Generational poverty in US 4x worse than peers, those born poor likely to remain poor

[Communion]

The original study Axios summarized that came out at the beginning of this month:

 

The Intergenerational Persistence of Poverty in High-Income Countries
https://osf.io/tb3qz/

 

Quote

Exposure to childhood poverty increases the likelihood of adult poverty. However, past research offers conflicting accounts of cross-national variation in the strength of the intergenerational persistence of poverty and the mechanisms through which it is channeled. This study investigates differences in intergenerational poverty in the United States (U.S.), Australia, Denmark, Germany, and United Kingdom (UK) using administrative- and survey-based panel datasets.

Quote

Intergenerational poverty in the U.S. is four times stronger than in Denmark and Germany, and twice as strong as in Australia and the UK. Intergenerational poverty in Denmark is primarily channeled through family background effects, but persists in the UK and Germany through mediators such as adult education and employment.

Quote

The U.S. disadvantage is not channeled through family background, mediators, neighborhood effects, or racial/ethnic discrimination. Instead, the U.S. has comparatively weak tax/transfer insurance effects and a more severe residual poverty penalty. Should the U.S. adopt the tax/transfer insurance effects of peer countries, its intergenerational poverty persistence could decline by more than one-third.

 

[JayG]

Well yeah, cause we need to be educated and get away from it... but, its not that simple really

[Communion]

9 minutes ago, JayG said:

Well yeah, cause we need to be educated and get away from it... but, its not that simple really

I get what you're saying, sis, about making more people aware of just how deeply rooted the inequality goes, but also we should avoid using terms of "be educated" because the study explicitly found that attainment of a degree had little impact on social mobility. 

 

Even if you have a degree, if you are living in poverty, your children will likely also grow up to remain poor:

 

Edited June 18, 2023 by Communion

[JayG]

31 minutes ago, Communion said:

I get what you're saying, sis, about making more people aware of just how deeply rooted the inequality goes, but also we should avoid using terms of "be educated" because the study explicitly found that attainment of a degree had little impact on social mobility. 

 

Even if you have a degree, if you are living in poverty, your children will likely also grow up to remain poor:

 

I dont mean a degree sis, I mean educated as in how to navigate the bullshit and make decisions that allow us to self actualise and thrive without conforming to this bullshit system

[Happylittlepunk]

If educating isn’t helping then what exactly is the solution? 
I understand education costs an arm and leg here in the US. But I feel getting a degree, get a high paying job, and educating yourself financially makes a world difference. Now if you make terrible financial decisions like going on massive debt, gambling, drug problems/drinking problems. At that point you are making yourself poor. 
I notice a lot of these studies bring up the issues but don’t bring up any solutions or theories what can possibly done individually or by the government. 
The article says that taxes and government transfers is poor. But what exactly is the federal government doing wrong or states? 

[Communion]

3 minutes ago, Happylittlepunk said:

If educating isn’t helping then what exactly is the solution? 

Direct income transfers.

 

[Happylittlepunk]

1 minute ago, Communion said:

Direct income transfers.

 

So basically a handout/another stimulus check? I feel like this will just cost the taxpayers in the end more nothing is for free in this world.

[Communion]

4 minutes ago, Happylittlepunk said:

So basically a handout?

Is every major European country giving out "handouts" when raising the bare minimum quality of life everyone is entitled to experience by virtue of being alive via a social safety net?

 

America holds unique penalties for poverty that simply don't exist in many other places. This came up in the discussions of work requirements related to the debt ceiling. Many European countries have work requirements to receive social welfare, but the drop-off's simply are not the same.

 

Someone not able to find work may receive 70% or 80% of a benefit vs the 100% they would normally if working yet still impoverished in European countries with a large safety net. In America, the inability to find work results in a drop-off of 100% benefit receive to 0% benefit receive.

 

It's theorized by neoliberals that a welfare state is not needed because America offers upward mobility, but time has simply shown such outcomes to have never materialized.

Edited June 18, 2023 by Communion

[Nights]

8 minutes ago, Happylittlepunk said:

So basically a handout/another stimulus check? I feel like this will just cost the taxpayers in the end more nothing is for free in this world.

