Getting Men Back to Work: A Little Public Shaming Doesn’t Hurt

April 24, 2017

Over the past year, three notable policy experts from across the political spectrum have documented the crisis of prime-working-age men dropping out of the labor force. And they have come up with some interesting ideas for getting men back to work.

In his 2016 book “Men Without Work,” demographer Nicholas Eberstadt found that more than 7 million men between the ages of 25 and 54 were not working or looking for work. President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers corroborated Eberstadt’s findings on the extent of the problem, concluding that the labor force participation rate for prime-aged men fell from 96 percent to 88 percent from 1967 to 2016. For those with only a high school diploma, the labor force participation rate now stands at 83 percent.

And it’s not because these men have something better to do.

These men are generally not engaged in other productive activities like education or child-rearing. Instead, they mostly spend time in leisure activities, though not happily. Opioid use and dependency among them is rampant, and their mortality rates — what Anne Case and Angus Deaton of Princeton University call ‘deaths of despair’ — are rising.

In other words, this trend is a disaster. Getting men back to work is not only critical for them, but for their communities and the U.S. economy.

In a new paper released last week, former New York City Human Resources Administration Commissioner, Robert Doar; former Clinton Labor Department chief economist Harry Holzer; and family and economic stability expert Brent Orrell outlined a range of policy responses that leaders of both political parties in Washington would be smart to consider.

Interestingly, in their long road map for reforms, the authors cite a little public shaming, as well as a lively discussion of the dignity of hard work (as expertly expressed by Mike Rowe) as potential motivators for getting men off the sidelines and back into the workforce.

In other words, to sit around and do nothing deserves a little scolding,  they recently wrote in The Hill newspaper:

 We endorse a strong public commitment to work by our political, social and community leaders. A little stigma about non-work when work is available is a good thing. Every adult should be engaged in a productive activity in the job market, at school or at home.

They add in their research paper,

Of course, there is no obvious policy lever that can change social norms regarding work. However, that does not mean political leaders are powerless to affect change. Much has been made of our present ‘populist’ political moment, in which leaders have promised to stand up for the men and women forgotten by the distant political elites and victimized by trade, immigration, and elite corruption. These messages should come with an addendum: Just as elected officials have an obligation to defend the interests of Americans, able-bodied Americans must take some responsibility for improving their economic situations by working and pursuing the opportunities that are available.

Aside from calling men out, the authors acknowledge that they disagree among themselves about some of their own plan’s proposed reforms, but they would rather pick all than none. In other words, the political fights in Washington that devolve into each team rooting for its own side is damaging the playing field as much as the players. And for that, elected officials could use a little scolding of their own too.

The situation is dire enough that everything on the table needs to be implemented, particularly since the psychological impact on men not working has such far-reaching consequences, including a decline in marriage and intact families, increased drug use, and recidivism by ex-criminal offenders.

Their proposals include work-focused reforms to government benefit programs such as food stamps and Medicaid, increased tax credits, and more generous wage subsidies. Other ideas include training programs in community colleges and apprenticeships in sectors like health care, advanced manufacturing, and information technology, where labor demand is high.

For others who are hard to employ or residing in depressed communities where few jobs exist, we need to create more jobs through subsidies to employers. Recent evidence shows that we can do so quickly and in large numbers, thereby raising employment among the disadvantaged and creating indirect positive effects, like lower crime.

With the baby boomer generation heading into retirement, the need for more men to work is only going to get worse, especially in male-dominated sectors like construction, which could experience an even higher demand for labor if President Trump and Congress follow through on an infrastructure package.

So shame on the men who just sit around rather than diligently toiling away. There’s plenty of work to be had if men pick themselves up and go out and get it.

Filed Under: Front-Page Feature, Happiness Tagged With: , , ,

Are Poor People More Optimistic Than Others About Their Futures?

August 18, 2016

Poor people are more likely than non-poor people to think that they will be able to pull themselves out of poverty. Forty-eight percent of the poor say most poor people will remain poor for a long time while 41 percent say poverty is a temporary condition. That compares to 60 percent of people who said that the poor will remain poor for some time.

Meanwhile, 61 percent of Americans, including 64 percent of Americans living in poverty, say that most poor people who receive welfare benefits would rather earn their own living instead of staying on welfare.

Those are some of the findings from a new Los Angeles Times poll, conducted in partnership with The American Enterprise Institute, a top Washington think tank. The poll provides other stark findings about how Americans think about people in poverty.

America’s political parties may want to take note of those findings, particularly because 37 percent of people living in poverty defined themselves as somewhat or very conservative while only 31 percent defined themselves as liberals. Another 24 percent declared themselves moderate.

