Blaming Poverty on the Poor: An Analysis of the Origins and Consequences of American Antiwelfarism

November 22, 2022

YCSC Grand Rounds November 22, 2022

Darren Barany, PhD, MPA
Professor of Sociology
LaGuardia Community College, the City University of New York

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ID: 9172
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00:00All right. So good afternoon, everyone.
00:04Thank you for being here today.
00:06My colleague Kieran's a
00:07little bit under the weather,
00:08so I'm going to do my best to pinch it here.
00:11So I want to thank those of you
00:13who are here in person and on
00:16zoom for today's grand rounds.
00:18I know that many of you are already
00:19connecting with your families in gratitude,
00:21and then I invite you all to reflect
00:23on doctor Mays's message this morning.
00:26I also want to let you know that
00:27our next grand rounds will feature
00:29Doctor Aaron Dunn from Harvard,
00:30and she'll be describing biological
00:32embedding of adversity. So.
00:34For those here, and for those on zoom,
00:37I also want to take a moment of
00:40silence to honor the lives sensibly,
00:42senselessly taken in Colorado Springs.
00:52The amount of hate that lives in our
00:54world is actually rather heartbreaking,
00:56and I'm saddened by safe spaces
00:59that I'm unsafe and fear that this
01:01evokes in the LGBTQ community,
01:03their parents, partners, and friends.
01:05You deserve to feel safe,
01:07and if I can be of support to you or
01:09help you connect with other supports,
01:11please know that I'm here.
01:13And so it is my pleasure to introduce
01:15you to doctor Darren Burani.
01:17He's a professor of sociology
01:19at LaGuardia Community College
01:20at City University of New York.
01:22He earned his PhD from the
01:24CUNY Graduate Center and has an
01:27MPA from Columbia University.
01:29His work has primarily focused on
01:30how special interest groups and
01:32intellectuals shape the political culture,
01:34especially in relation to welfare
01:36state policy.
01:37His most recent project explores
01:39how the food industry influences
01:41public thinking on nutrition.
01:43Public health and the environment,
01:45with a focus on the harmful consequences
01:47of industrial animal agriculture,
01:49disproportionately experienced by
01:52frontline and marginalized communities.
01:54So I've known Doctor Virani D,
01:57as I call him, for about 20 years.
02:00And my first introduction to his
02:02brilliance was when he married a
02:03dear friend of mine from high school,
02:05both because of who he chose to marry
02:08and from the conversations that we had.
02:11So for years we've engaged
02:12in deep analytical.
02:13Conversations about the world
02:15and our evolving perspectives
02:16as young adults and parents.
02:19And I was excited.
02:20It was exciting to know that he was going
02:22to publish an analysis of anything like.
02:24I was just excited because we've had
02:26so many wonderful conversations,
02:28let alone on a topic of such
02:29relevance to our center.
02:31And so at the time that it was published,
02:33I actually didn't have any way of knowing
02:35how relevant and important his work
02:37would become to our community until
02:39my role at our at the center shifted.
02:41And so as part of our commitment to DI,
02:43we're consistently.
02:44Working toward understanding how
02:45structures and systems have created
02:48and sustained narratives and policies
02:50that continue to oppress populations
02:52and that have populations that have
02:54been historically marginalized.
02:56So we've all heard the narrative of
02:58pulling oneself up by their bootstraps,
03:01but we rarely acknowledge that
03:03many have been denied access to
03:05boots in the first place.
03:07And so today,
03:07let's listen to Doctor Perini with
03:09open minds and hearts to understand
03:10how the narrative of poverty and
03:12welfare has been framed in our country,
03:14to continue to oppress and see how
03:16we're able to disrupt this narrative.
03:18And so for those who are here,
03:20we also have planned for,
03:21we noticed that every time after a speaker,
03:23people linger and want to ask more questions.
03:25So we actually did it.
03:26Plan fully this time and we'll have
03:28some vegan treats coming in and
03:30also the opportunity to continue to
03:33chat with Doctor Burani after you
03:35hear what he has to share with us.
03:37Now, Darren Doctor Virani, please join us.
03:54You're all set. You just gotta click
03:55on it first and then you can use
03:57the arrow keys. Gotcha. Oh, OK.
04:04I knew that would happen.
04:07Thank you so much, Tara,
04:08for that lovely introduction.
04:11I hope I can live up to that.
04:13But I I, I share your opinion that,
04:16you know, I think my my
04:17brightest moment of brilliance
04:18was my partner of choice, so.
04:22Who I think is watching.
04:25It's a pleasure to be here,
04:26and thank you so much for the opportunity
04:28to speak with all of you about my work.
04:30And thank you for the important work you
04:33do here at the Yale Child Study Center.
04:36You know, the title of today's talk is
04:39what I. Kind of wish the book was titled.
04:42If I could do it all over again,
04:44I probably wouldn't choose the name,
04:46the new welfare consensus, and I'll
04:48explain kind of what that term means.
04:50But this, I think,
04:51is a better characterization of
04:53where the book is coming from.
04:55You know, I did some thinking.
04:57I've never, I haven't done this.
04:59The book talk actually in in
05:02a minute as the kids say.
05:04And I've certainly never done
05:06it in a healthcare setting.
05:07So I'm really delighted to be
05:09able to do this and it, you know,
05:11it got me thinking at 1st and how
05:14this material relates directly
05:15to the work that you all do.
05:18You know,
05:18it tells a story of how intellectuals
05:20and interest groups have shaped the
05:22debate and sort of the discourse
05:24around welfare and related issues,
05:26things like family and work and
05:28personal responsibility and the role
05:29of the state in providing a minimum,
05:31you know,
05:32standard of living outside
05:33of Labor markets and such.
05:35And over a long period of time,
05:38narratives related to race
05:40and class demeaning,
05:41narratives that demonized sexual behavior
05:43attributed to poor women of color,
05:46drummed up hostility and
05:48opposition to these programs.
05:49So while it's in particular social
05:52environments that people develop a
05:54sense of what one or another program
05:56or or policy initiative does,
05:58we're crucially it's people,
06:00families,
06:00children,
06:01already subject to the cold
06:02disaffection of the market and
06:04struggling to overcome the effects.
06:06Of poverty and exploitation,
06:08who bear the brunt of punitive
06:10policy and who are demeaned by the
06:13hurtful characterizations of them.
06:15Also,
06:15I'm really glad that in recent
06:17years there's been a growth of
06:19interest in having conversations
06:21around equity and justice.
06:22So, you know,
06:23another thread connecting this,
06:24I think is how when we interrogate
06:26the origins of what we think
06:28and sometimes uncritically and
06:30unconsciously take for granted,
06:32this can help us address forms of
06:34implicit bias and how we engage
06:36with the people that we serve.
06:40All right, method to do that this time.
06:43So the investigation mainly covers
06:45the period from the interwar period,
06:47the 1930s, to the signing of the
06:50personal responsibility and Work
06:52Opportunity Reconciliation Act.
