Download or read book The Working Poor written by David K. Shipler and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2008-11-12 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the author of the Pulitzer Prize–winning Arab and Jew, an intimate portrait unfolds of working American families struggling against insurmountable odds to escape poverty. "This is clearly one of those seminal books that every American should read and read now." —The New York Times Book Review As David K. Shipler makes clear in this powerful, humane study, the invisible poor are engaged in the activity most respected in American ideology—hard, honest work. But their version of the American Dream is a nightmare: low-paying, dead-end jobs; the profound failure of government to improve upon decaying housing, health care, and education; the failure of families to break the patterns of child abuse and substance abuse. Shipler exposes the interlocking problems by taking us into the sorrowful, infuriating, courageous lives of the poor—white and black, Asian and Latino, citizens and immigrants. We encounter them every day, for they do jobs essential to the American economy. This impassioned book not only dissects the problems, but makes pointed, informed recommendations for change. It is a book that stands to make a difference.
Download or read book Working with the Poor written by Bryant L. Myers and published by Authentic and World Vision. This book was released on 2008-06 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How do Christian practitioners express authentically holistic transformational development? This is the challenge to World Vision development practitioners and to all non-government organizations concerned about community development that addresses the whole person and the entire community. This dilemma is rooted in the western assumption that the physical and spiritual realms are separate and distinct from one another. Such a dichotomy leads to a belief among practitioners that restoring people's relationship with God has nothing to do with restoring just political, social and economic relationships among people. Even Christians often believe God's redemptive work takes place in the spiritual realm, while the world is seemingly left to the devil. But the Bible never separates the physical from the spiritual - the rule of God permeates both. In this volume, development practitioners struggle to overcome the problem of dualism and find a way toward a more genuinely holistic approach to helping the poor. Experienced development practitioners reflect on: - Understanding poverty - Participatory learning and action - Appreciative inquiry - The Bible and transformational development - Sustainable economic development - Community transformation in the urban context - Community development and peacebuilding Everyone wanting to engage in transformational development will find new insights and essential learnings from these hands-on practitioners.
Download or read book Working Hard Working Poor written by Gary S. Fields and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2011-07-01 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: More than three billion people in the world live on less than two-and-a-half U.S. dollars per person per day. In this book, Gary Fields explains how the poor work, how they have improved their self-employment earning opportunities, how poor-country governments can stimulate more inclusive economic growth, and how they can be aided.
Download or read book Working and Poor written by Rebecca M. Blank and published by Russell Sage Foundation. This book was released on 2007-01-09 with total page 447 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over the last three decades, large-scale economic developments, such as technological change, the decline in unionization, and changing skill requirements, have exacted their biggest toll on low-wage workers. These workers often possess few marketable skills and few resources with which to support themselves during periods of economic transition. In Working and Poor, a distinguished group of economists and policy experts, headlined by editors Rebecca Blank, Sheldon Danziger, and Robert Schoeni, examine how economic and policy changes over the last twenty-five years have affected the well-being of low-wage workers and their families. Working and Poor examines every facet of the economic well-being of less-skilled workers, from employment and earnings opportunities to consumption behavior and social assistance policies. Rebecca Blank and Heidi Schierholz document the different trends in work and wages among less-skilled women and men. Between 1979 and 2003, labor force participation rose rapidly for these women, along with more modest increases in wages, while among the men both employment and wages fell. David Card and John DiNardo review the evidence on how technological changes have affected less-skilled workers and conclude that the effect has been smaller than many observers claim. Philip Levine examines the effectiveness of the Unemployment Insurance program during recessions. He finds that the program's eligibility rules, which deny benefits to workers who have not met minimum earnings requirements, exclude the very people who require help most and should be adjusted to provide for those with the highest need. On the other hand, Therese J. McGuire and David F. Merriman show that government help remains a valuable source of support during economic downturns. They find that during the most recent recession in 2001, when state budgets were stretched thin, legislatures resisted political pressure to cut spending for the poor. Working and Poor provides a valuable analysis of the role that public policy changes can play in improving the plight of the working poor. A comprehensive analysis of trends over the last twenty-five years, this book provides an invaluable reference for the public discussion of work and poverty in America. A Volume in the National Poverty Center Series on Poverty and Public Policy
Download or read book Unpoverty written by Mark Lutz and published by . This book was released on 2010-08-01 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Author, Mark Lutz, conveys true stories of the working poor he's met through the years. Lutz discovered that all they needed was a chance to help themselves. When given that opportunity, the author watched these innovative people undo the chains of poverty-often with a large ripple effect that impacted their communities.
