"Bleeding-Heart Liberal" is a Misnomer

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
I don't really care what is commonly heard, Oerdin. I'd actually like to see the information for myself and if it is so common it shouldn't be hard for people to source it.

LBJ declared war on poverty in 1964. Started in 1965 when Mollie Orshasnky from SSA came up with the (now completely wacked out see WaPo article below) guidleines for establishing poverty rate.

At that time Poverty rate was estimated at about 17% by the end of LBJ's admin it was 13%. It hit its nadir in 1973 (under Nixon) at 11.1%

By no means a halving in poverty rate or in terms of raw numbers.

See PDF Figure from Census

The establishing of poverty level has gone off the tracks according to this article.

WaPo

Of course the great societies impact on poverty level also conflates to a certain degree the effects of the Kennedy tax cuts enacted in '64. Some argue those being aimed as a demand side cut wiht incidental supply side impliactions others the reverse.


The common knowledge thing Oerdin speaks to is poppycock as it attempts to apply LBJ admin back to 1960 4 years prior to the announcement of the war on poverty and great society. 22% (In the Kennedy admin)down to 11% in 1973 (a full 4 years after LBJ left office). Funny how when you pick the number you can tell any story you wish. But clearly in 1960 none of the enacted programs were in play.

Realistically the starting point should be circa 1964-1965 and as I alluded to already the tax cuts are part and parcel of that admin performance during those and following years.

[Caligastia]

Originally posted by Arrian
By what authority? By authority of the representative government of the United States of America. You don't like it, and I understand why. But I, and a majority of the population, disagree with you. If you can convince enough that it's "legalized theft" then you might change the way your money is spent. Vote Libertarian (you do, right?).

No, I can't because I'm not a U.S. citizen.

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
I don't really care what is commonly heard, Oerdin. I'd actually like to see the information for myself and if it is so common it shouldn't be hard for people to source it.

I'm paging through the US Census Bureau (relevant charts can be found at http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/poverty.html ).

One interesting statistic is on the pverty rate for poor families. In 1964, when the War on Poverty began, this rate was 15%. By 1968 it had fallen to 10%, and has remained between 8.7% and 12.3% ever since.

Here is a quote from a Christian Science Monitor article (Jan. 9, 2004):

[LBJ] made his pitch at a time when poverty was actually declining, from 22.4 percent in 1959 to about 19 percent at the time of his address.

Still, the next few years saw the nation make its greatest gains since the end of the Depression against an intractable human problem. The poverty rate fell steadily for almost a decade, bottoming out at 11.1 percent in 1973.

And that was it. Since then, the poverty rate has seesawed up and down, largely following the state of the economy. It hit highs of 15.2 percent in 1983 and 15.1 percent in 1993. It declined in the go-go 1990s, then began rising again: In 2002, the latest full year for which the Census Bureau has figures, it was 12.1 percent. That's almost 35 million people in poverty, 12.1 million of them children.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Christian Science Monitor gets the gist right in that the poverty level was already on the mend by the time of the War on Poverty speech in '64 but by all accounts any new programs realistically wern't in play, funded or in application until '65. By all accounts the starting figure should be 65 and 17% not '64 and 19%. IMO.

Grand total if all credit was given to great society programs and not the Kenedy tax cuts is at best 4-5% reduction in poverty. I think that is about as generous as one could be and likely it is much much less than that.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
I don't really care what is commonly heard, Oerdin. I'd actually like to see the information for myself and if it is so common it shouldn't be hard for people to source it.

19% down to 11.1% is a 42% decline which is pretty damn close to halving the poverty rate no matter if you care to hear it or not.

[DinoDoc]

Oggie pwnd you already, Oerdin.

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by Ogie Oglethorpe
Christian Science Monitor gets the gist right in that the poverty level was already on the mend by the time of the War on Poverty speech in '64 but by all accounts any new programs realistically wern't in play, funded or in application until '65. By all accounts the starting figure should be 65 and 17% not '64 and 19%. IMO.