Only 27 percent of Americans said they believe that conditions for poor people have improved in the last 10 or 15 years while 42 percent say it has gotten worse for poor Americans. Only 13 percent said they believe that the poverty rate has declined in 30 years.

In reality, 14.8 percent of people were living beneath the official poverty line in 2014, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, 3 points below the rate that lived in poverty in 1965, the year that President Johnson’s War on Poverty programs began, and 3.3 percentage points higher than in 1985, when the AEI-LA Times study was first conducted.

The 2016 survey mimicked the 1985 survey and demonstrates how (little) opinion has changed over 30 years. The seemingly small differences over that time frame may be due to the fact that little has changed when it comes to public policy — or more exactly, how much change has kept things the same. The pivotal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), which is coming up on its 20th anniversary since enactment, shifted responsibility for welfare from the federal government to states, but poverty is more persistent than the “T” in TANF intended.

The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities notes that only about half of the federal and state grant money for TANF actually went to “core welfare reform activities” in 2013, in part because “states can use TANF funds much more broadly than the core welfare reform areas of providing a safety net and connecting families to work; some states use a substantial share of funding for … other services and programs.”

So what else do people think of the poor, and how do the poor perceive themselves? Other poll findings that stand out:

Fifty-four percent of people as a whole, and 47 percent of people living in poverty, said they believe that the potential loss of welfare benefits “almost always” or “often” impacts the decision of unmarried people on whether to get married. This is an interesting finding given that much work has been done demonstrating that marriage helps families get out of poverty. It’s notable also that 47 percent of all the people who took the survey reported they are married, but only 23 percent of the people in poverty who answered the poll said they are married.

About 87 percent of Americans — including 81 percent of individuals living below the poverty line — believe that requiring poor people to seek work or participate in a training program in return for benefits is a better approach than providing benefits without asking for anything in return.

Fifty-four percent of people think welfare encourages dependency, down from 59 percent in 1985. On the flip side, more people feel negatively about the way things are going, 67 percent of people, and 66 percent of people who are poor, said they are dissatisfied with the country’s direction. That pairs with the increase in the number of people who say that it’s harder for poor people to find work, up to 57 percent today from 43 percent in 1985.

Seventy-six percent of people, including 71 percent of people in poverty and 80 percent of people not in poverty, said they thought that welfare programs are badly designed or under-funded, and that’s why they have failed to pull people out of poverty.

Thirty-five percent of people said government has the greatest responsibility for helping the poor — that’s twice as high a percentage over those who responded that either churches, charities, families, or the poor themselves have the greatest responsibility.

The entire poll, conducted between June 20 and July 7, 2016, can be viewed here. The survey was conducted among 1,202 adults, including 235 adults living in poverty. The survey oversampled individuals living below the poverty line to get reliable estimates of the views of poor Americans themselves.

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The Persistent Marriage Penalty and Its Impact on Family Formation

July 29, 2016

You thought this was resolved in the ’90s, didn’t you? It wasn’t.

“Almost one-third of Americans aged 18 to 60 report that they personally know someone who has not married for fear of losing means-tested benefits.”

That’s right, the marriage penalty still exists on families who receive government subsidies, and it is impacting more families as the safety net expands.

Now, the bias up the social ladder has traditionally been to assume that people who have kids without getting married are of questionable moral character because who would go have a baby without having a stable household, right? After all, studies show that children raised by their biological parents in married households have a likelier chance of success in school, a stable job, and upward mobility.

That notion of planning your marriage, then your family is outdated in a lot of communities, not least because when is it ever a good time to have a kid? So maybe the decision to not marry is not a question of moral repute, but in fact a question of public policy working against a loving family whose only commitment phobia is filling out the paperwork.

At least 43 percent of families with children 18 and under receive some kind of means-tested aid from the federal government, from Medicaid to Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program funds. That number goes up to 47 percent for families with children five and under. And this is what they are likely to face if they marry.

… 82 percent of those in the second and third quintiles of family income ($24,000 to $79,000) face this kind of marriage penalty when it comes to Medicaid, cash welfare, or food stamps. By contrast, only 66 percent of their counterparts in the bottom quintile (less than $24,000) face such a penalty. …

Couples where each partner’s individual income is near the cut-off for means-tested benefits—are about two to four percentage points less likely to be married if they face a marriage penalty in Medicaid eligibility or food stamps. Most of these couples are in the second and third quintiles of family income for families with children two and under ($24,000 to $79,000).

Indeed, this recent report on the marriage penalty notes that couples’ combined income in that second and third quintile of earners ($24,000 to $79,000) could face penalties of lost benefits up to one-third of their income if they were to marry.