Download or read book When Helping Hurts written by Steve Corbett and published by Moody Publishers. This book was released on 2014-01-24 with total page 355 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With more than 450,000 copies in print, When Helping Hurts is a paradigm-forming contemporary classic on the subject of poverty alleviation. Poverty is much more than simply a lack of material resources, and it takes much more than donations and handouts to solve it. When Helping Hurts shows how some alleviation efforts, failing to consider the complexities of poverty, have actually (and unintentionally) done more harm than good. But it looks ahead. It encourages us to see the dignity in everyone, to empower the materially poor, and to know that we are all uniquely needy—and that God in the gospel is reconciling all things to himself. Focusing on both North American and Majority World contexts, When Helping Hurts provides proven strategies for effective poverty alleviation, catalyzing the idea that sustainable change comes not from the outside in, but from the inside out.
Download or read book The Working Poor in Europe written by Hans-Jürgen Andreß and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2008-01-01 with total page 335 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book provides important findings on the link between institutions and in-work poverty. The volume makes a significant contribution to this strand of literature as evidence on cross-country differences is scarce. The combination of case studies and comparative quantitative investigations is an interesting approach. Annekatrin Niebuhr, Papers in Regional Science This data-rich book explores the causes of in-work poverty in Europe. . . The balanced provision of theoretical insights and strong empirical support will prove useful to poverty scholars and policymakers alike. Contemporary Sociology A book on in-work poverty could not be timelier. . . At a time when many of the working poor are likely to become the non-working poor this book is a must-read. Zoë Irving, Journal of Social Policy This volume represents a valuable contribution to debates on welfare states, public policy, poverty and social exclusion. It is an empirically rich and analytically robust comparative collection, highlighting the variations between and contradictions of in-work poverty across Europe. Patricia Kennett, University of Bristol, UK For a long time in-work poverty was not associated with European welfare states. Recently, the topic has gained relevance as welfare state retrenchment and international competition in globalized economies has put increasing pressures on individuals and families. This book provides explanations as to why in-work poverty is high in certain countries and low in others. Much of the present concern about the working poor has to do with recent changes in labour market policies in Europe. However, this book is not primarily about low pay. Instead, it questions whether gainful employment is sufficient to earn a living both for oneself and for one s family members. There are, however, great differences between European countries. This book argues that the incidence and structure of the working poor cannot be understood without a thorough understanding of each country s institutional context. This includes the system of wage-setting, the level of decommodification provided by the social security system and the structure of families and households. Combining cross-country studies with in-depth analyses from a national perspective, the book reveals that in-work poverty in Europe is a diverse, multi-faceted phenomenon occurring in equally diverse institutional, economic and socio-demographic settings. With its rich detail and conclusions, this genuinely comparative study will be of interest to academics and researchers of labour and welfare economics, social policy and European studies as well as to policy advisers.
Download or read book Jobs for the Poor written by Timothy J. Bartik and published by Russell Sage Foundation. This book was released on 2001-06-11 with total page 486 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Even as the United States enjoys a booming economy and historically low levels of unemployment, millions of Americans remain out of work or underemployed, and joblessness continues to plague many urban communities, racial minorities, and people with little education. In Jobs for the Poor, Timothy Bartik calls for a dramatic shift in the way the United States confronts this problem. Today, most efforts to address this problem focus on ways to make workers more employable, such as job training and welfare reform. But Bartik argues that the United States should put more emphasis on ways to increase the interest of employers in creating jobs for the poor—or the labor demand side of the labor market. Bartik's bases his case for labor demand policies on a comprehensive review of the low-wage labor market. He examines the effectiveness of government interventions in the labor market, such as Welfare Reform, the Earned Income Tax Credit, and Welfare-to-Work programs, and asks if having a job makes a person more employable. Bartik finds that public service employment and targeted employer wage subsidies can increase employment among the poor. In turn, job experience significantly increases the poor's long-run earnings by enhancing their skills and reputation with employers. And labor demand policies can avoid causing inflation or displacing other workers by targeting high-unemployment labor markets and persons who would otherwise be unemployed. Bartik concludes by proposing a large-scale labor demand program. One component of the program would give a tax credit to employers in areas of high unemployment. To provide disadvantaged workers with more targeted help, Bartik also recommends offering short-term subsidies to employers—particularly small businesses and nonprofit organizations—that hire people who otherwise would be unlikely to find jobs. With experience from subsidized jobs, the new workers should find it easier to obtain future year-round employment. Although these efforts would not catapult poor families into the middle class overnight, Bartik offers a powerful argument that having a full-time worker in every household would help improve the lives of millions. Jobs for the Poor makes a compelling case that full employment can be achieved if the country has the political will and adopts policies that address both sides of the labor market. Copublished with the W. E. Upjohn Institute for Economic Research