06:54Or perwira might be the most clumsy
06:56name for a piece of legislation.
06:59So and that was in 1996,
07:01but for the remainder of the talk I'll refer
07:04to it as the welfare reform bill of 1996.
07:06And you know, this period saw
07:08the sequence of legislative
07:10developments leading up to the bill.
07:12But it also,
07:13and probably more importantly,
07:15as one where an emerging social
07:17policy narrative was solidified
07:18in the public consciousness and
07:20with informal policy circles.
07:22In other words, a new welfare
07:25consensus over time had solidified.
07:28And the study traces the origins
07:29of today's political debates
07:31around things like social policy,
07:33equality, distributive justice,
07:34both between the right and and left,
07:37but also within the right and left too.
07:39As you know,
07:40there was often debates and and,
07:42you know, conflict within those
07:44those political formations.
07:45Also,
07:46and of particular interest is how a
07:48set of ideas went from the political
07:50fringe in the 1930s and 40s to
07:53mainstream thinking on welfare policy
07:55and related issues by the 1970s.
08:01So. It's hard to see, apologies.
08:04But you more or less just need to see
08:05the relationship as it goes down.
08:07And I'll explain, but the investigation
08:10mainly covers whoops, wrong part.
08:12But unlike our European counterparts,
08:14the US has not maintained
08:16an extensive safety net.
08:17You know, it's often taken for granted
08:19that this is just part of America,
08:21you know, rugged American culture,
08:22or that we're just more inclined
08:24towards self-sufficiency and hard work.
08:26Some see it as a superior arrangement,
08:28more lean than our European counterparts,
08:31but rather than uncritically.
08:32Saying that, that's just how
08:33things are in the United States,
08:35the study set out the trace of
08:37the origins of such ideology.
08:38So it sees the new welfare consensus
08:40as the product of particular historic,
08:43political, social, ideological currents.
08:45And there's many myths in the
08:48popular discourse on welfare,
08:50for example,
08:51that the United States directs a
08:53significant portion of its resources
08:55to welfare state expenditures
08:56compared to other nations.
08:57And as I said, it's a bit hard to see.
08:59But if you look at the slide,
09:00there's a list of 29 O ECD.
09:03Countries in order of the percent of
09:05their gross domestic product that they
09:07they contribute to welfare programs,
09:09and the United States is at the bottom.
09:14And on this next slide is a list
09:16of 18 OCD countries in order of
09:18per capita welfare expenditures.
09:20That is the total amount contributed
09:22towards welfare programs,
09:23but then divided by the population.
09:25And again, we see the US at the bottom.
09:29So one of the questions that
09:31inform this study is why is the
09:33United States so different,
09:34compared again to our European counterparts,
09:36with regard to prioritizing benefits
09:39and services for those most in need?
09:45So another question that informed the
09:47study was why attitudes toward welfare
09:49in the United States shifted overtime.
09:51And these tables just sort of show how,
09:54you know, opposition or support
09:56to to welfare spending and welfare
09:59policy shifts over the period.
10:01The least opposition was in the decades
10:04after FDR rolled out the Social Security Act,
10:07which was in 1935 in response
10:09to the Great Depression.
10:10And we see little opposition to
10:12welfare in 1939 and 1946, for example.
10:16Oh, and you specifically told me
10:17not to look up at the screen.
10:18Sorry.
10:20Cameras over there with 23 and 19% saying
10:23that the government should not provide
10:26for people without means of subsistence,
10:28meaning that close to 80%
10:30were in support of it.
10:31And this changes over time, as you'll see.
10:35So the 1960s.
10:36Look there,
10:38the 1960s are significant because what
10:40you see is over the course of that decade,
10:42a real shift in terms of public opposition
10:45with regard to welfare programs.
10:47So in 1961 and 64, we see respondents
10:51to the general Social Survey,
10:53and the former data was from the
10:55Roper polls from that time.
10:57And you know, over all of these decades,
11:00the wording of the questions they
11:02ask on the surveys kind of change a bit.
11:04And, you know, and depending on
11:06what it is that you're looking for.
11:07Sometimes you have to look at different
11:09opinion surveys so you know it's not perfect.
11:12Apples to apples, but it tells a story.
11:15So by the end of the 60s,
11:17forty 4 and 45% reported that
11:19too much is spent on welfare,
11:21right?
11:22Seeing more than a doubling in opposition
11:23from the beginning of that decade to the end.
11:26And what we'll kind of like focus
11:28in on the 60s in a in a bit and
11:30why that's important.
11:33By the late 1970s, in the years leading
11:35up to the election of Reagan in 1978,
11:39and 198062 and 59% respectively responded
11:42that too much was spent on welfare.
11:45And in the Clinton years,
11:46the years leading up to the
11:48welfare reform bill of 1996,
11:49sixty two and 58% responded
11:51that too much was spent.
11:53So we see that same level of
11:55opposition kind of stabilizing and
11:57that 60 ish percent number stays
11:59consistent pretty much ongoing,
12:01give or take like. 5 to 7%.
12:06Oops.
12:11That's it. So.
12:14New welfare consensus refers
12:15to a new way of thinking about
12:18welfare and related issues,
12:19and that have particular consequences.
12:22The parameters around acceptable
12:23policy discourse and legislation
12:25as a result of the emergence
12:27of a new welfare consensus have
12:29been significantly constrained,
12:30and this has produced a welfare state
12:32that had become more fiscally austere,
12:34demeaning and coercive.
12:40Now historically the attack
12:42on welfare is rooted in the
12:44conservative intellectual tradition.
12:47So the attack on the safety net was
12:50initially waged by conservative
12:51politicians and intellectuals.
12:53And this isn't meant to alienate
12:55anybody or their worldviews,
12:56but simply a way of tracing where
12:58you know where anti welfarism
13:00as an ideology comes from.
13:02So looking at how it evolved and essentially
13:04what mainstream in the United States.
13:06And to be fair,
13:07the attack on welfare
13:09definitely became a bipartisan.
13:10Effort by the 1970s and going into the 90s,
13:14after all, it was Bill Clinton,
13:15someone seen as a kind of a moderate liberal,
13:18who signed the bill into enthusiastically
13:20signed the bill into law.
13:23So many who didn't identify with
13:25conservative politics and saw themselves
13:27as moderate or pragmatic or centrist
13:29Democrats or even mild liberals would
13:31later become vociferous critics of
13:33the welfare state by the late 60s,
13:35around 6869 and going into the 70s.
13:38And this was the group that.
13:41Came to be known as the
13:43new the neoconservatives.
13:44It was a label that was used pejoratively
13:46at first, but then folks like Irving,
13:48Crystal and others kind of embraced it,
13:50and I'll go into a little bit
13:52of detail on that bit later.
