Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and a welcome to woke F Daily
Speaker 1: with me your girl, Danielle Moody recording from the Long
Speaker 1: Island Bunker. You know, I often say to you that
Speaker 1: you need to take a break so that you do
Speaker 1: not have a breakdown. And with all of the compacted
Speaker 1: crises that we are dealing with at this time and
Speaker 1: making the march to midterms, there never seems like the
Speaker 1: right time to take a break. But I say that
Speaker 1: you have to make that time. And so for me,
Speaker 1: dear friends here on woke F, I am going to
Speaker 1: be taking a much needed vacation so that I can
Speaker 1: rest and recharge as we head into what I believe
Speaker 1: is going to be one of the craziest falls we've
Speaker 1: ever seen. I have left you with eight amazing episodes
Speaker 1: that we have recorded back in twenty twenty one with
Speaker 1: some of the most thoughtful, engaging and insightful commentary that
Speaker 1: looks at our politics, our spiritual nature, our emotional well being,
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Speaker 1: these episodes and these interviews that I think will be
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Speaker 1: the major topics that we consistently discuss here on woke F,
Speaker 1: from racism to gender inequality, to police misconduct to wealth inequality,
Speaker 1: which my God and the need and the need and
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Speaker 1: have been thrown at us over the past couple of years.
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Speaker 1: I really do hope that you enjoy these next eight
Speaker 1: episodes and I will see you with brand new episodes
Speaker 1: after Labor Day. Hey there, I want to tell you
Speaker 1: about another podcast I think you'll love. The Brown Girl's
Speaker 1: Guide to Politics, hosted by a Shanty Goehler, the president
Speaker 1: of Emerge BGG, is the one stop shop for women
Speaker 1: of color who want to hear and talk about the
Speaker 1: world of politics. Join a Shanty this season as she
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Speaker 1: Political Gabfest. As another election season accelerates, it can be
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Speaker 1: Each week on the gap Fest, John Dickerson, Emily Bathalona
Speaker 1: and I decipher the headlines, break down the races, and
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Speaker 1: I'm so excited to be joined on woke Affiddaily with
Speaker 1: the Professor Social Scientists and Herbert S. Hadley, Professor of
Speaker 1: Social Welfare at Brown School at Washington University in Saint Louis,
Speaker 1: Mark Rank, who is also the co author of Poorly
Speaker 1: Understood What America Gets Wrong About Poverty. Mark, thank you
Speaker 1: so much for making the time to join us. I
Speaker 1: think that your book is incredibly important. I have always thought,
Speaker 1: and I've always discussed the fact that we don't have
Speaker 1: the right conversations with regard to poverty in this country.
Speaker 1: We never have, and I frankly believe it's because we
Speaker 1: have set up our government in a way that we
Speaker 1: reinforce white supremacy. So if we tell the tale about
Speaker 1: black and brown people being on the margins of society,
Speaker 1: not deserving, not part of the mainstream, and they are
Speaker 1: the ones that require welfare and require public assistance, then
Speaker 1: we can perpetuate the lie. Right. Your book with your
Speaker 1: co authors kind of blast that wide open. And so
Speaker 1: I want to start off with what are some of
Speaker 1: the common misconceptions and myths that we share as a
Speaker 1: country around poverty. Yeah, well, first, thanks Daniel for having
Speaker 1: me on. There are obviously a lot of different myths
Speaker 1: out there, but I think one to start with is
Speaker 1: this idea that well, poverty is going to affect somebody
Speaker 1: else but not me, that it's an issue of them
Speaker 1: rather than an issue of us. And one of the
Speaker 1: ways we start out in the book is to say, actually,
Speaker 1: if you look across people's lifetimes, majority of Americans at
Speaker 1: some point will experience a year below the official poverty line.
Speaker 1: So between the ages of twenty and seventy five, sixty
Speaker 1: percent of folks will find themselves in poverty, and three
Speaker 1: quarters of Americans will find themselves either in poverty or
Speaker 1: near poverty for at least a year. And this really
Speaker 1: puts a different perspective on it because it says, you know, actually,
Speaker 1: poverty is an issue that affects most of us us
Speaker 1: in one way or another. So that's that's one sort
Speaker 1: of variation on this idea that the myth of poverty
Speaker 1: being an issue of them rather than an issue of us. Um.
