Fifty years of War on Poverty

By Sam Blackwell

Fifty years after President Lyndon Johnson declared war on poverty, poverty is alive and well in America. Though the war has reduced the poverty rate by about 10 percent, 46 million Americans still live in poverty.

One of the 46 million is an underemployed single mother of five who lives in south Cape Girardeau. She was laid off last year from a job she'd held for two years. Because hers was contract work, she is ineligible for unemployment. The hours on the lower-paying job she took were cut to part-time, so now she has two low-paying part-time jobs.

She has gone to college and makes mortgage payments. Yet she and her children are living in poverty. "Are there nights I don't eat because there is not enough food? Yes. Are there nights we sit in the dark or light candles to try and save a bill? Yes. Do we find alternative things to do, free things for family entertainment? Yes. Do I worry about soap and toilet paper? Yes. Do we have family meetings about not being wasteful, unplugging items and conserving energy? Yes. We don't have fancy clothes, new gadgets or go to salons."

But she doesn't think of herself as poor. Her family's lives are no less rich than anyone else's. It's just that so much of her life is spent struggling to provide necessities the rest of us take for granted. "People think the simple fix is to get up and get a job," she says. "If that doesn't work, then I should get another job. I should work at McDonald's or Burger king …. Go to a gas station."

She has applied for entry-level jobs. Managers won't hire her because her salary history is too high, and they don't want to waste their money training someone they think will quickly leave. Besides, a kid is happy with almost any pay and more likely to hang around. It makes disconcerting sense.

Unable to make a house payment on time, she called the lender hoping to work out a solution. Their response was to try to help her find an extra job at a fast-food restaurant.

She wants to use the services of the Cape Girardeau Career Center but has no transportation. The bus system's fixed routes don't run to North Kingshighway, and a taxi ride there costs at least $10 one way. What's the center doing way out there when most of the people who need it live on the other side of town? It doesn't add up in all kinds of ways.

Some days are filled with frustration. "It is stressful and hard," she says. "It's even harder and more stressful to plaster that smile on and keep pushing. I keep pushing."

Sargent Shriver, the architect of the War on Poverty, said Johnson was calling on the generation that had beaten Hitler in World War II to defeat poverty the same way. People said, Why not?

Johnson's weapons were Medicare and Medicaid, expanded minimum wage coverage and more federal support for public education, all benefits we now take for granted. President Richard Nixon widened the war by expanding the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program and introduced an automatic cost-of-living adjustment for Social Security. Conservatives and liberals alike took on this fight.

But poverty won't be defeated the way an enemy can be. It will take the opposite. The love of humanity.

Earlier this month, a Who's Who of American charitable organizations announced they are joining together to continue taking on poverty. Catholic Charities USA, Feeding America, Save the Children, The Salvation Army, the National Alliance to End Homelessness, Lutheran Services in America, United Way and The Alliance for Children and Families agreed to a joint strategy aimed at finding solutions.

The strategy calls for educating the public about the obstacles faced by people in poverty, using innovation to connect local social workers and national leaders, and taking action at the local level using the newest knowledge and techniques.

Educating the public about the everyday challenges people in poverty face is the goal of "Poverty 101," a new presentation offered by the United Way of Southeast Missouri. Businesses and institutions that work with people in poverty are provided information about who lives in poverty, causes and types of poverty and stereotypes people in poverty must overcome. "Too often, poverty is internalized and people are blamed for their situation, rather than blaming the external causes of poverty," says Melissa Stickel, director of community development for the United Way of Southeast Missouri.

In some ways, the War on Poverty has degenerated into a War on the Poor, a Darwinian fantasy of winners and losers in which people must be getting what they deserve. Pass the baloney.

There are plenty of jobs that don't pay enough to live on and not enough that do. Whether you're an employer or an employee, you know we as a nation and a community are better than that. Johnson expressed his War on Poverty ideal this way: "We have a right to expect a job to provide food for our families, a roof over their head, clothes for their body and with your help and with God's help, we will have it in America!"

Sam Blackwell writes a blog for the United Way of Southeast Missouri. He is a former editor and reporter at the Southeast Missourian.