13:54But it included our Irving,
13:55Crystal, Nathan Glazer, Daniel Bell,
13:58politicians like Daniel Patrick Moynihan,
14:00the late New York senator,
14:02and you know,
14:03I'll be mentioning names through the talk.
14:05I didn't list them on slides.
14:07If anyone has any questions later
14:09or wants any clarification on
14:11any of these concepts or names,
14:12please feel free in the Q&amp;A.
14:19So there's terms I'll use that are
14:21synonymous with each other and that
14:23have a particular meaning that I'd
14:24like to establish ahead of time.
14:26So economic conservatism,
14:27one of the major sort of strands
14:30of conservatism that becomes part
14:31of the new welfare consensus,
14:33will be used interchangeably in
14:35the talk and more or less means
14:37the same thing as libertarianism,
14:39laissez-faire individualism,
14:41classical liberalism, etcetera.
14:43And it might seem confusing,
14:44like how could a tradition of.
14:45Liberalism be connected to
14:47economic conservatism,
14:49and that's actually a
14:50really interesting history,
14:51and that's something we could
14:53talk about later if you want.
14:54But classical liberalism at one point
14:56used to be the term used to describe,
14:59you know,
15:00the libertarians or economic
15:01conservatives prior to the 1950s.
15:03Now for economic conservatism,
15:05the key political questions are economic.
15:08They tend to be philosophically
15:11individualist.
15:11Champions of the free market with
15:13emphasis on things like individual liberty,
15:16private property,
15:17limited government and their
15:19anti collectivist and anti
15:21communist and by collectivism.
15:22It's a term that's used a lot in the
15:25political discourse up to the early 1950s,
15:27and it simply means the drive toward
15:31central planning and government
15:33control over public institutions.
15:35Umm, now,
15:36this included the early kind of economic
15:39conservatives or libertarian thinkers,
15:41included people like Albert J Knock,
15:44HL Mencken, Frank Chodorov,
15:46Milton Friedman,
15:48who becomes really a kind of premier,
15:51you know, a free market intellectual
15:53in the in the Reagan years,
15:56Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich von Hayek,
16:00and others.
16:02Now.
16:05Social conservatism, the other major strand.
16:08And there's a lot of disagreement
16:10over what the major strands are.
16:11Should religious conservatism be
16:13its own thing? And, you know,
16:14if you've looked at the literature and
16:16political science or political sociology or,
16:18you know, political theory,
16:19etcetera, there are a lot of ways
16:21these discussions are framed.
16:22But I don't want to get so
16:24bogged down in all of that. But.
16:28Social conservatism is also known
16:30as traditional conservatism,
16:31traditionalism, moral conservatism,
16:33moral values, conservatism,
16:35classical conservatism, etcetera.
16:36And the key questions for this strand
16:40of conservatism are religious and moral,
16:43and the principles include that
16:44morality should be the guiding
16:45principle of government,
16:46that government should play a role in
16:49regulating moral conduct in the society,
16:51and that traditional judeo-christian
16:53values represent an absolute moral truth.
16:56So with regard to the welfare state,
16:58the economic conservatives or
17:00libertarians would really want to
17:01see the government out of the way,
17:03right to don't interfere with the
17:05invisible hand of the market.
17:06Whereas the social conservatives
17:08thought the government should play
17:09a role with regard to such programs.
17:11If it meant that they could encourage,
17:13you know,
17:14the right kind of morality or
17:16behaviors among the poor.
17:17And they disagreed over this a
17:18great deal and it would become kind
17:20of an issue going into the 50s.
17:22But it resolves and then the movement
17:24becomes a real driving force directing.
17:26A policy discourse.
17:30They were also seen as anti collectivist.
17:33And the influential thinkers in
17:35this camp included folks like the
17:37Southern agrarian, Richard Weaver,
17:39Austrian emigre, Eric Vogelin,
17:42and Leo Strauss and others.
17:44And it's the the classical,
17:46the sort of classical social
17:48conservative literature as it
17:50addresses issues related to equality.
17:52It's actually a really fascinating
17:54literature, and I'd be again,
17:55I'd be happy to take any questions
17:56on that later.
18:01Now, I found in my research that the
18:04emergence of a new welfare consensus.
18:06It was related to several factors.
18:08For one, the successful
18:10consolidation and organization of
18:11several strands of conservatism.
18:13So fusing these different traditions
18:16together into more cohesive and organized
18:19intellectual and political movement.
18:21The decline into two parent family
18:23ideal beginning in the 1960s.
18:25This was something that was very
18:27much latched on to and exploited to
18:29stoke resentment toward populations.
18:31We utilized public assistance
18:33on the programs themselves,
18:35racist and nativist reactions to the
18:37migration of African Americans from
18:39the rural S to urban centers mostly
18:42in the industrial Midwest and NE,
18:44and to the influx of immigrants
18:47from Latin America.
18:48Also, the decentralization of welfare
18:50program financing at administration
18:52was relevant for this too,
18:54but I'm going to probably go
18:56into that the least.
18:58But again, if anyone has questions and.
19:03Probably most importantly,
19:04the paradigm shift with regard
19:06to poverty that went from seeing
19:08poverty as a structural issue,
19:09right that that individuals,
19:11families fell through the cracks
19:13of the market and it wasn't
19:15their fault to a more behavioral
19:17framing of poverty right.
19:19And given this,
19:20appealing to things like racial
19:21fear and patriarchal and class
19:23insecurity and representing the
19:25problems associated with poverty
19:27as the result of individual
19:29familial and cultural pathology.
19:34Now, these two strands of conservatism
19:36come together in the 1950s.
19:38At first, it's known as Fusion Fusionism,
19:41quite literally, because the two strands
19:43fused together to create a new kind of,
19:45you know, syncretic tradition that
19:47included aspects of both of these,
19:49you know, smaller movements.
19:51And it's really a progenitor of today's
19:55contemporary conservative movement.
19:57It was a generative moment of folks
19:59like William F Buckley Junior,
20:01who's a Yale alum, by the way,
20:03and Russell Kirk put together the
20:05Conservative journal of Opinion,
20:06National Review,
20:07which becomes wildly popular,
20:09huge readership at that time,
20:11and still is a pretty prominent
20:14conservative outlet today.
20:15In the beginning,
20:17it included work by prominent libertarians
20:19as well as social conservatives,
20:21and it was part of a growing.
20:22Conservative press,
20:23along with other publications
20:25like human events, the Freeman,
20:27and others,
20:28and there was conflict among
20:30conservatives at this time.
20:31So the social conservatives
20:33thought the libertarians lacked
20:34a kind of moral framework,
20:37and the libertarians thought the
20:38social conservatives were were too
20:40worried about regulating people's
20:42lives and were too authoritarian.
20:48But it was the anti communism of the
20:50new right and in each of these groups
20:53and anti collectivism that kind of
20:55like brings them all together, right?
20:57Because they can focus their energies on
20:58something that they both agreed upon.
