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Breaking the Chains of Dependency
| Article
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20724 |
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Section : |
SPECIAL SECTION
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| Issue
Date : |
9 / 1992 |
3,607 Words |
| Author
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Noel R. Card
Noel R. Card is director of public affairs for the American
Legislative Exchange Council, the nation's largest individual
membership organization of state legislators, based in
Washington, D.C. |
The clouds of black smoke drifting over Los Angeles in May were actually signals warning that the crisis in the nation's cities has reached a flashpoint. The verdict in the Rodney King trial touched off the rage of thousands of inner-city dwellers at the seeming inability of politicians to address the problems of crime, illegal drugs, poverty, homelessness, inadequate schools, health care, and housing, in rioting unseen since the 1960s. Though the violence was largely committed by the gangs that rule the streets of south-central L.A. like the militias of Beirut, the very existence of gangs like the Crips and the Bloods is a symptom of a social structure that is quickly collapsing into anarchy.
Shortly after the fires stopped burning, the Bush administration attempted to place the blame on the "failures of the Great Society," claiming that the misguided social programs of Lyndon Johnson and his liberal successors were responsible for creating the underclass that it now trapped in most major cities. The liberal architects of the programs quickly counterattacked, citing successes of programs such as Head Start and food stamps. Yet when the ideological and partisan sparring subsided, there was a clear and growing consensus that a major overhaul of the nation's urban policies was long overdue.
There is also mounting evidence that the government programs intended to help people climb out of poverty have contributed to the creation of the underclass and the increasing tension between various segments of American society. As evidence, we need only look to the presidential campaigns of politicians as varied as Jesse Jackson, David Duke, Jerry Brown, and Pat Buchanan to confirm that in America today there is a tremendous difference of opinion as to the government's role in fighting poverty.
There are more than a hundred federal programs to assist the "poor," along with thousands of other programs managed at the state and local levels. Outlays for federal "safety net" programs, those that provide cash, food, housing, and medical care to the nation's poor, rose from $54.9 billion in 1981 to $70.5 billion in 1990, in constant 1990 dollars. Even so, the number of families in poverty rose 10.7 percent between 1989 and 1990 alone.
Today, more than 4.7 million American families, approximately 13 million individuals, are participating in Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), arguably the most prominent of the federal welfare programs. Enrollment in AFDC rose 25 percent in the last two years alone, and 14 percent of the nation's
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