America's poor getting poorer

More than forty million people.  40000000.   Read HERE.

Why, with such low unemployment?

HERE

Housing in San Francisco

This isn't the article I mentioned, but it is better:  HERE. 

Week 14

OK.  Read this carefully.


These are the questions I promised you.  I'm not looking for "answers."  I'm looking for responses that show that you can discuss these ideas clearly, with an awareness of the range of views we've explored.  

I want 2-3 page responses.  And I want it all in your own words.  And I want it all to be your own work--wander through our readings, but I'm not asking for (and don't want) outside research or citations.  I want your thorough thought and nuanced articulation.  (If it helps, pretend that you'll be teaching a lesson on each topic--and write like your job is to explore the various sides of the issue.  We want good, clear, organized responses.)

These have different due dates, and they are firm.  

The first one is due in class on Tuesday.
The second one is due in class on Thursday.

These will also be the discussion topics of those days, so you have to have the assignment ready, or you can't sit in on the discussion.  And that would be bad.  Grade-wise. 

The last two responses are both due on May 9 at 5pm.  Email them to me.

Feel free to ask me any questions you have about these things.


1.  What considerations are most important in thinking about the advantages and disadvantages of relative and absolute measures of poverty? 

2.  What, according to Harrington, is integration supposed to accomplish?  And why, according to Riley (and Gilder, if you want) is it doomed to fail?

3.  Both liberals and conservatives appear to be convinced that the various fractures that have afflicted the traditional heterosexual, nuclear family are causally related to poverty.  Is there a path to diminishing poverty that does not require restoring that traditional social form?  First answer this in the affirmative, then in the negative.  Support your response in each case as you discuss the issues.

4.  Harrington, Gilder, and Riley all seem to invoke the notion of a "culture" of poverty.  What are the advantages and hazards of employing such a notion?  What is the best specification of the idea you can give that captures something important yet avoids likely misuse?

Assignment for Thursday, April 19

Finish the book. 

Assigment for Tuesday, April 13

Let's read three more chapters in Riley.

For Tuesday, April 10

Carefully read the introduction and first two chapters of _Please Stop Helping Us_ by Riley. 

We won't have class on Thursday, the 12th.  But for the following Tuesday, a short writing assignment will be due.  I'll post about that soon. 

For Thursday, April 5

Read 10, 11, and 12.  Then we'll move on. 

For Tuesday, April 3

Sorry about the delay.  Just read (carefully) the next chapter in Gilder. 

Assignment for Thursday, Mar. 29

Read the next three chapters in Gilder.  And since we're going in a straight line, feel free to read more.  But those three at least.  Take good notes.

(Also, the Bookstore tells me that another of our books is finally in stock.  Please get that at your earliest convenience.)

For Thursday

Just read one more chapter in Gilder. 

Look, I know that it is painful.  But think of it as a foil--it can help us to define and articulate what we think.  That's not always easy to do well without encountering a view very different from one's own.

Thanks for the good discussion in class today.

Unusual Extra Credit Opportunity

This has nothing to do with our class, but it is an important bit of college business, so I'll give you extra credit if you attend.  The guest speaker is on campus interviewing for a job in Classics, and his "sample" presentation will go better if there are some students in the room.  No pressure, just making it available.



Monday at 4:15 in Fausett 22:  "Inglorious Praise:  A How-To Guide" by Dr. Martin Shedd.

We'll learn about way ancient Romans were trained in rhetoric & how they were able to manipulate rhetorical templates to send--in subtle, sneaky, and clever ways--the messages they wanted to.

For Tuesday

On Walmart HERE.

Read the next two chapters in Gilder.

Assignment for Thursday, Mar. 8

You might have heard that Arkansas just passed a law requiring Medicare recipients to work or undergo job training.  There are exemptions for those with children and for those with medical and other sorts of restrictions.   See  HERE.

But I assume that these people about to be "motivated" to work will join the low wage economy described by Ehrenreich. 

Perhaps it is a cynical view, but my first thought about it was:  "if you want any support from us, you must place yourself in the trap, and become an unwilling donor to the lifestyles of the better off."


Anyway, for Thursday, read all intros and prefaces and the first two chapters in Gilder's _Weath and Poverty_.

Take careful notes.  You'll want them.

Alabama Has The Worst Poverty In The Developed World, U.N. Official Says

Article HERE.

