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Lawrence M. Mead | |
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Born | |
Education | Amherst College (B.A., 1966) Harvard University (M.A., 1968; Ph.D., 1973) |
Occupation | Political scientist |
Employer | New York University |
Known for | Arguing that employment is an obligation of citizenship. |
Notable work | Beyond Entitlement: The Social Obligations of Citizenship, The New Politics of Poverty: The Nonworking Poor in America |
Title | Professor of Politics and Public Policy |
Political party | Republican |
Lawrence M. Mead III (born 1943) is a professor of politics and public policy at New York University (NYU). [1]
Born in Huntington, New York, Mead graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. from Amherst College in 1966, and from Harvard University with an M.A. and Ph.D. in 1968 and 1973. [2]
Mead has taught at New York University (NYU) since 1979. He has been a visiting professor at the University of Wisconsin (1987), Harvard University (1993-4) and Princeton University (1994-5). He was a visiting fellow at Princeton (1995-6, 2001-2) and the Hoover Institution at Stanford (1988). Mead was Deputy Director of Research for the Republican National Committee in 1978–79, a research associate at the Urban Institute from 1975 to 1978, a speechwriter to Secretary of State Henry Kissinger in 1974–75, and a policy analyst at the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare from 1973 to 1975. [2]
Mead has written on poverty and welfare in the United States. In the books he wrote between 1986 and 2004, he provided the main theoretical basis for the American welfare reform of the 1990s, which required adult welfare recipients to work as a condition of aid. His books have influenced welfare reform in Europe, Australia, and New Zealand. [3]
Mead has written six books, coauthored three books, and edited or co-edited two others, all on poverty and/or government welfare policies. Government Matters, his study of welfare reform in Wisconsin, was a co-winner of the 2005 Louis Brownlow Book Award, given by the National Academy of Public Administration. [4] Mead has published dozens of articles on poverty, welfare, program implementation, and related subjects in scholarly journals, such as the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, Public Administration Review, The Public Interest and the Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. His book reviews and commentaries have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and other outlets. [2]
Mead believes that welfare should be means-tested, so as to encourage behaviors among aid recipients to alleviate their poverty. According to Mead, extreme poverty is more commonly found in minority groups not because of a lack work ethic. Rather, he argues that their belief in work unfortunately does not sufficiently bind their actions. This assessment is identical to JD Vance's assessment of poor, white Appalachians in his book Hillbilly Elegy. Hence, Mead argues "[t]he ideal in welfare... is to link benefits as tightly as possible to work. That requires a clear work test that employable recipients must meet as soon as they apply for aid, not sometime later. Equally important, there must be ample benefits to support working, particularly child and health care." [5]
On July 21, 2020, Mead published a commentary in the journal Society titled "Poverty and Culture" based on ideas from his 2019 book Burdens of Freedom but also found in his 1983 book, Beyond Entitlement. [6] In the paper, he wrote that extreme poverty is found amongst Black and Hispanic people in the United States more often than white people because they "typically respond only weakly to chances to get ahead through education and work" due to cultural differences in adapting to the United States' "individualist culture", a culture he posits derives from Europe. He repeated his hypothesis that while impoverished minorities do value work, their values do not sufficiently guide their actions. [7] The paper drew widespread outrage [8] [9] from the academic community for allegedly perpetuating racist, xenophobic and classist stereotypes, [10] and multiple petitions circulated requesting a retraction. [9] NYU issued a statement expressing its rejection of "false, prejudicial, and stigmatizing assertions about the culture of communities of color in the United States" in his paper. [11] The journal publisher launched an investigation, and on July 31 the editor-in-chief retracted the paper and apologized for publishing it. [7]
John Philippe Rushton was a Canadian psychologist and author. He taught at the University of Western Ontario until the early 1990s, and became known to the general public during the 1980s and 1990s for research on race and intelligence, race and crime, and other purported racial correlations.
A welfare state is a form of government in which the state protects and promotes the economic and social well-being of its citizens, based upon the principles of equal opportunity, equitable distribution of wealth, and public responsibility for citizens unable to avail themselves of the minimal provisions for a good life.
In academic publishing, a retraction is a mechanism by which a published paper in an academic journal is flagged for being seriously flawed to the extent that their results and conclusions can no longer be relied upon. Retracted articles are not removed from the published literature but marked as retracted. In some cases it may be necessary to remove an article from publication, such as when the article is clearly defamatory, violates personal privacy, is the subject of a court order, or might pose a serious health risk to the general public.
The underclass is the segment of the population that occupies the lowest possible position in a class hierarchy, below the core body of the working class. This group is usually considered cut off from the rest of the society.
In economics, a cycle of poverty, poverty trap or generational poverty is when poverty seems to be inherited, preventing subsequent generations from escaping it. It is caused by self-reinforcing mechanisms that cause poverty, once it exists, to persist unless there is outside intervention. It can persist across generations, and when applied to developing countries, is also known as a development trap.
The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA) is a United States federal law passed by the 104th United States Congress and signed into law by President Bill Clinton. The bill implemented major changes to U.S. social welfare policy, replacing the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program with the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program.
Robert Allen Katzmann was a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He served as chief judge from September 1, 2013, to August 31, 2020.
Brian Wansink is an American former professor and researcher who worked in consumer behavior and marketing research. He was the executive director of the USDA's Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion (CNPP) from 2007 to 2009 and held the John S. Dyson Endowed Chair in the Applied Economics and Management Department at Cornell University, where he directed the Cornell Food and Brand Lab.
