Trapped: For Want of the American Dream

We have to face facts: welfare has a reputation. Lawrence Mead (1986) would have you believe that the scorn for these programs are rightfully earned because they serve to prop up the reckless, lazy, and downright irresponsible. Charles Murray (1984) distills the system into a series of disincentives to work and claims that the welfare state is a bloated and inefficient system that rewards idleness and causes individuals to “cease to function”. Both decry a system that is deeply flawed, but what these gentlemen seem to fail to address is the overwhelming evidence that suggests that many of these disincentives are much more entrenched in the politics of the value of labor as a commodity rather than what they claim is a lack of desire to work. Mead and Murray both seem to seek a goal of moving individuals living in poverty into places where they are no longer in poverty. If the goal of these authors is to encourage this economic and social movement of these persons into a position of “full citizenship”, then individuals must have access to pathways that will find them well-paid jobs (Collins & Mayer, 2010; Leichter, 2001). If the value of work is the lesson that is to be taught to persons who are poor, by what logic does it stand that we undervalue their labor -- i.e. that they should ‘suck it up and take what you can get’ (as Mead would put it) when the economic pie is so wildly distorted in its’ distribution (Reich, 2007)?

Part One - I Know How to Work Hard

With infrastructure of the United States crumbling, why couldn’t the state simply hire people at a full, protected wage? (Hint: because then it wouldn’t be punishment.) Why are these same governmental bodies then permitted to outsource to companies that disenfranchise their labor through independent contractor loopholes (Brady, 2009; Kalleburg, et al., 2000)? A generous welfare state supported by a more equitable distribution of GDP growth is the best means by which poverty can be managed long-term because if we ensure that all citizens of a given society have the basic necessities, exploitative labor relationships would not be possible because in order for an individual to be willing to do dirty, nasty, dangerous, undesirable work, you’d have to make it worth their while (Brady, 2009; Collins & Mayer, 2010; Kenworthy, 2011). The truth is: these institutional bodies are set against a motivation to cut costs at all cost and to provide cheap labor for what is relegated as dreg employment and unless government functions as the mitigating force in the dispensation between individual self-interest and the common good, this form of imbalance is inevitable as non-unionized, low-wage service employment replaces unionized, high-wage industrial and manufacturing employment which once served as the primary means of middle class entry for low-skill workers (Wilson, 1996; Reich, 2015; Leichter, 2001). And human beings, for whatever advances we may have above all others in the animal kingdom, are still relegated by our base needs to eat and sleep.

Simply put: when people are desperate to fulfill those base needs, they are often willing to do whatever is necessary and it is the system that is structured to be exploitative. An underlying current of a Protestant heritage removed of all religious intent permeates American capitalism, denoting that the  “capitalistic system [has] an attitude toward material goods which is so well suited to that system, so intimately bound up with the conditions of survival in the economic struggle for existence, that there can be today no question...whoever does not adapt his manner of life to the conditions of capitalistic success must go under, or at least cannot rise” (Weber, 2012, p. 30). The United States must reconcile with a multitude of heritages that promoted a religious framework as justification for acquisition and accumulation that ultimately saw the religion of that framework fall away, leaving a transference of devotion from God (and the implications of moral teachings) to work and the American Dream, which hinges itself on economic success.

Charles Murray (1982) seeks to eliminate the welfare state altogether, emphasizing that actors are responsible for their own successes. This stems from a perspective that promotes the virtue of suffering (Smith, 2015). Murray asserts that various changes to social policies that were developed by elites, presumably to aid the poor, have only made matters worse; he hates hand-outs. Murray (1982) claims that changes in AFDC regulations permitted unemployed fathers to remain unemployed and that eligibility checks and man-in-the-house rules ensured that individuals were not loafing off the system (Smith, 2015).  Mead (1986) would assert that the policies that currently make up the welfare system encourages dysfunction and that oversight is necessary in order to hold individuals accountable to their “social citizenship duties” that insists on a social separation between the rich and the poor. Mead concludes that the welfare system is a means by which the government can maintain order among the poor and encourage specific ways of being (1986, p. 9). Both authors assume, however, that poor individuals are somehow lacking in either a desire to be productive or a drive to improve oneself. This is fundamentally contrary to human nature: given enough time on vacation, we can hardly wait to get back to the real world of work and thought and creativity. One of the most unique things about human beings is this deep capacity for curiosity and focused exploration. Even if work in the future does not look like the work of today, doesn’t mean we will ever stop exploring.

