Dec 21, 2009

Welfare | Chapter 2 Preface

In 1997, the New York Times ran an article on the Southside neighborhood in Brooklyn, where half the population of 27,000 received welfare benefits. To a casual observer, such a high percentage of people on welfare would seem to indicate that a dismal local economy had driven many families onto the welfare rolls. But in 1997, New York City was undergoing its greatest period of economic expansion since the 1960s, and unemployment was declining rapidly in many areas of the city. Instead of destitution, the reporter, Joe Sexton, uncovered a culture where widespread abuse of the...