Case study after case study after case study have refuted the "handout"/"nothing is free in this world" argument and shown that cash transfers are the overwhelmingly most reliable way of breaking generational cycles of poverty, bringing more people into the formal economy and, over time, raising overall living standards. Yes it's expensive but it has an incredible multiplicative return on investment over the long term.

 

(But of course it has to be done in a fiscally responsible, fair, carefully targeted based on genuine need, and non-corrupt way)

Edited June 18, 2023 by Nights

[Happylittlepunk]

4 minutes ago, Communion said:

Is every major European country giving out "handouts" when raising the bare minimum quality of life everyone is entitled to experience by virtue of being alive via a social safety net?

I know many Europeans countries have free healthcare and education or low cost. So european countries also provide free checks for every citizen? Getting a random monthly free check from the US government would be suspicious without any actual catch coming with it. 

[Happylittlepunk]

12 minutes ago, Nights said:

Case study after case study after case study have refuted the "handout"/"nothing is free in this world" argument and shown that cash transfers are the overwhelmingly most reliable way of breaking generational cycles of poverty, bringing more people into the formal economy and, over time, raising overall living standards. Yes it's expensive but it has an incredible multiplicative return on investment over the long term.

 

(But of course it has to be done in a fiscally responsible, fair, carefully targeted based on genuine need, and non-corrupt way)

Inflation is sky high right now and inflation is being blamed because of government spending is one of the factors but the whole national debt thing. Seeing the government take action like handing out checks for everyone let’s say $2500 one on a monthly basis with no major spending/economic issues coming up will be a huge pill to swallow. I am not saying you are wrong but it be difficult for many to accept that. I gotta do more research on this. 

Edited June 18, 2023 by Happylittlepunk

[bad guy]

1 hour ago, Communion said:

we should avoid using terms of "be educated" because the study explicitly found that attainment of a degree had little impact on social mobility. 

Does it specify what types of degrees or is this across the board? I have trouble thinking those that STEM degrees or becoming a doctor, lawyer, etc. doesn’t change ones social mobility (despite how expensive attaining such degrees are without financial aid/loans). 

[Nights]

7 minutes ago, Happylittlepunk said:

Inflation is sky high right now and inflation is being blamed because of government spending is one of the factors but the whole national debt thing. Seeing the government take action like handing out checks for everyone let’s say $2500 one on a monthly basis with no major spending/economic issues coming up will be a huge pill to swallow. I am not saying you are wrong but it be difficult for many to accept that. I gotta do more research on this. 

Yup, definitely agree. It has to be done in a fiscally responsible way like has been done in many countries (both developed and developing with much success). But similar things have been done by usually populist governments in an irresponsible way and the effect is oftentimes economic catastrophe where everyone ends up worse off. It's really is a fine balance, kinda scary.

[Communion]

29 minutes ago, Happylittlepunk said:

I know many Europeans countries have free healthcare and education or low cost. So european countries also provide free checks for every citizen? Getting a random monthly free check from the US government would be suspicious without any actual catch coming with it. 

Income is not the same as cash. Studies show that direct cash benefits are often extremely effective - but they do not encapsulate the totality of the welfare state that many prosperous nations have built up.

 

I edited my post before you finished posting to include mention of how they note that the American attempt at social welfare is largely residualist (ie: only available to those in extreme forms of poverty) and carries penalties for being poor that don't exist elsewhere:

36 minutes ago, Communion said:

America holds unique penalties for poverty that simply don't exist in many other places. This came up in the discussions of work requirements related to the debt ceiling. Many European countries have work requirements to receive social welfare, but the drop-off's simply are not the same.

 

Someone not able to find work may receive 70% or 80% of a benefit vs the 100% they would normally if working yet still impoverished in European countries with a large safety net. In America, the inability to find work results in a drop-off of 100% benefit received to 0% benefit received.

 

It's theorized by neoliberals that a welfare state is not needed because America offers upward mobility, but time has simply shown such outcomes to have never materialized.

Direct income transfers include subsidizing the costs of specific standards of a high-quality life, through taxation on the highest-earners within a country. Education. Healthcare. Childcare. Housing.

