The Trump administration has a new argument for dismantling the social safety net: It worked.
By Jeff Stein and Tracy Jan
July 13 at 8:11 PM
Republicans for years have proclaimed the federal governments decades-old War on Poverty a failure.
Americans are no better off today than they were before the War on Poverty began in 1964, House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) wrote in his 2016 plan to dramatically scale back the federal safety net.
Now the Trump administration is pitching a new message on anti-poverty programs, saying efforts that Republicans had long condemned as ineffective have already worked.
The White House in a report this week declared the War on Poverty largely over and a success, arguing that few Americans are truly poor only about 3 percent of the population and that the booming economy is the best path upward for those who remain in poverty.
Over the past 54 years since President Lyndon B. Johnsons declaration of a War on Poverty, federal spending on welfare programs targeting low-income households has grown dramatically, contributing to a substantial reduction in material hardship, the White House Council of Economic Advisers wrote, saying that poverty had fallen by 90 percent since the programs began.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/white-house-declares-war-on-poverty-largely-over-amid-push-to-revamp-social-programs/2018/07/13/8f9536ea-86b2-11e8-8f6c-46cb43e3f306_story.html