A valid question is why has the social safety net grown so large that families making nearly $80,000 are still receiving benefits? That may make sense if you’re talking about a family in Brooklyn or around the Beltway outside Washington, D.C., or  Honolulu, or San Francisco, for example, but that’s certainly not the situation in Indianapolis, Louisville, Omaha, Memphis, Tulsa, and so on.

The answer lies in the decision not to marry. If one unmarried person is reporting income to an agency, then the household earnings don’t get counted as $80,000, it only gets counted as the one family member’s income. A combined income would phase out benefits whereas a reported single income would qualify.

Certainly, no one wants to see anyone in need unable to receive the staples of shelter and food, but as the below infographic demonstrates, 59.7 percent of cities surveyed by Experian (click on it to enlarge) have a lower median income and a lower cost of living than the national average so many recipients can in fact afford to live without federal benefits.

Cost of living in America infogrpahic

The report does not challenge the expansion of the safety net to the lower-middle class, but it does raise the question of whether public policy discourages couples from marrying. And as the evidence shows, a significant minority of Americans say they have seen marriage ruled out because of the policies.

So how does government policy correct itself to not penalize lower-middle-class couples for being married when they start their family? The report makes four suggestions:

– In determining eligibility for Medicaid and food stamps, increase the income threshold for married couples with children under five to twice what it is for a single parent with children under five. Such a move would ensure that couples just starting a family do not feel pressured to forgo marriage just to access medical care and food for their families. The cost of this policy change would be limited, since it would only affect families with young children.

– Offer an annual, refundable tax credit to married couples with children under five that would compensate them for any loss in means-tested benefits associated with marrying, up to $1,000. This would send a clear signal that the government does not wish to devalue marriage and, for couples, it would help to offset any penalties associated with tying the knot.

– Work with states to run local experiments designed to eliminate the marriage penalty associated with means-tested policies. States could receive waivers to test a range of strategies to eliminate penalties in certain communities, and to communicate to the public that the penalties are no longer in force there. Successful experiments could then be scaled up to the national level in future efforts to reform means-tested policies.

– Encourage states and caseworkers working with lower-income families to treat two-parent families in much the same way as they do single-parent families. For instance, states could ease the distinctive work requirements that many have in place for two-parent families receiving cash welfare. Reforms such as this one would put two-parent and single-parent families on a more equal footing when it comes to public assistance. More generally, policymakers and caseworkers should try to eliminate policies and practices that effectively discriminate in favor of single-parent families.

Read the report on the marriage penalty’s impact on lower-middle income families.

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The Working Poor: When a Job is a Chore

July 18, 2016

Too few poor Americans work. That may seem obvious, but maybe the reason is not.

The most common explanations given by nonworking, poor adults  for why they aren’t employed are family and home responsibilities and disability and illness, not inability to find a job.

The full-time working poor make up only 17 percent of the 46.7 million Americans in poverty in 2014. Meantime, most working-age adults in poverty — 61.7 percent — did not work at all in 2014.

Work is a central part of the American dream. Steady employment supplies income to households, provides opportunities to move up the income ladder, and minimizes the risk of being in poverty. Only 3 percent of adults who work full-time, year-round live in poverty.

More importantly, work is often a source of dignity and purpose and is an important way in which everyone can contribute to society.

While working for pay is something that enables families to thrive and fosters a sense of pride, labor economist Angela Rachidi asserted that “labor force participation rates among prime-age workers have declined over the past two decades, suggesting that America is facing a work problem.”

If not working is a choice, then it may be of little concern to public policy. But when a lack of employment leads to poverty, it raises important questions about the role for government. In many ways, government can make poverty less painful through income transfers, but the important question is whether government can encourage those who are not employed to work and provide for themselves. …

Notably, fewer than 10 percent of nonworkers in poverty reported inability to find work as their reason for not working. This suggests that current economic and workforce development policies, which primarily focus on people already working or looking for work, have limitations. With over 60 percent of poor working-age people not working at all, public policies aimed at increasing work may have stronger effects than these other policies.”

Rachidi looked at people in poverty as described by the federal government’s definition as well as the supplemental poverty measure, which includes government benefits in determining a poor person’s income.

“Ultimately,” she wrote, “the results related to work and nonwork for people in poverty according to both measures were similar, and the conclusions were the same.”

Rachidi suggested that anti-poverty efforts may have to focus on the larger variables that drive people from the workplace, including health issues and family responsibilities, as well as disincentives to work, like those seen in disability insurance programs, which TPOH has previously noted.

Otherwise, Rachidi said, “we can either accept the status quo, which would mean leaving millions of Americans in poverty, or continue funding large government programs that transfer income from working taxpayers to the nonworking poor.”

Neither of these seems like a good option.

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