Dan Mitchell discusses the latest “increase” in the poverty rate here. As the graph illustrates, it all depends on the start date.
But the real story should be the degree to which the federal
government?s War on Poverty has been a complete failure. Taxpayers have
poured trillions of dollars into means-tested programs,
yet the data show no positive results. Indeed, it?s quite likely that
the programs have backfired. As shown in the chart, Census Bureau data
reveal that the poverty rate was steadily falling in the 1950s and
early 1960s, but then stagnated once the War on Poverty began. It?s
possible that there are alternative and/or additional explanations for
this shocking development, but government intervention may be
encouraging poverty by making indolence more attractive than work.