Speaker 1: There are many others as well. For example, we often
Speaker 1: our image of poverty is often that of folks of
Speaker 1: color in inner city areas that have been in poverty
Speaker 1: for long periods of time and that are using social
Speaker 1: safety net programs. It turns out, it turns out that
Speaker 1: that's that image is not correct. Actually, most people in
Speaker 1: poverty do not live in high poverty inner city neighborhoods.
Speaker 1: They live in a variety of places. They live in suburbs,
Speaker 1: they live in rural America. So I guess the point
Speaker 1: of this is to say that the reach of poverty
Speaker 1: is very wide, and it affects a lot of folks
Speaker 1: at some point in their lives. Why do you think
Speaker 1: that we, I mean, from your research and the work
Speaker 1: that you've done throughout your career. Is it just the
Speaker 1: storytelling aspect that needs to shift because we've perpetuated the
Speaker 1: lie the media And when I say we, I mean
Speaker 1: the media has perpetuated the lie with regard to poverty
Speaker 1: and what we're seeing, you know. But it's while we
Speaker 1: have this image right of black and brown people in
Speaker 1: the inner city, in these dilapidated communities as being impoverished.
Speaker 1: What we know to be true is that if a
Speaker 1: four hundred dollars bill were to come due in most
Speaker 1: American household, seventy five percent of those households would be
Speaker 1: unable to pay that bill. Right. We know that healthcare
Speaker 1: continues to bankrupt families, which is why we had the
Speaker 1: push for the Affordable Care Act so that you're, regardless
Speaker 1: of your economics suation, you could still get healthcare outside
Speaker 1: of an emergency room. So we know we hold those
Speaker 1: facts while we still perpetuate the lie. And so how
Speaker 1: do you think that we disrupt that? Well, I think
Speaker 1: you know, one thing is is addressing that and addressing
Speaker 1: that with you know, good solid evidence and facts and research,
Speaker 1: which is what I've tried to do throughout my career.
Speaker 1: But I think you know, an interesting question here is
Speaker 1: to step back and to say, look, so we go
Speaker 1: we in the book, we go through all kinds of
Speaker 1: miss and basically show that those myths are not true.
Speaker 1: So the question is, if that's the case, how come
Speaker 1: we continue to hold those myths? Which I think one
Speaker 1: of the things you're asking here, and we can step
Speaker 1: back and say, well, who's benefiting from these myths? Who's
Speaker 1: benefiting from the perpetuation of these miss and I think
Speaker 1: we can point to several different groups. One would be
Speaker 1: political actors and politicians. Politicians have used the issue of
Speaker 1: the undeserving for the lazy person on welfare to score
Speaker 1: political points over and over and over again. So Ronald
Speaker 1: Reagan was infamous in terms of his use of the
Speaker 1: welfare Queen Bill Clinton talked about we want to end
Speaker 1: welfare as we know it. Donald Trump railed against welfare recipients.
Speaker 1: And what that's done is it's scored them political points
Speaker 1: in the American population, and so they've had a vested interests.
Speaker 1: But there's also we could step back and say, you know, actually,
Speaker 1: these myths that the poor are deserving of their situation
Speaker 1: really benefits those on the top because what it says
Speaker 1: is that I don't have any responsibility. It's not my
Speaker 1: problem if you're poor. Whereas if we say, actually, these
Speaker 1: problems are structural. It has to do with our economic policies,
Speaker 1: it has to do with our political and policy programs.
Speaker 1: If we do that, then we have to say, you
Speaker 1: know what, we all have a responsibility in terms of this.
Speaker 1: So I think that's a really important question to ask.
Speaker 1: You know, who's benefiting from these myths? And I would
Speaker 1: argue that the folks that have benefited have been basically
Speaker 1: the folks in power, who are who are content with
Speaker 1: the status quo of widening inequality and more of the
Speaker 1: gains going to those at the top. But doesn't that then, Mark,
Speaker 1: isn't that going to stress our systems even more by
Speaker 1: not looking at the gap that is purposefully being widened.
Speaker 1: I mean, so I want to look at this now
Speaker 1: in the context of the current moment that we're in
Speaker 1: with COVID nineteen, which has created, which has not created,
Speaker 1: but I will say, revealed the inequities that we have
Speaker 1: always known that have existed, right, and we know who
Speaker 1: is bearing the brunt both economically as it pertains to
Speaker 1: business closures, school closures, and all of the kind of
Speaker 1: um points of of of of business and wealth creation
Speaker 1: around these systems that are now shut shuttered right to
Speaker 1: some extent um. But we're seeing through this, through this revelation,
Speaker 1: exactly how broken our system is. And so how do
Speaker 1: you look now at these food lines right at people
Speaker 1: being one paycheck away at the desire of one political
Speaker 1: party not to provide relief because they don't think it's needed. Um,
Speaker 1: how do how do we use this moment to kind
Speaker 1: of to to to as a war shed moment around
Speaker 1: how we look at poverty. Yeah, you know, if you
Speaker 1: look in the past and look at whenever we had
Speaker 1: changes in policies, they've usually come at times of economic turmoil.