"Welfare queen" is a derogatory term used in the United States to describe individuals who are perceived to misuse or abuse the welfare system, often through fraudulent means, child endangerment, or manipulation. The media's coverage of welfare fraud began in the early 1960s and was featured in general-interest publications such as Reader's Digest. The term gained widespread recognition following media reporting in 1974 regarding the case of Linda Taylor. It was further popularized by Ronald Reagan during Reagan's 1976 presidential campaign when he frequently embellished Taylor's story in his speeches.
Chester Evans "Checker" Finn Jr. is a former professor of education, an educational policy analyst, and a former United States Assistant Secretary of Education. He is currently the president emeritus of the nonprofit Thomas B. Fordham Foundation in Washington, D.C. He is also Volker Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution where he chairs the Working Group on Good American Citizenship. He was also a member of the Maryland Kirwan Commission on Education during its authorization period from 2016 to 2019.
Joshua Morris Epstein is Professor of Epidemiology at the New York University College of Global Public Health. Formerly Professor of Emergency Medicine at Johns Hopkins University, with joint appointments in the departments of Applied Mathematics, Economics, Biostatistics, International Health, and Environmental Health Sciences and the Director of the JHU Center for Advanced Modeling in the Social, Behavioral, and Health Sciences. He is an External Professor at the Santa Fe Institute, a member of the New York Academy of Sciences, and a member of the Institute of Medicine's Committee on Identifying and Prioritizing New Preventive Vaccines.
Robert Larkin Doar is an American academic, businessman, and former public administrator serving as the president of the American Enterprise Institute. His research focuses on federal and state antipoverty policies and safety net programs.
Welfare culture refers to the behavioral consequences of providing poverty relief to low-income individuals. Welfare is considered a type of social protection, which may come in the form of remittances, such as 'welfare checks', or subsidized services, such as free/reduced healthcare, affordable housing, and more. Pierson (2006) has acknowledged that, like poverty, welfare creates behavioral ramifications, and that studies differ regarding whether welfare empowers individuals or breeds dependence on government aid. Pierson also acknowledges that the evidence of the behavioral effects of welfare varies across countries, because different countries implement different systems of welfare.
Kathryn J. Edin, is an American sociologist and a professor of sociology and public affairs at the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University. She specializes in the study of people living on welfare. Two of her books are Making ends meet: how single mothers survive welfare and low-wage work, and Promises I can keep: why poor women put motherhood before marriage.
Welfare dependency is the state in which a person or household is reliant on government welfare benefits for their income for a prolonged period of time, and without which they would not be able to meet the expenses of daily living. The United States Department of Health and Human Services defines welfare dependency as the proportion of all individuals in families which receive more than 50 percent of their total annual income from Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), food stamps, and/or Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits. Typically viewed as a social problem, it has been the subject of major welfare reform efforts since the mid-20th century, primarily focused on trying to make recipients self-sufficient through paid work. While the term "welfare dependency" can be used pejoratively, for the purposes of this article it shall be used to indicate a particular situation of persistent poverty.
Sanjiv M. Ravi Kanbur, is T.H. Lee Professor of World Affairs, International Professor of Applied Economics, and Professor of Economics at Cornell University. He worked for the World Bank for almost two decades and was the director of the World Development Report.
Jeanne Theoharis is a Distinguished Professor of Political Science at Brooklyn College.
The Family Assistance Plan (FAP) was a welfare program introduced by President Richard Nixon in August 1969, which aimed to implement a negative income tax for households with working parents. The FAP was influenced by President Lyndon B. Johnson's War on Poverty program that aimed to expand welfare across all American citizens, especially for working-class Americans. Nixon intended for the FAP to replace existing welfare programs such as the Aid to Assist Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program as a way to attract conservative voters that were beginning to become wary of welfare while maintaining middle-class constituencies. The FAP specifically provided aid assistance to working-class Americans, dividing benefits based on age, the number of children, family income, and eligibility. Initially, the Nixon administration thought the FAP legislation would easily pass through the House of Representatives and the more liberal Senate, as both chambers were controlled by the Democratic Party. In June 1971, the FAP under the bill H.R. 1 during the 92nd Congress, passed in the House of Representatives. However, from December 1971 to June 1972 H.R.1 bill that included the FAP underwent scrutiny in the Senate chamber, particularly by the Senate Finance Committee controlled by the conservative Democrats, while the Republicans were also reluctant on passing the program. Eventually, on October 5 of 1972, a revised version of H.R.1 passed the Senate with a vote of 68-5 that only authorized funding for FAP testing before its implementation. During House-Senate reconciliation, before Nixon signed the bill on October 15, 1972, the entire provision on FAP was dropped. The FAP enjoyed broad support from Americans across different regions. Reception towards the program varied across racial, regional, income, and gender differences. The FAP is best remembered for beginning the rhetoric against the expansion of welfare that was popular during the New Deal. It initiated the support for anti-welfare conservative movements that became mainstream in American political discourse during the Reagan era.
Lilian Brandt (1873–1951) was an American author, historian, philanthropist, and social reformer. She is noted for her involvement in social welfare-related projects, particularly her works that compiled and interpreted statistical and factual information for social workers. Brandt was also a historian of the Russell Sage Foundation.
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: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of January 2025 (link) (Retracted, see doi:10.1007/s12115-020-00496-1, Retraction Watch)