Furthermore, when researchers have made time to listen to the plight of the poor, you find that their struggles are less influenced by any lack of desire to succeed, but rather incidental barriers that contribute to their struggle. The experiences of Jackie York, 27, as she moves through the system that constantly feels like its’ hassling her demonstrates clearly this disconnect between the assumptions of the poor held by both Murray and Mead and who they actually are (Smith, 2007). Collins and Mayer (2010) found the same narrative with their participants: declining availability of well-paid jobs that provide enough both in economic compensation coupled with strong protections for injury, overtime, and retirement for individuals who have little to no educational experience -- or *gasp* even intellectual capacity for highly skilled work. One harsh reality: not everyone can be a rocket scientist.

Part Two - Economic Growth and the Welfare State

Herein lies the rub: we must provide every individual with the opportunity to pursue that however insignificant possibility of a dream that they might have, whatever it is. Even if the welfare state is to continue serving the functional mechanism of government oversight and control, as Mead suggests, wouldn’t that threat and reward system function more efficiently if the rewards for compliance were an elimination of poverty for that individual actor (1986, p. 10)? Automate the jobs no one wants and provide the basic means of subsistence and suddenly, you find everyone has a lot more free time to expand their own horizons: “we must massively assert our dignity and worth. We must stand up amidst a system that still oppresses us and develop an unassailable and majestic sense of values” (Tucker, 1978; King, 1967).

“We must develop a program that will drive the nation to a guaranteed annual income...dislocations in the market operations of our economy thrust people into idleness and bind them in constant or frequent unemployment against their will. Today the poor are less often dismissed, I hope, from our consciences by being branded as inferior or incompetent. We also know that no matter how dynamically the economy develops and expands, it does not eliminate all poverty… The fact is that the work which improves the condition of mankind, the work which extends knowledge and increases power and enriches literature and elevates thought, is not done to secure a living” (King, 1967).

These are not soft words, nor do I intend to handle Mead or Murray with kid gloves. Their suggestions are abominable and completely overlook fundamental shifts in the labor market, the structure of employment, the structure of pay, and the reality of the lived experience of being poor (Wilson, 1996; Collins & Mayer, 2001; Reich, 2007; Smith, 2015). The truth is that the majority of the poor are working, often more than 60 hours a week to still be living in poverty; 11% of the adult working population works more than 27 weeks a year, only 3% of the adult working population does not work in that timeframe (United States Census Bureau, 2015). This is exploitation, pure and simple. In an era where productivity has increased by over 200% of what it was in 1957 and that 97% of that growth has been captured by the 1% of our consumer base, how does Murray sleep at night at the suggestion that there in something fundamentally flawed in individual actors that set them into being poor (Reich, 2015)? Even the 7.3 million children in the United States who are living in poverty ?This is not a matter of laziness; this is a matter of constructed policies that denigrate and stigmatize individuals caught in a technological, industrial shift in paradigms.

Labor has changed in fundamental ways that undermine the very notion that the poor are responsible for their own lot in life (Brady, 2009; Collins & Mayer, 2010; Kenworthy, 2011; Leichter, 2001; Reich, 2015; Smith, 2015). If our wage is a reflection of the value of our labor, as it allows us to maintain our existence, then absolute terms of basic survival must be treated as an extension of that wage. “People must be made consumers by one method or the other. Once they are placed in this position we need to be concerned that the potential of the individual is not wasted. New forms of work that enhance the social good will have to be devised for those for whom traditional jobs are not available” (King, 1967). If social mobility is our primary concern as a meritocratic democracy, as suggested by the intense debate over inequality, then equality of opportunity must include the opportunity for full-time employment to provide an escape from poverty, not working full-time to live in it (Surowiecki, 2014). When we embrace that the free market is not truly free, that there is government intervention well and fully entrenched in whatever market exists, and we move to separate the basic “means of subsistence” from the rest of all capitalistic endeavors, then individuals will be able to demand compensation wherein they find dignity in whatever work they are doing. In more simple terms: in order to get someone to do that dirty, nasty, dangerous, undesirable work, you’d have to make it worth their while (Tucker, 1978, p. 70-81).