Speaker 1: So the nineteen thirties saw the Great Depression, the rise
Speaker 1: of the New Deal, that's when Social Security began, unemployment insurance.
Speaker 1: There was a feeling that there's a structural failing here
Speaker 1: and we need to address it on a federal level,
Speaker 1: and that's what FDR did. We're at a point now
Speaker 1: where we're seeing the same kinds of things because of
Speaker 1: the pandemic. It's kind of pulling the bandage off of
Speaker 1: the scar and um and is showing us just what
Speaker 1: you're saying that you know, there are you know, forty
Speaker 1: fifty percent of folks in this country who don't have
Speaker 1: four hundred dollars to cover an emergency. So so yes,
Speaker 1: I think that you know, we're at a moment in
Speaker 1: time where we can use this to really say, let's
Speaker 1: start thinking about some of these structural issues. But let
Speaker 1: me throw in another thing here that to this, and
Speaker 1: that is, you know, people often will say, well, you know,
Speaker 1: I feel bad about folks in poverty, but again, it
Speaker 1: doesn't really affect me, and I don't really have to
Speaker 1: pay for that. Well, I did a study a couple
Speaker 1: of years ago, and what we tried, and what we
Speaker 1: did in that study was we estimated how much childhood
Speaker 1: poverty in the United States costs us on an annual basis.
Speaker 1: We know that childhood poverty is associated with higher healthcare costs,
Speaker 1: we know it's associated with less economic productivity when children
Speaker 1: become adults, and we know it's related to higher criminal
Speaker 1: justice costs. And so we factored all all those elements
Speaker 1: in and what we found was that childhood poverty costs
Speaker 1: the United States on an annual basis around one trillion dollars.
Speaker 1: To put that in perspective, in twenty fifteen, that was
Speaker 1: twenty eight percent of the entire budget of the entire
Speaker 1: federal budget. And so the point of this is to say,
Speaker 1: it's not like we aren't paying for poverty. What we're doing,
Speaker 1: right is we're paying for it on the back end
Speaker 1: of the problem rather than on the front end of
Speaker 1: the problem. And it's always more effective to deal with
Speaker 1: the problem on the front end. And that's what we
Speaker 1: need to think about here in this moment of the
Speaker 1: pandemic and seeing these kinds of structural failings that are
Speaker 1: going on. We need to invest in our people and
Speaker 1: by doing that, we'll save money in the long run.
Speaker 1: Part of the investment, though, is believing that people are
Speaker 1: worthy of that investment. And I think that we have
Speaker 1: set up a political system where you have one party
Speaker 1: that believes that government can provide abundance living wages, safety nets, security,
Speaker 1: and then you have another party that's like, no, these
Speaker 1: people are undeserving, they want to hand out and we're
Speaker 1: not going to give it to them. And were we
Speaker 1: are the holders of the purse strings, right, And so
Speaker 1: that is a shift in in thinking that needs to
Speaker 1: happen in order to create a shift in policy. How
Speaker 1: does this shift in thinking happen? Yeah, great, great question.
Speaker 1: Here's a way I like to think about this, because
Speaker 1: I think you're exactly right. We need a shift in thinking.
Speaker 1: We need to think about poverty on a different level.
Speaker 1: Here's the example. Let's take the analogy of musical chairs,
Speaker 1: and let's say we've got eight chairs and we have
Speaker 1: ten people playing. They're circling around music stops. Two people
Speaker 1: are going to lose out, and so we ask the
Speaker 1: question who's going to lose out? Well, if we just
Speaker 1: focus on the two folks that lost out, we'll say, well,
Speaker 1: they weren't fast enough, or they were in a bad
Speaker 1: position when the music stopped, and those are all reasons
Speaker 1: for why they lost out. But if we step back
Speaker 1: and we say, wait a minute, the structure of the
Speaker 1: game ensures that two people are going to lose out,
Speaker 1: and therefore those individual characteristics only explain who loses out
Speaker 1: at the game, not why the game produces losers in
Speaker 1: the first place. And what we need to do in
Speaker 1: this country is step back and look at the structure
Speaker 1: of the game and saying why are people losing out.
