The American Welfare State: How We Spend Nearly $1 Trillion a Year Fighting Poverty - And Fail

Comments

Persona non grata's picture

You are missing the point, the "nearly $1 Trillion a Year" isn't being spent to "fight poverty", rather the aid is used as a form of quid pro quo.

Which is all the better at keeping the disaffected great unwashed safely ensconced in cheese doodles, NASCAR and Entertainment Tonight (etal), rather then protesting the US governments theft of their property and liberties.

eugenedw's picture

Persona non grata: Bread and circuses all over again, eh? :-)

Paul's picture

Actually, the war on poverty has been wildly successful. It has created a giant jobs program for social workers and bureaucrats. It has turned a segment of the population completely dependent. It has spawned hoards of new problems for government to "fix". It has helped the "Divide and Conquer" strategy. It has almost killed private and church charity. I can't think of a program more successful at its actual aims than this one has been, except perhaps for the War on Some Drugs.