Download or read book Work Consumerism and the New Poor written by Zygmunt Bauman and published by McGraw-Hill Education (UK). This book was released on 2004-09-16 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reviewers’ comments on the first edition “Zygmunt Bauman presents a cogently argued and compelling thesis... an important book from a distinguished scholar, that adds a new dimension to the poverty debate.”British Journal of Sociology “It will be of great interest and value to students, teachers and researchers in sociology and social policy… [Bauman] provides a very forceful and sophisticated statement of the case; and a very well written one too. As a wide ranging analysis of our present discontents it is an admirable example of the sort of challenge which sociology at its best can offer to us and our fellow citizens to re-assess and re-think our current social arrangements.”Work, Employment and Society “This is a stylish and persuasive analysis of the transition between the age of the ‘society of producers’ to that of the ‘society of consumers’.”Political Studies It is one thing to be poor in a society of producers and universal employment; it is quite a different thing to be poor in a society of consumers, in which life projects are built around consumer choices rather than on work, professional skills or jobs. Where ‘being poor’ was once linked to being unemployed, today it draws its meaning primarily from the plight of a flawed consumer. This has a significant effect on the way living in poverty is experienced and on the prospects for redeeming its misery. Work, Consumerism and the New Poor traces this change over the duration of modern history. It makes an inventory of its social consequences, and considers how effective different ways of fighting poverty and relieving its hardships are. The new edition of this seminal work features: Updated coverage of key thinkers in the field Discussion of recent work on redundancy, disposability and exclusion Current thinking on the effects of capital flows on different countries and the changes on the shop floor through, for example, business process re-engineering New material on security and vulnerability Key reading for students and lecturers in sociology, politics and social policy, and those with an interest in contemporary social issues.
Download or read book No Shame in My Game written by Katherine S. Newman and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2009-03-04 with total page 413 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Powerful and poignant.... Newman's message is clear and timely." --The Philadelphia Inquirer In No Shame in My Game, Harvard anthropologist Katherine Newman gives voice to a population for whom work, family, and self-esteem are top priorities despite all the factors that make earning a living next to impossible--minimum wage, lack of child care and health care, and a desperate shortage of even low-paying jobs. By intimately following the lives of nearly 300 inner-city workers and job seekers for two yearsin Harlem, Newman explores a side of poverty often ignored by media and politicians--the working poor. The working poor find dignity in earning a paycheck and shunning the welfare system, arguing that even low-paying jobs give order to their lives. No Shame in My Game gives voice to a misrepresented segment of today's society, and is sure to spark dialogue over the issues surrounding poverty, working and welfare.
Download or read book Walking with the Poor written by Bryant L. Myers and published by Orbis Books. This book was released on 2011 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this revised and updated edition of a modern classic, Bryant Myers shows how Christian mission can contribute to dismantling poverty and social evil. Myers demonstrates what is possible when we cease to treat the spiritual and physical domains of life as separate and unrelated.
Download or read book It s Not Like I m Poor written by Sarah Halpern-Meekin and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2015-01-14 with total page 299 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The world of welfare has changed radically. As the poor trade welfare checks for low-wage jobs, their low earnings qualify them for a hefty check come tax time—a combination of the earned income tax credit and other refunds. For many working parents this one check is like hitting the lottery, offering several months’ wages as well as the hope of investing in a better future. Drawing on interviews with 115 families, the authors look at how parents plan to use this annual cash windfall to build up savings, go back to school, and send their kids to college. However, these dreams of upward mobility are often dashed by the difficulty of trying to get by on meager wages. In accessible and engaging prose, It’s Not Like I’m Poor examines the costs and benefits of the new work-based safety net, suggesting ways to augment its strengths so that more of the working poor can realize the promise of a middle-class life.
Download or read book Hand to Mouth written by Linda Tirado and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2015-09-01 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The real-life Nickel and Dimed—the author of the wildly popular “Poverty Thoughts” essay tells what it’s like to be working poor in America. ONE OF THE FIVE MOST IMPORTANT BOOKS OF THE YEAR--Esquire “DEVASTATINGLY SMART AND FUNNY. I am the author of Nickel and Dimed, which tells the story of my own brief attempt, as a semi-undercover journalist, to survive on low-wage retail and service jobs. TIRADO IS THE REAL THING.”—Barbara Ehrenreich, from the Foreword As the haves and have-nots grow more separate and unequal in America, the working poor don’t get heard from much. Now they have a voice—and it’s forthright, funny, and just a little bit furious. Here, Linda Tirado tells what it’s like, day after day, to work, eat, shop, raise kids, and keep a roof over your head without enough money. She also answers questions often asked about those who live on or near minimum wage: Why don’t they get better jobs? Why don’t they make better choices? Why do they smoke cigarettes and have ugly lawns? Why don’t they borrow from their parents? Enlightening and entertaining, Hand to Mouth opens up a new and much-needed dialogue between the people who just don’t have it and the people who just don’t get it.
