-country traveling in my RV 4 ½ years ago for my unconventional homelessness education endeavor, HEAR US. True to my commitment to see parts of America that have become obscure to Interstate-addicted travelers, I traversed empty Michigan backroads, enjoying the breath of spring erupting in winter-ravaged lands.
The current economic devastation has pummeled Michigan, with the understated 12.9% unemployment rate inadequately reflecting suffering of those without paychecks, or workers whose shrunken paychecks don’t begin to cover rising expenses.
Stimulus $$ Bypasses High-Poverty Neighborhoods
Published May 22, 2009 @ 11:10AM PT
Interesting piece in WaPo today about stimulus allocation for public housing improvements: Only high performing housing authorities have been awarded $$, in theory to prevent waste and misuse by those not meeting expectations. Seems reasonable enough.
But the case of the L.A. authority questions this calculation:
King said that larger housing authorities have a tougher job because they've had to make cuts in recent years while maintaining a massive, aging housing stock. The city's housing authority has about 7,000 units serving 21,000 people. The agency will still get $25 million regardless of how it fares with the competitive grants, but it has a backlog of capital needs that exceeds $500 million. He said the competitive grants could enable the city's housing authority to replace some complexes completely rather than remodel them.