21:00And ultimately as people were
21:02joining this growing movement,
21:03people were picking up different
21:05aspects of each of these political
21:06formations and it more or less became,
21:09even if contradictory,
21:09it kind of cohesive movement
21:11on at least the veneer of it.
21:19So. Internationally, right,
21:21they were certainly opposed to the,
21:23to Communist Russia.
21:24But domestically, they targeted welfare
21:26state programs and often portrayed
21:29welfare bureaucrats as either liberals
21:31who'd been duped by communist plants
21:33or actual communists working, you know,
21:36undercover to destroy America from within.
21:38They had some conspiratorial narratives
21:39like that, but by and large,
21:42Buckley and others sort of, you know,
21:44working within the conservative press at
21:46the time and reaching out to to people,
21:49you know, policymakers.
21:50And and folks with actual power,
21:53they're able to.
21:54You know, remake conservatism
21:56into more of an intellectual,
21:59more of a respectable movement,
22:02and one that was more
22:03organized politically as well.
22:08Now National Review and the new right
22:10at the time really stick to the,
22:13the economic conservative script
22:15when attacking the welfare state.
22:16So it's wasteful in terms of
22:19spending and allocation of resources.
22:21And they were certainly concerned that,
22:23you know, the consolidation of power by
22:25the state in terms of administering welfare
22:27state programs could be a slippery slope to,
22:31you know, a totalitarian system and
22:33regulating the lives of people.
22:35And this was more or less the economic
22:37conservative or libertarian. Argument.
22:38And it's the argument that the new right
22:42largely sticks to up until the early 60s.
22:45So in 1960 and 61, there's some test
22:47cases which happened that that kind of
22:49start pushing against that narrative.
22:51So in 1960,
22:53the Governor of Louisiana had cut 23,000
22:56mostly African American children from
22:59the AFDC roles or the welfare rolls.
23:03And the rationale for the cuts,
23:04you know,
23:05he deliberately tried to racialize
23:07the discourse and he argued
23:09that homes where families had,
23:10where children had been born
23:13outside of marriage were,
23:14should be considered as unsuitable and
23:16therefore their benefits should be cut.
23:18Which is kind of contradictory, right?
23:21If you were thinking of a home as
23:22being unsuitable and unfit for kids,
23:24why would you want to cut resources
23:26going to those homes to be able to,
23:28you know, make ends meet and so forth?
23:29But nonetheless, that was the narrative,
23:32but ultimately the Louisiana.
23:33Cuts are reversed by the federal government.
23:36The media pushes back against it.
23:38At that time, the public largely sees it as,
23:42as, you know,
23:43as a wrongheaded and mean spirited
23:45kind of thing to do.
23:46And it was framed as hurting innocent
23:48children and starving babies and so on.
23:50So it's able to be reversed and and
23:52most people are on board with that.
23:54However, just the next year in 1961,
23:57the Newburgh controversy takes
23:58place in Newburgh,
24:00NY and this is a kind of historical pilot
24:02case illustrating the effectiveness.
24:05Of exploiting the public's
24:06disdain toward poor black mothers
24:08with disgusting stereotypes,
24:10calling their sexual morality into question.
24:13So whereas the Louisiana,
24:14Louisiana controversy was framed in
24:16terms of hurting innocent children,
24:18in Newburgh,
24:19the city manager Joseph Mitchell,
24:21he scapegoated the city's growing
24:23black population for the city's
24:25industrial decline and joblessness.
24:27And, you know,
24:28instead of thinking about it as
24:31hurting innocent people who who were
24:33in need of benefits and services.
24:35He put forward the narrative that
24:37black mothers were being subsidized
24:39for their promiscuity.
24:41He also implied that having children
24:42while poor was akin to abuse.
24:46So the attitude of the public unfortunately
24:49kind of follow in kind through the 1960s,
24:52and this is reflected in the opinion
24:54polls that I showed before Mitchell
24:56capitalized on hit on the publicity
24:58he was getting at that time.
25:00He was extensively covered in the growing
25:02body of of conservative literature as
25:04well as mainstream outlets at that time.
25:07And he developed a 13 point plan for reform,
25:11reforming the welfare state that
25:13included things like child caps,
25:15time limits, work requirements.
25:16Things that are strikingly familiar
25:19features of contemporary welfare
25:20reform discourse and aspects,
25:22actually, that are included in
25:24the 1996 welfare reform bill.
25:27And it's not that Clinton and.
25:30You know,
25:31the House and Senate Republicans
25:32and Democrats who are supportive
25:34of welfare reform looked back to
25:36Joseph Mitchell in 1961 and said
25:38we're going to do what he said.
25:40But Rather Mitchell's proposal
25:41of this and the the the extensive
25:43coverage that he was getting indicated
25:45that there was a shift in in the
25:48public's thinking on this issue.
25:55So after saying all of this,
25:57it should be noted that it was intellectuals
26:00who were on the political left,
26:02self identified as liberals and so on who?
26:06Really gave social scientific
26:08credibility to behavioral analysis
26:11of poverty that explicitly evoked
26:14race and gender and family roles.
26:17And again, these were figures
26:18like Irving Crystal, Daniel Bell,
26:20Norman Podhoretz, Earl Rabb,
26:22Nathan Glazer and a whole host of others,
26:25Daniel Patrick Moynihan,
26:26as I mentioned before,
26:27who later again come to be identified with
26:31this political label of neoconservative.
26:33These critics of welfare state
26:35programs illustrated concern for
26:37preserving traditional institutions
26:38like marriage and the nuclear family,
26:41and we're very concerned with the
26:43effects of welfare state programs in
26:45terms of disrupting these institutions.
26:47And they highlighted this again by
26:49demonizing poor black communities and
26:51framing their economic poverty in terms like,
26:53you know,
26:54referring to children as quote,
26:55UN quote, illegitimate,
26:57using terms like cultural pathology,
26:59community and family disorganization,
27:01etcetera and etcetera.
27:06They were very active in magazines
27:07and journals of opinion at the time,
27:09as well as academic journals.
27:12They published in magazines
27:14like Commentary, The Atlantic,
27:15which was a very different magazine
27:17back then than it is today.
27:18The public interest,
27:19the New York review of Books,
27:21also a bit different back back then.
27:24Now the public interest was founded
27:26by Irving Crystal and Daniel Bell and
27:29was presented as scholarly discourse.
27:31It wasn't peer reviewed,
27:33but it was editorial reviewed.
27:34Um, and they would later link up with
27:37editors and and associates at the
27:38Wall Street Journal and it really
27:40became a kind of mouthpiece for the
27:43growing supply side economics kind of
27:45Reaganomics frame that would come later.
27:51Umm. And in the public interest they
27:53regularly talked about things like so
27:56an article by Earl Robb talked about
27:58liberals being and this idea again
28:00that like you know well-intentioned
28:02bureaucrats were being duped by
28:05people who had nefarious aims was
28:07very common across the literature.