Speaker 1: They're losing out because we don't have enough jobs that
Speaker 1: can support families at a decent wage. People are losing
Speaker 1: out because we don't have national healthcare, we don't have
Speaker 1: childcare that's available, we don't have programs to protect folks.
Speaker 1: So what we need to do is, instead of saying
Speaker 1: who loses out at the game, let's focus on the
Speaker 1: question of why the game is producing losers in the
Speaker 1: first place. And that's a real paradigm shift that you know,
Speaker 1: I want to sort of promote. Certainly our book is
Speaker 1: advocating for that kind of change. I mean, that is
Speaker 1: a massive That is a massive shift, because essentially what
Speaker 1: you're calling for are the writers of the rules of
Speaker 1: that game to recognize that they created a game purposefully
Speaker 1: so that people would lose out, so that there could
Speaker 1: be winners and losers. And it's and I think about this,
Speaker 1: and again I always go back to there are two
Speaker 1: ways to look at the world. You look at it
Speaker 1: in terms of scarcity. There is not enough, and so
Speaker 1: I need to hoard and have and have mind mind mind,
Speaker 1: or that the world is in fact abundant, and that
Speaker 1: there is more than enough, and we need to create
Speaker 1: structures and so that everything is equitably shared. And I
Speaker 1: just you know, when I think about that, and I think, oh, well,
Speaker 1: that's easy. We just have to make this shift. But
Speaker 1: if that shift means that in some people's mind, the politicians,
Speaker 1: the one percent, that they are losing out, yeah, right,
Speaker 1: that they no longer will benefit from the crooked game
Speaker 1: that they've created, right, but they are the ones that
Speaker 1: are in charge of the game. It's like, how do
Speaker 1: you shift that? Well, you know, yes, you raise really
Speaker 1: good points here, but it's still true that we live
Speaker 1: in a democracy and we do. Now I'm I'm the
Speaker 1: last person to sort of be pie in the sky,
Speaker 1: but we do elect officials to represent the people and
Speaker 1: what we need to do. I mean, things like the
Speaker 1: Black Lives Matter movement is a great example of people
Speaker 1: coming together to say, hey, this needs to change, and
Speaker 1: it's and there has been changed and we're moving towards change.
Speaker 1: We need to do the same thing here with thinking
Speaker 1: about poverty and economic inequality. We need folks to start saying, hey,
Speaker 1: we need to change here. We need to have our
Speaker 1: elected officials pay attention to this. Now, again, that's hard
Speaker 1: to do, but I think you know what we're talking
Speaker 1: you know, democracy really begins with discussions and conversations and
Speaker 1: you talking to people and me talking to people and
Speaker 1: talking on the air to folks. You know, because again,
Speaker 1: as I said, you know, eighty eighty percent of the
Speaker 1: population if you look at what's happened in America over
Speaker 1: the last since really the early nineteen seventies, the bottom
Speaker 1: eighty percent has completely stagnated in terms of economic gains.
Speaker 1: All of those gains have been focused on the top,
Speaker 1: particularly to the top five and one percent. So it's
Speaker 1: like there are a lot of people that this is
Speaker 1: that this should be a key issue, and we should
Speaker 1: think about organizing and getting people to recognize that. Yes, um,
Speaker 1: you know, as you point out that this is a
Speaker 1: rich country. We do have a lot of resources, and
Speaker 1: we certainly can afford to start thinking about some of
Speaker 1: these policies that we don't have. I mean, that's the
Speaker 1: other thing here is that you have to ask yourself,
Speaker 1: why is the United States the only country, the only
Speaker 1: high economy country that does not provide universal healthcare yep,
Speaker 1: that does not provide childcare assistance, that that does not
Speaker 1: provide affordable housing and and I think one of the
Speaker 1: reasons is, you know, our history has been steeped in
Speaker 1: the idea of the rugged individual of reliance. You do
Speaker 1: it on your own, you don't depend on other people,
Speaker 1: and you know, and we need to confront that, and
Speaker 1: we need to say, actually that that is not working.
Speaker 1: That is not working anymore, and we need a new
Speaker 1: way of thinking. You know that one of the last
Speaker 1: questions that I want to ask you by because I
Speaker 1: find this topic. I've always found this topic really fascinating.
