I want to call attention to a short article on unemployment and the need for programs of subsidized jobs that has been posted on the website Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity, a link to which appears above. The posting, written by Tony Mallon of Virginia Commonwealth University and myself, is entitled Promise of a Job: Reducing Poverty and Enhancing Children's Future Opportunity. It summarizes two longer studies that examine the causes of the persistent poverty that has afflicted a majority of the families leaving the welfare roles over the last fifteen years -- a condition that has predated the current depression by many years.
On the basis of a review of the results and costs of a large number of past and current programs of job creation and job training, we propose Promise of a Job, a program that we think addresses the failings of previous efforts. A major component of the program is a job guarantee that can last considerably longer than those featured in related transitional job programs; the main goal is to keep people working more-or-less full time. If the program can do that -- an admittedly big if given the available data and research results -- we show that Promise of a Job can result in dramatic reductions in the adult and children's poverty rate. We are particularly interested in the reduction of children's poverty, because of its critical importance for equal opportunity.
Here's a recent posting and how to get to it and a longer paper. Promise of a Job: Providing Opportunity for "Welfare-Leavers"
The Spotlight piece also provides a link to one of our longer articles, Making the 1996 Welfare Reform Work: The Promise of a Job, that can be accessed on website of the National Poverty Center at the University of Michigan.
Guy
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