28:10But being duped white liberals were
28:12being duped by quote black and Spanish
28:14speaking anti poverty militants that
28:16the slum ***** is the special target
28:19of the anti poverty program UN quote.
28:22During a sit in by welfare
28:24rights demonstrators in 1967,
28:25Senator Russell Long of Louisiana
28:27uses really nasty,
28:29racialized and gendered language
28:30to disparage them,
28:31referring to them as quote,
28:32UN quote black brood mayors incorporated.
28:35Moynihan in 1968 in the public
28:38interest blamed the mean spirited
28:40and racist tone of of Russell,
28:43Long directed towards the
28:45welfare rights mothers,
28:46on the mothers themselves,
28:47saying that in truth this is a quote.
28:49Their tactics have invited the
28:51racial slurs End Quote.
28:53And Moynihan was considered a
28:55Liberal Democrat by them.
28:59So in 1965, Moynihan publishes
29:02the infamous Moynihan report.
29:05The actual title of the
29:06report was the ***** family,
29:07and it provided a moral dimension
29:09to the critique of the welfare
29:12state and analysis of poverty.
29:13Like it further reinforced that,
29:16and he appropriated what was at the time
29:19called the culture of poverty argument
29:21from the anthropologist Oscar Lewis.
29:23And Moynihan used it,
29:25and and other others of his
29:27cohorts used it to under score.
29:30What they saw as behavioral patterns among
29:32poor among the poor that were considered
29:34out of sync with white middle class values.
29:37Oscar Lewis, it should be noted,
29:38did not approve, right?
29:40He never meant for his concept
29:41to be used in that way.
29:43But those who had more, one might say,
29:45in terms of policy issues,
29:46more conservative agenda,
29:47used it that way and and with great success.
29:51Again, they used stigmatizing
29:53words like illegitimacy,
29:54welfare dependence,
29:55and highlighted especially divorce and
29:57single motherhood as pathological.
30:00Cultural patterns demonstrated
30:01by black families,
30:02and it should be noted that
30:04single motherhood and divorce,
30:06right?
30:06The increase in those rates was
30:07something that was happening
30:08across racial groups at that time,
30:10but it was being highlighted in
30:12particular for communities of color.
30:15And, you know,
30:16this contributed to revitalizing
30:18old stigmatizing labels like
30:20the worthy and unworthy core,
30:22for example.
30:22And while he didn't use the term culture
30:26of poverty verbatim in in the report,
30:29he described these behaviors
30:31with regard to black communities
30:32as being stuck in a quote,
30:34UN quote tangle of cultural pathology.
30:40So. This shift among intellectuals
30:42that we're looking at policy was part
30:44of a larger trend and that was that
30:47the political culture in the US in
30:49the 60s and although we don't usually
30:51associate the 60s with the with this
30:54was actually moving to the right.
30:56You know typically the movements
30:58for justice at the time you know,
31:01economic justice, the feminist movement,
31:03the anti war movement, gay liberation,
31:05etcetera, they,
31:06they get a lot of attention by
31:09folks as an indication that.
31:12Sort of radical left politics and reforms
31:14were kind of universally accepted and and
31:16and kind of you know part of how people
31:19were were looking at their worldviews.
31:21But you know Nixon at that time you
31:23know he coined this term that when
31:26Trump was running for office in 2015
31:28and 2016 he kind of rekindled it the
31:30term the silent majority to actually
31:33you know highlight that you know this
31:37and I don't believe that this was the
31:39case but this small vocal minority right
31:41that was getting all the attention.
31:43That actually most Americans were still
31:45traditionally conservative in their values,
31:47and they were a silent majority.
31:49And in fact,
31:49we're probably becoming more conservative.
31:51And in that respect,
31:52he was right.
31:55This was empowered by a growing sense
31:57of material and social insecurity
31:59experienced across the classes,
32:01except for the very rich,
32:02which is usually the case,
32:04for example, a working or middle
32:06class family by the end of the decade.
32:08The end of the 1960s was feeling
32:10the effects of inflation and was
32:12more likely exposed to print and
32:14broadcast media accounts of the
32:16welfare poor that associated fraud
32:17and abuse of the system with black
32:21Americans in the 1969 Life magazine.
32:23Article and Life published a
32:25lot of articles of this nature.
32:28They really worked to you know
32:29today we would say to get clicks
32:32but to sell magazines.
32:33Back then they really capitalized and
32:35and kind of exploited white fear.
32:38So they published a lot of articles
32:40about black militants at the time.
32:41They created the trope of the black
32:43sniper in cities shooting police
32:45which and the pictures they use,
32:47it turned out later were totally
32:49fabricated but in Life magazine
32:51they had an article that said
32:53quote the ordinary person.
32:55If not affluent, was likely unblack.
32:57How's that for euphemism, for white,
32:59urban and in seething revolt?
33:02If among the skilled wage earners and
33:04property owning middle income groups,
33:06they were likely white,
33:07respectable suburban and small town and
33:09equally convinced that Boondoggling poor
33:11welfare cheats were getting away with murder.
33:14UN quote.
33:15And again,
33:16this is 1 quote that's
33:18representative of many,
33:19many many articles and and again
33:21a growing narrative in terms
33:22of trying to appeal to people's
33:24resentment and anger at that time.
33:30So the attack on the welfare
33:32state during this period,
33:33with the influence of this newer
33:35discourse on the issue, began to shift.
33:38So up through the early 1960s,
33:41people like, for example,
33:43Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater,
33:45who ran against Lyndon Johnson
33:47in 64 and lost, National Review,
33:51the new right, human events,
33:53the Freeman, you know,
33:54this sort of growing a body
33:56of intellectuals from the.
33:58From the 50s into the early 60s,
34:00they characterized the welfare
34:01state as a kind of, you know,
34:04socialism creeping or
34:05socialism through welfarism.
34:07But by 1990,
34:08and this comes from the contract with
34:11America by Newt Gingrich in the in the
34:14Congress that then a prominent conservative,
34:18you know,
34:18politician who addressed these issues a lot,
34:21**** Armey and the House Republicans.
34:25That welfare reform should
34:27set out to address, quote,
34:29destructive social behavior by quote
34:31requiring welfare recipients to take
34:33responsibility for the decisions they make.
34:35UN quote.
34:36So we see this decisive shift
34:38in the in the narrative around,
34:40you know,
34:41the the discourse on welfare
34:42policy going from,
34:43again,
34:43more of an economic argument to
34:45more of a behavioral argument.
34:48So by 1980, Ronald Reagan
34:52is elected as president.
34:55The the Reagan Revolution
34:57was truly unmistakable.
34:58Reagan popularized something
35:00called supply side economics.
35:02He didn't invent it.
35:03It's also known as trickle down economics.
35:05You've probably heard of it and
35:07it it defined government spending,
35:09social programs,
35:10and taxes as unnecessary evils.
35:13And it consisted of drastic
35:15reductions in taxes,
35:16especially for corporations in the affluent,
35:19and significant spending
35:20cuts to social programs.
