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Study: Public Assistance Programs Lessen Poverty

posted by Fnord666 on Tuesday May 29 2018, @07:39AM   Printer-friendly
from the at-what-cost dept.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Yahoo Finance reports

Poverty-alleviation programs like food stamps (SNAP), Social Security, and other "welfare" programs are broadly effective at reducing poverty, a new study from University of Chicago researchers found.

The study, performed by researchers Bruce Meyer and Derek Wu, conducted a more comprehensive analysis than most studies, because it used administrative data from the programs' payment records, not just survey data of recipients from the Census Bureau.

[...] For the elderly, Wu said the research found that Social Security benefits "single-handedly slashes poverty by 75%." Social Security's overall effect on all poverty is also enormous, responsible for by far the largest poverty reduction among all these programs, the study said.

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  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday May 30 2018, @09:08AM (1 child)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday May 30 2018, @09:08AM (#686182) Journal
    I have a couple additional comments.

    $27k/year (average individual income) doesn't necessarily go all that far in a lot of places.

    And in the places where it doesn't go that far, they tend to earn more than that.

    As for an inflationary argument- you're NOT changing the money supply - you're simply redistributing the existing amount.

    Inflation also is not always global. Putting a lot of additional funds in a sector can inflate prices for things that sector demands. For example, the alleged majority who can't even save a month's worth of income, will spend that UBI like sand falling through open fingers. The increased flow of such money for the services most likely purchased will go up in response.

    In all though, this is the best response I've received in years. It's refreshing to read from someone who has actually thought about the problem.

  • (Score: 2) by Immerman on Wednesday May 30 2018, @02:57PM

    by Immerman (3985) on Wednesday May 30 2018, @02:57PM (#686292)

    Let me add my own update then - I realized after posting that $27k is the average (mean) income - nowhere near half the population makes that much. In fact I couldn't find the median individual income, only for households, but going from the disparity between mean and median household income, median income is closer to $20k.

    As for "more expensive places paying a lot more - even in New York City the median household income is only $50k, which if it bears the same relationship to individual income as the country overall, means the median individual income is still in the neighborhood of $20-22k. And of course that's the MOST you can make and still be in the bottom half of the population. Most people in the bottom half make a lot less than that.