How Not To Be Poor

Hold the presses! A new study has discovered the best tool to fight poverty. It’s called a job. OK, that’s not really news, at least not for readers of these pages. But this time the study comes from a leftleaning group, the Urban Institute, which recognizes that job growth is the best single cure for poverty.

The study looked at seven different antipoverty tools: “transitional jobs” programs, minimumwage hikes, direct subsidies, etc. Of these, it found programs that provide real jobs had “the largest impact,” cutting the poverty rate 25 percent. Yes, other methods also cut poverty. Yet no single tool worked better than actually placing an unemployed worker directly in a job.

Why? Because even entrylevel jobs offer invaluable experience that can be parlayed into longerterm gigs. They also teach folks without such experience what employers expect from workers (like showing up on time). And let’s not overlook how jobs give people the dignity that comes from providing for themselves and their families rather than having to rely on a handout.

All this might seem simple common sense. But too many progressives never seem to grasp this. Instead, they repeatedly favor more government programs over faster economic — and job — growth. Who can forget, for instance, when Bronx President Ruben Diaz famously dissed “the notion that any job is better than no job,” as he moved to kill 1,200 jobs in his borough?

Will progressives now agree that the best way to fight poverty is for them to get out of the way and let business create opportunities for people to take control of their lives and rise up the economic ladder?