Wednesday, January 21st, 2009
Mother Jones
I’ve got an article in the new issue of Mother Jones on Barack Obama’s poverty platform:
The bigger question is whether Obama, once in office, will conclude that the government can’t now afford this kind of bold initiative. It may be that the plan will be put on hold for a year or two, until the worst of the downturn passes. But Obama, drawing on the research of his Hyde Park neighbor, the economist James Heckman, has made the point that programs like the Harlem Children’s Zone are not giveaways; they’re investments that will pay for themselves in reduced spending on welfare, job training, and the criminal justice system. As Obama put it, “We will find the money to do this because we can’t afford not to.”
[Photo by Alex Tehrani]