 

In nations with large welfare states, children of poor people aren't denied the same access to day care that rich people are - progressive taxation of the rich subsidizes the cost for an equal allocation of resource. In the US, children of poor parents and poor parents are often left to fend for themselves.

 

This is why they make the distinction between income transfers and societal benchmarks.

 

In a society where these inequalities have been mitigated, yes, factors like being married or having a degree will have a large impact on whether someone and/or their children is more successful or not. But when you remove that welfare state, these factors eventually prove largely ineffective.

 

Having married parents vs a single parent, having a parent with a college degree vs no college degree, etc. don't improve the outcomes in a greater way than the absence of a welfare state drastically makes these outcomes worse for those in poverty. There's largely no individual act that can greater positively impact income than the totality of what poverty entails.

 

Basically no individual poor person can pull themselves out of poverty as effectively as the government can.

Edited June 18, 2023 by Communion

[Robert]

46 minutes ago, Happylittlepunk said:

Inflation is sky high right now and inflation is being blamed because of government spending is one of the factors but the whole national debt thing. Seeing the government take action like handing out checks for everyone let’s say $2500 one on a monthly basis with no major spending/economic issues coming up will be a huge pill to swallow. I am not saying you are wrong but it be difficult for many to accept that. I gotta do more research on this. 

If they can accept $2T spending on military then they can learn to accept social security. 

 

US needs policies that actually help everyone like a livable minimum wage (Aus and UK are both double), paid vacation, health coverage, paid maternity leave, stronger social security etc. All of these are the absolute bare minimum in every other developed country most of whom are less affluent than the US. Republicans are vampires draining the country. 

Edited June 18, 2023 by Robert

[Communion]

55 minutes ago, bad guy said:

Does it specify what types of degrees or is this across the board? I have trouble thinking those that STEM degrees or becoming a doctor, lawyer, etc. doesn’t change ones social mobility (despite how expensive attaining such degrees are without financial aid/loans). 

It's a bit complicated because there's limited opportunity for those who grew up poor to ever become any of these occupations due to stratification (studies show that, even in largely equal societies within Northern Europe, as many as 1-in-5 doctors, for example, are themselves the children of doctors).

 

There's an idea of America being the land of where the son or daughter of a janitor or a taxi driver or a maid can become doctors, lawyers, etc. but these feel-good stories are often the exception, not the rule, etc. Poor people going to college is a largely recent development within the last 20-30 years of America, with degreed-work replacing fields within manufacturing and production becoming a new experiment. (Part of that is why student debt and forgiveness is such a prominent discussion now within American politics.)

 

Then there's also the comparative point to other peer nations (though the paper presents the grim theory that neoliberalism will see the UK, AUS and Germany all begin to look more and more unequal like the US)... the solution to getting out of poverty isn't to become an highly-degreed doctor or lawyer in most other high-income countries. The choices aren't really become a doctor or remain destitute elsewhere.

 

And it becomes cyclical. If you grew up poor, what cycle are you breaking by becoming educated and increasing your wealth if also.. you're still too poor to have children? A common reason cited by working-class and newly middle-class millennials for not having children is not wanting to inflict upon their future offspring the kind of harm from being poor that they had undergone themselves from growing up poor.

Edited June 18, 2023 by Communion

[Bloo]

2 hours ago, Happylittlepunk said:

So basically a handout/another stimulus check? I feel like this will just cost the taxpayers in the end more nothing is for free in this world.

Why is it a bad use of our tax dollars to try to eliminate poverty? Helping people from impoverished communities to live dignified lives would lead to them working jobs, paying taxes, and pitching back into society. These social investments aren't a sink on society. If they are done well, then they will benefit all of us.

[Gesamtkunstwerk]

Education in the US isn't easily accessible unless you have money, so there you have it.

 

I know many people, who come from families with parents with low paying jobs, or no jobs, that in 1 generation turned it around and make very decent living, because going to university is easy here, and you don't have to worry about if your parent can dish out the money for it.

 

Investing in education is very healthy for society imo, but that's hard in the US when nobody wants to pay taxes. Which I understand to a certain degree, because of the low level of trust in the government and that the money will be spend correctly.