35:22Now Irving Crystal against
35:24one of the intellectuals.
35:25I discussed before,
35:26he's still very much active in this debate.
35:28He's still very relevant.
35:30He recalled that when
35:32he first was exposed to.
35:36Supply side economics.
35:37He actually didn't understand it,
35:39but he immediately saw its
35:41political possibilities.
35:42And, you know, he realized that this
35:46critique of progressive taxes and
35:48social policy that is centered on the
35:51idea that strategies for distributive
35:54justice disjoint individuals
35:56from regulatory and moral norms,
35:58such that strategies tend to weaken
36:00the position of elites as well.
36:02So he really, he knew that he could.
36:05Present supply side economics as
36:07an effective way of, you know,
36:09relegating the poor to the discipline
36:11of the market and at the same time
36:14cutting taxes for the rich and it would
36:17be politically very possible to do.
36:19Poverty was being framed increasingly
36:21as a managerial and behavioral problem.
36:23Welfare reform was predicated on
36:25identifying the everyday behavior of
36:27a large portion of the population
36:29as pathological and non productive
36:31and moving them off the rolls
36:33into the low wage labor market or
36:35mandating behavioral compliance in
36:37return for benefits and services.
36:40Reports, Books, media appearances,
36:42congressional testimony by key scholars,
36:45and a growing network of policy
36:47planning groups also was a very
36:49significant part of the story.
36:51It's, you know, for the sake of time.
36:53I'm not going to get into it too much.
36:55However,
36:55you might be familiar with the work
36:57of Charles Murray or George Gilder.
37:00Murray infamously wrote the Bell Curve,
37:02which was explicitly racist book
37:04that claimed that, you know,
37:07non whites were were genetically inferior.
37:09That had lower IQ's.
37:11And the justification was that,
37:13you know,
37:14welfare programs were therefore
37:16encouraging inferior people with
37:18lower IQ's to have more children when
37:19we we should be doing the opposite.
37:21And it sounds like those ideas
37:24should have been on the fringe
37:26and not in the mainstream,
37:27but by the 1980s and 90s,
37:30scholars like Murray and others,
37:32George Gilder,
37:33Robert Rector, and you know,
37:34the the the experts who worked within the
37:37context of the think tanks and lobbying.
37:40Groups and other policy planning groups.
37:43Their ideas were becoming quite
37:45salient in the halls of Congress and
37:47informal policy circles as well.
37:57So. The debates in the Congress and
38:01the 1980s and 90s revealed that
38:04there was a decisive shift in the
38:07political culture in how poverty and
38:10welfare policy were conceptualized.
38:12The idea is advocated by folks like
38:14Charles Murray and George Gilder and
38:16others was echoed in the chambers of
38:18Congress with a logic that situated
38:20adversary adversity and suffering as
38:23necessary for ensuring good behavior,
38:25especially for poor families of color.
38:28Moynihan, the sponsor of a major
38:30precursor to the 96 welfare reform bill,
38:33the 1988 Family Support Act,
38:35and the the cover of the book where
38:38Clinton and Reagan are shaking hands.
38:40It's actually at the signing of the
38:411988 signing of the Family Support Act.
38:46You know, poverty.
38:47What he continued the frame poverty
38:50in a behavioral context which still
38:52it never really departed from his
38:55tangle of pathology analysis.
38:57And the focus on individual behavior,
39:00especially reproductive, domestic,
39:02sexual, occupational,
39:03was now part of mainstream policy
39:06discourse and was by no means the
39:09exclusive intellectual enterprise
39:11of conservatives.
39:12This behavioral focus and emphasis
39:14on the otherness of the welfare poor,
39:16with reference to worthiness,
39:18work ethic, race, gender, role,
39:21performance, sexuality,
39:22etcetera,
39:22constructed a caricature of those
39:24who relied on public assistance that
39:26discouraged the general public from
39:29being sympathetic with them or even
39:31identifying their own hardship with them.
39:33So the attack on the welfare state.
39:36Reflected that programs were seen as
39:38no longer disciplining productive and
39:40reproductive norms and, you know,
39:42among, you know,
39:43target populations for welfare programs.
39:47And what emerged over time was a
39:49weaker and more enfeebled welfare
39:51state that could become more vulnerable
39:53to attack and reform in ways that
39:56were considered consistent with elite
39:57prerogatives and and the economic
40:00system and with the consequences of
40:03stigmatizing and further reducing
40:04services and benefits for the most.
40:06Vulnerable and marginalized in our society.
40:11And that's it. Happy to take
40:13any questions at this time.
40:20Thank you, Darren. That was you hit
40:21on so many different things that my,
40:24my brains are my brain is like spinning.
40:27I have one question and you,
40:29you began to refer to this with
40:31the the sort of liberal movements
40:33that were going on in the 60s,
40:36but I'd be curious to hear a little
40:38bit more about sort of. Yes.
40:41How did the civil rights movement
40:42impact some of these decisions that
40:44were being made in the 60s as well,
40:46if there was any like backlash and.
40:49Just would love to hear a little
40:50bit more about your thoughts on
40:51that. That's a great question.
40:55So people like like Daniel Patrick
41:00Moynihan especially among others,
41:02there was there was a push in the
41:05welfare rights movement to actually
41:06have folks in the communities who who
41:09who utilize public assistance actually
41:11have more input and to be more empowered
41:14in terms of the administration and
41:15structuring of the programs themselves.
41:17This was called the Community Action
41:19programs and one thing that this emerging
41:22group of of intellectuals formally.
41:25On the left, formerly on the left,
41:26but whose politics kind of
41:28migrated to the right over time.
41:30They hated the idea of non elites
41:33expressing any kind of collective
41:35political agency or having any
41:38kind of direct input in in program
41:41administration or or or even politically.
41:44And you know, it was this kind of.
41:46And what's ironic is many of them
41:48themselves came from very working class
41:50origins folks like Norman Podhoretz and
41:52Daniel Bell and Glazer and on and on.
41:55Going on.
41:55But they saw the system as being good
41:57to them because they kind of played
41:59by the rules and they thought that
42:01other people should do the same.
42:03It just so happened that they became
42:05very influential in the intellectual
42:06and political spheres and their
42:08ideas were able to, you know,
42:10have have influence.
42:13Anyone have any questions?
42:20Yes, thank you. I think we could
42:21talk for a while about this.
42:23One question I have is,
42:25is as the discourse starts to shift.
42:28Do you start to see rural urban
42:30differences in that discourse?
42:32Does it become more prominent in one
42:34versus the other?
42:36That's an excellent question.
42:37It's interesting in that one of
42:39the stereo, I didn't do that.
42:41One of the stereotypes with regard to
42:44folks who utilize public assistance
42:47is that the majority of people that
42:49do are live in urban communities and
42:52are and are are black and brown and
42:55the reality is that there are more
42:58rural white populations that utilize
43:00welfare than urban non white populations.