Speaker 1: Is this you know I'm looking at it was, I
Speaker 1: think the Global Finance magazine, right, And in twenty twenty
Speaker 1: they put out their list of the top twenty richest countries,
Speaker 1: as they do every single year, America is not in
Speaker 1: the top ten. America is actually number eleven according to
Speaker 1: them and the metrics that they use. Could it be that,
Speaker 1: instead of let's say, trying to convince politicians and the
Speaker 1: one percent to do the right thing for the right
Speaker 1: thing's sake, do we shift a discussion that is about
Speaker 1: America losing right its ability to provide its standing as
Speaker 1: one of the wealthiest nations because of the ways in
Speaker 1: which we have purposefully caught our nose to spite our face,
Speaker 1: meaning that if we were to actually invest in the
Speaker 1: marginalized communities that we demonize right, then we could propel
Speaker 1: our GDP, We could propel our offerings to the world.
Speaker 1: Is that a conversation that we need to have instead
Speaker 1: of you, instead of airing on the side of better
Speaker 1: angels when we know clearly not everyone has better angels. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: I mean yes, we should argue about better angels. But
Speaker 1: there's no question that what you're saying is absolutely on target.
Speaker 1: That our economy is dependent on our workforce and investing
Speaker 1: in our human capital, and what we've been doing for
Speaker 1: so long in this country is writing off a significant
Speaker 1: percentage of our population. So what we need to do
Speaker 1: is we need to invest in our people. That means
Speaker 1: providing healthcare, childcare. It also means providing that every American
Speaker 1: child should get a hop quality education, which is not
Speaker 1: the case when you look at I live in Saint Louis,
Speaker 1: and you go to any metropolitan area and you go
Speaker 1: to a poor neighborhood and you look at the schools
Speaker 1: and the resources available versus a rich community, there's a
Speaker 1: world of difference. That's wrong. That's wrong morally, but that's
Speaker 1: also wrong economically because we're not investing in all of
Speaker 1: our people. And if you look at those countries that
Speaker 1: are doing really well, they do invest in everyone. And
Speaker 1: so I think that's exactly the kind of argument, along
Speaker 1: with these other arguments we've been making, that need that
Speaker 1: that we need to do, we need to make in
Speaker 1: the future. Yeah, I think that you know, we we
Speaker 1: have a tendency to want to appeal to people's moral standing.
Speaker 1: And what we have to understand is that everyone doesn't
Speaker 1: have the same set of morals and the same set
Speaker 1: of values, and that if we are truly going to
Speaker 1: make a difference, it's kind of you know, it's the
Speaker 1: way that you run various media campaigns. It's a way
Speaker 1: that you do target marketing, right. Different people are moved
Speaker 1: by different energies. Yeah, and that's why you know. I
Speaker 1: mentioned earlier the cost of childhood poverty study that I did.
Speaker 1: But here's another thing that came out of that study,
Speaker 1: which is which is a very hard nosed economic argument.
Speaker 1: For every dollar we spend in this country to reduce
Speaker 1: childhood poverty, we would save between seven and twelve dollars
Speaker 1: down the road in saved costs. That's a huge bang
Speaker 1: for your buck. And so by investing in people we
Speaker 1: are more productive economically, we will do better, we will
Speaker 1: save a lot of money down the road, and so
Speaker 1: I think that's a very powerful argument. Mark, I want
Speaker 1: to thank you so much for taking the time to
Speaker 1: join us on woke a f I think that this
Speaker 1: is an incredibly complex issue that needs to be unpacked
Speaker 1: and discussed more. Because I do think that we are
Speaker 1: very distant, very arms length between this seriousness of the
Speaker 1: poverty situation that is unfolding in America, and I think
Speaker 1: is getting worse and was already on track to be
Speaker 1: worse than you know, generations prior. But COVID nineteen has
Speaker 1: really illuminated the discrepancies that we have in wealth creation,
Speaker 1: in wealth building, and access to education, healthcare, all of
Speaker 1: these different things. Who we consider essential, who is not right,
Speaker 1: who is getting vaccinated right now that is on the
Speaker 1: front lines versus those that are just well connected. I
Speaker 1: think that it's an important conversation to have, and I'm
Speaker 1: really glad that you came on Woke a f folks.
Speaker 1: The book is poorly understood what America gets wrong about poverty.
Speaker 1: Mark Rank, thank you so much for making the time
Speaker 1: for us today. Oh you're very welcome. Dan, y'all, thanks
Speaker 1: a lot, as always, dear friends, Power to the people
Speaker 1: and to all the people. Power, get woke and stay
Speaker 1: woke as fuck. See after Labor Day