One example to illuminate the fallacy of assuming those living in poverty are lazy: a few months ago, an article circulated that spotlighted a program in California where non-violent inmates can earn reduced sentences by volunteering to be a wildlands firefighter (Lewis, 2015). The work fighting wildfires in California is grueling and dangerous, but Demetrius Barr reflects on his decisions as a young man growing up in the ghetto with mixed feelings. He says he regrets dropping out of junior college after less than a semester, and laughs when he’s told part of the justification for sending him to fight fires is that he must learn how to work hard. “Of course I knew how to work hard before,” he said, “I was just working hard at something illegal” (Lewis, 2015). It wasn’t a lack of drive; it was a lack of viable options. Selling crack had more utility than flipping burgers at the local fast food joint.

The relationship between the welfare state and the economy rests in the experience of individuals. When you evaluate the likelihood of an individual who is poor moving to the top quintile of the economy, it makes sense (functionally) that some individuals would rather sell drugs and live large than smell like fry grease and take a bunch of shit from a terrible manager for a wage that has fallen significantly in terms of absolute value (Brady, 2009; Kenworthy, 2011; Reich, 2015; Smith, 2015). If the work was sourced through a temp service or if the worker is classified as an independent contractor or, worse still, associated with any of the work-for-welfare programs that cropped up after the PROWRA (Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996) changes in the Clinton administration allowing states to fiddle with their welfare formulas, your chances of moving beyond poverty drop to nearly zero (Brady, 2009; Collins & Mayer, 2010; Kenworthy, 2011; Leichter, 2001; Reich, 2015; Smith, 2015). But, no...clearly, these folks are just lazy and broken.

Part Three - Proscriptions and Prescriptions

Moving towards systemic understandings of poverty, researchers in the 21st century have begun to develop gaps in the literature regarding the long term neurological and psychological effects of poverty, or in the broader terms of authors Mullainathan and Shafir (2013). So now, compounding the clear negative impacts trapping those living in poverty to remain in poverty that all of this politically and ideologically motivated tinkering has wrought, we have an added element of developmental and biological mechanisms that are triggered to ensure survival. This element of scarcity, according to Mullainathan and Shafir, reduces the individuals ability to focus on anything other than the here and now; to remedy the problem at hand regardless of whether or not the actions to be taken will later create additional problems of their own. So, we “borrow and juggle” our time and resources (Mullainathan and Shafir, 2013, p. 111-128). Not so surprisingly to someone who has lived for many years in poverty, their research was able to demonstrate a certain savvy among the poor in managing a dollar, but oftentimes finding that this management includes a strong disregard for long-term consequences (Mullainathan and Shafir, 2013). The relevance this holds for deconstructing the argument that the poor have only themselves to blame is that their research demonstrates that this kind of utilitarian behavior can and does happen to everyone when pressed for survival.

So, we return to the dynamic of our animal needs versus our consumer economy. They have become so inextricably linked that the inability to work, for whatever reason, limits the capacity to which one can engage as a full citizen in the United States (Collins and Mayer, 2010; King, 1967; Weber, 2012; Wilson, 1996). In the most blunt terms I can conceive: in order for individual actors to be full consumers, the total income that the individual commands for his/her labor must rise above subsistence levels (Esarey, 2015, p. 7; Tucker, 1978; Hanlon and Barrientos, 2010). This is not rocket science.

To conclude, I leave you with an anecdotal Twilight Zone moment:

A very conservative family member recently posted an article to Facebook in support of basic income grants. This guy is a hardliner; we’re talking avid gun collector, commanding officer in the military, red-blood “AMERICA!” kind of guy. His friends were aghast and he had this to say in response, “I think it needs to be looked at. The coming technological advances are going to put an unprecedented number of people out of work - we already have 92 million not in the workforce. While [technology increases], economic output of the country will continue to rise, but unemployed consumers won't be able to buy anything. I don't like it, but haven't heard any better ideas and haven't heard a single candidate address it properly - instead it's all mired in partisan vitriol.”

Even the most modest estimates in growth of human productivity compared to widening wealth inequality show this is only going to get worse unless there is some collective support for the common good.  Until we embrace that reality, we will be holding ourselves back.

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