43:03But. You know.
43:05Finding a, you know,
43:07in the the folks who are crafting
43:09and refining the discourse.
43:11Over time it became much more effective
43:14to scapegoat groups that already you
43:17know lacked political agency because
43:19of you know structural inequality and
43:21and systemic racism and and sexism etcetera.
43:25So it's much more effective for them to
43:28highlight what they saw as being problematic.
43:31You know characteristics of of those
43:33folks and and those communities.
43:36And what's sad is it worked.
43:37You know,
43:38it really appealed to mostly folks
43:39who were struggling like in the
43:41middle class and working class.
43:42And you saw going into the mid and
43:46late 1970s and with the election
43:48of Reagan in 1980,
43:50a lot of working class people in
43:52what were considered kind of blue
43:54states right flipped and voted for
43:56Reagan and Reagan overwhelmingly
43:58beat Carter in in 1980.
44:00So you know that was an important
44:02kind of distinction and and between
44:04those two groups and how it.
44:06Kind of played out with regard to
44:07the shift in thinking on welfare.
44:12Any other?
44:14Thank you for really fascinating talk
44:17and history being the Child Study Center.
44:19I'm wondering this question is about
44:21child focused policies, which I know kind
44:24of welfare policies affect children,
44:26but they're not necessarily
44:28directed towards them explicitly.
44:30So I'm curious as the conversation on
44:33welfare and welfare policies has changed,
44:36I guess how has that mirrored or been
44:41different from other child focused?
44:44Policies, for example,
44:45early head start or maybe free and reduced
44:48meal programs at schools or things like that.
44:51Have they seen similar changes over time?
44:55It's interesting.
44:56So the expansion, for example,
44:58the child tax credit has been a real
45:01success in reducing poverty and among
45:03folks of color and in communities of color.
45:06And it's, it's, it's interesting.
45:09I think his name is Martin Gillins,
45:12and I think he's a Yale political scientist.
45:14He did a great,
45:15he did a great study and his book was titled
45:17Why Americans Hate Welfare and what he saw,
45:20he studied media representation from
45:23the 1960s onward into the 1990s.
45:26If I'm remembering it correctly,
45:27I read it a long time ago and what he
45:31saw was that when programs were being
45:33featured in in media narratives that
45:36that addressed children specifically
45:37or the elderly like Social Security,
45:40etcetera,
45:41the pictures and images that tended to
45:43go along with those stories were often
45:46of like white people in the suburbs.
45:48But then when when they looked at
45:50issues like the underclass or welfare
45:52fraud and abuse and and and wasteful
45:54spending and those kinds of narratives.
45:57More often than not they portrayed
45:59those images that they they featured
46:02images of of folks of color.
46:04So I mean that was a really you know I the,
46:07the. I think that as.
46:10As intellectuals were crafting and
46:12refining a narrative to convince folks
46:15that welfare spending was a bad idea,
46:18they had to kind of go after those
46:21programs that targeted those
46:22populations that had less, you know,
46:25power and agency in in the society.
46:28So as you saw,
46:29like with Louisiana in 1960 when
46:31the issue was framed as hurting
46:33innocent children, it got reversed.
46:35It got rolled back.
46:36But when Mitchell,
46:38Joseph Mitchell and Newberg spun.
46:40The the narrative as where we're
46:42subsidizing all of this immoral
46:44behavior of these you know of these
46:47women quote UN quote then the the
46:49opposition kind of held and and and in
46:51many ways it was sort of the beginning
46:53of a new way of thinking about it.
46:55So in terms of the you know the
46:57details of specific programs and
46:59how that affected those overtime,
47:01I'm not sure I didn't really get
47:03granular with regard to the actual
47:05programs and funding for each
47:06program but I was looking more
47:08at the discourses but you know.
47:10In terms of the attack,
47:11they they featured within their
47:13narratives things that they knew they
47:16could sort of tap into and exploit.
47:18Things like popular resentment right
47:20around things like the changing family
47:23structure and gender roles and, you know,
47:25the gains made in civil rights and,
47:27you know,
47:28black liberation movements
47:29and things like that.
47:30I hope that answers your question somewhat.
47:33Thank you.
47:35Darren,
47:35thank you so much for that and that
47:37was a wonderful synthesis and I've
47:39certainly learned a lot from the
47:40from your presentation as someone
47:42who's not from America and Julia
47:43Zane has a question in the chat and
47:45she was wondering to what extent
47:47do you think the Immigration Act
47:49of 1965 and also played a part in
47:52politicians movement to attack black
47:54communities and welfare programs.
47:56You know, it's interesting. With the the.
48:00The wave of immigration that happens
48:02in the 60s and and the destination
48:04country are not destination the
48:06countries folks are coming from being
48:09predominantly Latin America and Asia,
48:11they're able to weave into the narrative.
48:14Um, you know,
48:16the issue of immigration somewhat,
48:18but it's not something for whatever reason
48:21that that is featured nearly as much as,
48:23you know the the culture of poverty stuff
48:25and black communities and and all of that.
48:28I think that for a lot of.
48:31You know, a lot of these figures
48:33that were that were engaged in this
48:35discourse and in these debates,
48:37they saw a lot what was happening
48:39in a lot of the immigrant
48:41communities actually were were they,
48:42they saw it as people conforming to the sort
48:45of achievement ethos and that kind of thing.
48:47So they didn't feature as prominently
48:49in their negative characterizations.
48:50And just if I may,
48:52while I still have the microphone,
48:53I was just wondering you, you,
48:55you started by presenting,
48:56you know,
48:57the kind of per capita investment in
49:00welfare across different countries.
49:01And I'm just.
49:02Interested in your research?
49:03Have you looked at any kind of cross
49:05cultural or country specific analysis
49:07of of narratives on poverty and how
49:09they differ between countries that
49:11invest heavily in social welfare
49:13programs versus the United States?
49:15Yeah,
49:15so the countries that are most like us
49:18but they're still the welfare states
49:20of say Canada and UK for example,
49:23are still much more expansive
49:25than that of the United States,
49:28but they're closer to us than
49:30say our central European and
49:32Northern European counterparts.
49:33Remember in in the UK when the Reagan
49:36Revolution is happening here the
49:38Thatcher revolution is happening there.
49:40And you know I I I kind of mentioned
49:42briefly the think tanks when I had
49:44to cut this down to 35 minutes
49:46I had a whole thing on the think
49:47tanks that I could get into it.
49:49But you know there's there's a guy
49:52named Anthony Fisher in England he
49:54was kind of like the Frank Perdue
49:56of England he he ran like a chicken
49:58operation and he had a lot of money and
50:00he decided to get into politics and.
50:02They started the Institute
50:04for Economic Affairs,
50:05which was one of the first think
50:07tanks in England that kind of was
50:09looking at these sorts of issues.
50:11And there were a whole host of,
50:13and this was under the influence of one
50:15of the libertarians I mentioned before,
50:17Friedrich von Hayek.