Download or read book Nickel and Dimed written by Barbara Ehrenreich and published by Metropolitan Books. This book was released on 2010-04-01 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The New York Times bestselling work of undercover reportage from our sharpest and most original social critic, with a new foreword by Matthew Desmond, author of Evicted Millions of Americans work full time, year round, for poverty-level wages. In 1998, Barbara Ehrenreich decided to join them. She was inspired in part by the rhetoric surrounding welfare reform, which promised that a job—any job—can be the ticket to a better life. But how does anyone survive, let alone prosper, on $6 an hour? To find out, Ehrenreich left her home, took the cheapest lodgings she could find, and accepted whatever jobs she was offered. Moving from Florida to Maine to Minnesota, she worked as a waitress, a hotel maid, a cleaning woman, a nursing-home aide, and a Wal-Mart sales clerk. She lived in trailer parks and crumbling residential motels. Very quickly, she discovered that no job is truly "unskilled," that even the lowliest occupations require exhausting mental and muscular effort. She also learned that one job is not enough; you need at least two if you int to live indoors. Nickel and Dimed reveals low-rent America in all its tenacity, anxiety, and surprising generosity—a land of Big Boxes, fast food, and a thousand desperate stratagems for survival. Read it for the smoldering clarity of Ehrenreich's perspective and for a rare view of how "prosperity" looks from the bottom. And now, in a new foreword, Matthew Desmond, author of Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City, explains why, twenty years on in America, Nickel and Dimed is more relevant than ever.
Download or read book When Work Disappears written by William Julius Wilson and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2011-06-08 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Wilson, one of our foremost authorities on race and poverty, challenges decades of liberal and conservative pieties to look squarely at the devastating effects that joblessness has had on our urban ghettos. Marshaling a vast array of data and the personal stories of hundreds of men and women, Wilson persuasively argues that problems endemic to America's inner cities--from fatherless households to drugs and violent crime--stem directly from the disappearance of blue-collar jobs in the wake of a globalized economy. Wilson's achievement is to portray this crisis as one that affects all Americans, and to propose solutions whose benefits would be felt across our society. At a time when welfare is ending and our country's racial dialectic is more strained than ever, When Work Disappears is a sane, courageous, and desperately important work. "Wilson is the keenest liberal analyst of the most perplexing of all American problems...[This book is] more ambitious and more accessible than anything he has done before." --The New Yorker
Download or read book Higher Ground written by Greg J. Duncan and published by Russell Sage Foundation. This book was released on 2007-01-11 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During the 1990s, growing demands to end chronic welfare dependency culminated in the 1996 federal "welfare-to-work" reforms. But regardless of welfare reform, the United States has always been home to a large population of working poor—people who remain poor even when they work and do not receive welfare. In a concentrated effort to address the problems of the working poor, a coalition of community activists and business leaders in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, launched New Hope, an experimental program that boosted employment among the city's poor while reducing poverty and improving children's lives. In Higher Ground, Greg Duncan, Aletha Huston, and Thomas Weisner provide a compelling look at how New Hope can serve as a model for national anti-poverty policies. New Hope was a social contract—not a welfare program—in which participants were required to work a minimum of thirty hours a week in order to be eligible for earnings supplements and health and child care subsidies. All participants had access to career counseling and temporary community service jobs. Drawing on evidence from surveys, public records of employment and earnings, in-depth interviews, and ethnographic observation, Higher Ground tells the story of this ambitious three-year social experiment and evaluates how participants fared relative to a control group. The results were highly encouraging. Poverty rates declined among families that participated in the program. Employment and earnings increased among participants who were not initially working full-time, relative to their counterparts in a control group. For those who had faced just one significant barrier to employment (such as a lack of access to child care or a spotty employment history), these gains lasted years after the program ended. Increased income, combined with New Hope's subsidies for child care and health care, brought marked improvements to the well-being and development of participants' children. Enrollment in child care centers increased, and fewer medical needs went unmet. Children performed better in school and exhibited fewer behavioral problems, and gains were particularly dramatic for boys, who are at the greatest risk for poor academic performance and behavioral disorders. As America takes stock of the successes and shortcomings of the Clinton-era welfare reforms, the authors convincingly demonstrate why New Hope could be a model for state and national policies to assist the working poor. Evidence based and insightfully written, Higher Ground illuminates how policymakers can make work pay for families struggling to escape poverty.
Download or read book Broke USA written by Gary Rivlin and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2010-05-25 with total page 472 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the author of the New York Times Notable Book of the Year Drive By comes a unique and riveting exploration of one of America’s largest and fastest-growing industries—the business of poverty. Broke, USA is a Fast Food Nation for the “poverty industry” that will also appeal to readers of Barbara Ehrenreich (Nickel and Dimed) and David Shipler (The Working Poor).