Assignment for Tuesday, Feb. 27

Finish Harrington, all the way to the end.  Get a couple of chapters into Ehrenreich.

Assignment for Thursday, Feb. 22

OK, we WILL have class.

Now then, 2 pages.

On the face of it, integration is not a source of income or a source of access to assistance.  Harrington obviously thinks that big government power and money ought to help with income and assistance.  But when it comes to racial prejudice and housing issues, he calls also for integration. 

Last week, we worried about how a strategy of integration could be a threat to the identity of a community.  Ignore those kinds of worries for a moment and try to dial in on What Harrington thinks that integration could bring--in race and in housing (and they are obviously related).  What are the evils that he thinks it would fight?  The goods that he thinks it would bring?  And do you agree?  Why?

Review those two chapters and give me your thoughts.  Bring it to class--we'll talk about it.

Arkansas Children Most Likely To Go Through Adverse Experience, Study Finds

On NPR HERE.

Automating Inequality

on NPR HERE.

Assignment for Tuesday, Feb. 20

Read, carefully, the next two chapters.  Be ready to discuss!

Universal Basic Income

An idea that rich people seem to like:  HERE.

What wage would get you out in the fields?

HERE.  And HERE.

Assignment for Tuesday, Feb. 14

OK, so have a strong working grasp of everything up to the end of Chapter 4.  There's a lot to review.

Increases in the number of "working homeless"

HERE.

Assignment for Thursday, Feb. 8

In Harrington's _The Other America_, read all prefaces and forewords and to the end of Chapter 2.

Carefully.  With notes. 

Assignment for Tuesday, Feb. 6

Finish Pimpare, including the epilogue.  Take careful notes!  

Assignment for Thursday, Feb. 1

Pimpare stresses, at the beginning of Chapter 6, that various forms of assistance have lifted people out of poverty, and that increasing the amount we apply to assistance programs could help more.

He seems to be countering the sometimes-heard claim that all of that money spent on poor people does no good.

Here's the question that I want you to think about:  If we did raise our assistance expenditures, and if we did make sure that everyone who qualified for assistance received it, would that count as solving the problem of poverty?  In other words, imagine that everyone who is now living below the poverty line were simply given the assistance they needed to be above the poverty line.  If that happened, is Pimpare satisfied, or would that state of affairs still leave a lot undone?

This is all really a way of asking Pimpare:  What's the end goal here?  If everyone who needs assistance gets it, is the idea that we'd just go one like that forever? 

What do you think?  Does "no one living without the assistance they need" = "poverty solved"?

1.5 pages, single spaced, printed, in class.  Use the book, but only what we've read so far.  I want your own thoughts on what Pimpare is aiming at, and whether or not you agree.

Another kind of American poverty

HERE

Experiments in Guaranteed Income

Short story on NPR: HERE.

Assignment for Tuesday, Jan. 30

Read an interesting Op-Ed: HERE

Also, read the next three chapters in Pimpare.  Carefully.  With notes.  Start soon--I want your reflective thoughts on this difficult stuff.

Assignment for Thursday, Jan 25

Just carefully read the next two chapters, and be ready to discuss them.  No writing this time.

Assignment for Tuesday, Jan. 23

OK, we're going to start in on _A People's History of Poverty in America_, by Pimpare. 

Read everything, all prefaces, intros, etc., up to the end of the second chapter. 

I want you to write something, too.  A summary of the basic approach that he takes to his topic, along with your own thoughts about the approach.  Is this a great way to study poverty?  A problematic way?  Explain.  All in your own words--you don't have to quote him.  This is two pages, max, printed.  No excuses.  You know that your print attempts will be stalled out by the print gods.  So plan ahead.  No.  Excuses.

Assignment for Thursday, Jan 18

Soak in these things.  Some of them are lengthy, so start early and take good notes.  I will assume that you have them well absorbed by class time.  Some are interactive.  Be proactive in exploring them.


Defining Poverty:  HERE.

Measuring Poverty:  HERE.

Alternative Approaches:  HERE.

An interactive map with data about poverty:  HERE.

What the Census can tell us about poverty:  HERE. 

A highly polemical, but interesting, presentation about inequality:  HERE.

In booming economies, food banks are busier than ever

Why is that?  Read about it:  HERE.

Thanks to Annie for the link!