Grand total if all credit was given to great society programs and not the Kenedy tax cuts is at best 4-5% reduction in poverty. I think that is about as generous as one could be and likely it is much much less than that.

A 4-5% reduction in poverty is still a significant number of people. We will probably differ on exactly how "worth it" the program was, but I think that the efficacy of the program suitably demonstrates that poverty can be alleviated significantly through such programs. Certainly more efficiency is desirable, and there were many changes that could have been made to make the program more effective and more economical, but the proof of concept is there.

The decrease in the poverty rate leading up to '64 could easily be explained as "normal" economic variation, like the variation between 11 and 15 since then. It is telling, however, that the range of that variation is now much lower than it was before the War on Poverty, despite an increasing antagonism from government policy-makers and the discourse of the public at large.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
Oggie pwnd you already, Oerdin.

No he didn't. He's making conjecture.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Notice however I give full credit of that 4-5% to the great soceity programs. The supply siders (or demand siders) likewise give credit to the tax cut implications of the Kennedy tax cuts circa 1964. Probably the realistic figure is 2-3% tops.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Originally posted by Oerdin


No he didn't. He's making conjecture.

Conjecture = 17% in 1965 when programs were put into effect

Conjecture = 13% at the end of LBJ's term.

I don't see how that is conjecture but perhaps you do.


Course it dropped to 11.1% in Nixons term when he supposedly 'gutted' them. Also conjecture I'm sure.

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by Ogie Oglethorpe
Notice however I give full credit of that 4-5% to the great soceity programs. The supply siders (or demand siders) likewise give credit to the tax cut implications of the Kennedy tax cuts circa 1964. Probably the realistic figure is 2-3% tops.

Do you have some evidence to assert this, as opposed to what you think to be "probably realistic?" I respect your background on this, which is probably more complete than mine, but I am a bit leery of chopping off 1-2% just because is seems likely.

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by Ogie Oglethorpe
Course it dropped to 11.1% in Nixons term when he supposedly 'gutted' them. Also conjecture I'm sure.

Most of the local organizations created in the spirit of "maximum possible participation" continued to operate despite funding cuts later; some closed, but others that traced their origins to the start of the War on Poverty continued to operate with lower budgets or with other funding sources. I'll make some conjecture of my own and say that it is at possible that the continued decline was a result of the continuation of the local programs instigated by the WoP that continued to function (albeit at a reduced effectiveness) even after funding was reduced or cut.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Not really as I was born in 65 so no first hand observation for sure. But given the rate of decrease in the level of poverty pre 1964 22-19% it probably isn't that big of a stretch to say the economy was rebounding to allow for a minimum of 2-3% decrease in poverty level from 65-68 from economy effect alone.

Whether one beleives a hoot about tax savings being rolled back into the economy is probably a matter for another discussion.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Originally posted by Cyclotron


Most of the local organizations created in the spirit of "maximum possible participation" continued to operate despite funding cuts later; some closed, but others that traced their origins to the start of the War on Poverty continued to operate with lower budgets or with other funding sources. I'll make some conjecture of my own and say that it is at possible that the continued decline was a result of the continuation of the local programs instigated by the WoP that continued to function (albeit at a reduced effectiveness) even after funding was reduced or cut.

Yeah I know ( )and am a believer in lag effects of policy on the economy. The full participation angle could indeed be valid but I also give some credence to a slight recessional recovery circa 1971-1974.

This was more of snide comment on peoples selective look at any given economy in XYZ's admin without giveing the necessary analysis to understand delayed impacts of policy on the economy. Pardon my overly subtle jab.

[Cyclotron]

Sure - it's always a mistake to say that one factor, and one only, was responsible for any such improvement. Clearly there were other reasons for the improvement in poverty besides the WoP programs. I think that enough evidence exists, however, to indicate that it accomplished a significant amount and could be even more effective if re-imagined and given more dedicated political support.