50:18He told people interested
50:20in addressing this issue.
50:22He said, listen,
50:23don't talk to the politicians,
50:25but talk to the professors,
50:26talk to the intellectuals,
50:27go into the arena of ideas,
50:29because that's that's where
50:30you can make a difference.
50:32And it was him and.
50:33And Milton Friedman and
50:35others who started what?
50:36It wasn't the first political think tank,
50:38but it was the first one
50:40that was dedicated to
50:41advancing a kind of singular
50:44political objective, right?
50:45And that was the Palaran society
50:47and that became kind of the
50:49blueprint for later think tank.
50:50So the IEA in England is really
50:55effective at demonizing, you know,
50:57folks who are struggling there and,
50:59you know, allocations for public
51:02housing get cut somewhat.
51:03Um, the healthcare system doesn't
51:05really get touched so much.
51:06Taxes get reduced for the
51:07wealthy and the affluent,
51:09but it's not nearly to the extent
51:11that happened here and there.
51:12There were at least 6 to 8 other
51:14think tanks after the IEA that that
51:17were created by Anthony Fisher that
51:19we're doing the same kind of work
51:21both in the US and in in in the UK
51:24and Canada and you know the in 19.
51:29Gosh, I think it was,
51:30this was the late 1980s.
51:32Margaret Thatcher actually,
51:35you know,
51:35granted a Lordship to the director of
51:37the IEA saying that without them and
51:39without the work of the think tanks that,
51:41you know,
51:42their revolution wouldn't have been possible.
51:45So, yeah, but, you know,
51:48it's interesting.
51:49I,
51:49I had a slide and I cut it again for
51:52time that looked at support in the
51:55European countries for welfare spending.
51:57And whereas in the US we're
51:59consistently at about a 60%,
52:01sixty five sometimes close to
52:0470% rate of opposition towards
52:06towards expanding welfare programs.
52:08And the the way the questions are
52:10worded I mean we can get granular with
52:12like well what does that really mean
52:14and all of that but it's what we have there.
52:16It's kind of the it's kind of
52:19the way it looked like here.
52:22In the early 1960s.
52:25So they,
52:26you know,
52:27some of the lowest support
52:29for welfare programs are in,
52:30if I'm remembering correctly,
52:32believe it or not Switzerland,
52:33even though they have an extensive welfare
52:35state and some of the other country,
52:36I think because it's extensive some
52:38there's a little more opposition,
52:41but that's about 65% support
52:44with about 35% opposition.
52:46That's still a drastic change from the US
52:49and Luxembourg actually has like 90% support.
52:52And that's about the range about 65% to
52:5590 compared to what it is in the US.
52:58Which is about 30% in any odd year,
53:0030 to 40.
53:02And
53:02I think we have one last question
53:04that we can take sort of on this.
53:05Apologies if I rambled there, but.
53:08But remember please that Doctor
53:10Brennan's going to linger.
53:11So if you have other questions,
53:12please stay around and and ask him but this.
53:17I thank you for your talk.
53:19I was curious,
53:20you mentioned a bunch about the
53:22media and control of magazines and
53:25narratives like that and I was
53:27wondering if you've noticed or you've
53:30seen a change in trends of public
53:33opinion with the rise of social media
53:36and having more individuals be have
53:38larger platforms or if that's still
53:41largely controlled by the billionaires
53:43they're owning these companies
53:46that's. An excellent question.
53:47I'm by no means a social media expert,
53:51even though I threw my,
53:52you know, my ads up there.
53:53But. Feel free to reach out,
53:56but it's interesting,
53:57you know, in 2012,
53:59Newt Gingrich makes a run for the presidency.
54:01He's, he's, he wants to,
54:03he's in the the the group of
54:06Republican presidential hopefuls to
54:08run against Barack Obama in 2012.
54:11And he kind of gets caught up in a
54:14he makes a speech somewhere and he
54:16and he uses the same kind of language
54:18that he and others did in the 1990s
54:21with regard to welfare programs.
54:23And he alluded to the fact that.
54:25Poor folks in black communities
54:27had used strange language.
54:28He said something like that.
54:29They have no habituation to work and
54:31they don't see anybody go to work.
54:34On Monday morning,
54:34he said something along those
54:36lines and he got a real backlash,
54:37actually on social media and
54:39and his his approval ratings.
54:42He was considered a frontrunner in the
54:44beginning of the primaries in 2012.
54:46His approval ratings came down somewhat
54:48with the midterm elections that just passed.
54:51You know, I I tuned into Fox News just
54:53to see what the discourse was and.
54:55There was a there was a particular
54:57analyst I can't remember his name
54:59who was really laboring over the
55:01fact that single women just didn't
55:03turn out for the Republicans to and
55:05and and the split was like 38 points
55:07and his response to that is sounded
55:09so much like the language around
55:11welfare reform years ago he said I
55:13think we need he said something like
55:14we need to get these women married or
55:16something like that and I was like
55:18really that's your take home point
55:20and he got and what's interesting
55:21is is that that was very common
55:24discourse back when in fact the.
55:26The language of the bill has all
55:27of this stuff in the beginning,
55:29where it's like.
55:30You know,
55:30whereas marriage is the cornerstone of what,
55:34you know of society.
55:35And this is the idea was,
55:37you know,
55:38really to encourage women to be an intact
55:40relationships regardless of the consequences,
55:43regardless of the the
55:44quality of the relationship,
55:45the demonization of single
55:47motherhood and everything.
55:48And it was almost refreshing
55:50that the day after he mentioned
55:52that with regard to the midterms,
55:54I mean,
55:54he was crucified on social media for it.
55:56And a lot of that discourse
55:58now sounds just absolutely.
56:00You know just medieval and I think
56:03that's because of you know people
56:05on social media are are you know
56:07the in in some ways I mean we
56:09all know that the downside of it.
56:11But in some ways the you know the
56:13the arena of ideas has become more
56:15democratized and that's a good
56:17thing but the narratives are still
56:19constrained you know the build back
56:22better act turned into the Inflation
56:24Reduction Act and like was cut
56:26in more more than more more than
56:28by half and a lot of things taken
56:29out and that was mostly because of.
56:31Disagreement among Democrats,
56:33not even, you know,
56:35because of the the negotiations
56:37happening across the party line.
56:38So the narratives are still
56:41constrained in ways that I think
56:43are important and related to this.
56:45But I think they're giving way a bit,
56:46and I think social media has
56:48played somewhat of a role. Yeah,
56:50well, clearly there's lots we
56:52can continue to talk about.
56:53And again, you know,
56:54if you're able to stay, please do.
56:56Thank you to everyone who tuned in on Zoom.
56:59Everyone here, please know that you
57:01are such an integral part to all
57:03of our missions here at the center,
57:05and we're so grateful to have
57:08such a wonderful community.
57:09And thank you for showing
57:10up and enjoy your break.