Progress in Poverty 1963-72
- Created by: amisavage99
- Created on: 29-05-17 18:35
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- To what extent was the situation of Americans who lived in poverty improved in the years 1963-72? (20 marks)
- Thesis: The situation of those who lived in poverty improved in the years 1963-72
- The Great Society: "The War on Poverty" (1964-68)
- Personally experienced poverty, most important aspect of his domestic program
- Racially
- The 'open housing law', 1968
- 'integrated housing' instead of 'imprisoning the ***** in the slums'
- Prohibited discrimination in the sale of housing - difficult to enforce with white opposition
- 'I think Johnson was the best we ever had'
- Housing (urban decay) was a major cause of poverty
- Housing and Urban Development (1965) HUD
- Demonstration Cities Act (1966) - $1.2bn (underfunded, NY needed $6bn)
- Omnibus Housing Act (1965) - ghetto housing via rent supplements
- Omnibus Housing Act (1965) financed rent supplements, responded to continued racial discrimination with Fair Housing Act (1968)
- The 'open housing law', 1968
- Specifically poverty
- Predicted $2 billion annual budget to end poverty - unrealistic
- Economic Opportunity Act EOA (1964) established the OEO (Office of Economic Opportunity)
- Anti poverty programs
- Job Corps (training) centres
- College work-study programmes
- Programmes to teach illiterate adults/ basic education programmes
- Youth corps
- VISTA - assisted needy children/NI/migrants
- AFDC (>4m receivers)
- Headstart
- Upward bound
- Food Stamp Act (1964) extended Kennedy's food stamps
- Also 35c raise in minimum wage
- Medicare/Medicaid through the Social Security Act (1965)
- Large proportion of poor were elderly -due to healthcare- previously smacked 'communism' (19m)
- Gaps in coverage/ extremely expensive
- Deserves credit for drawing attention to poverty/ efforts to improve the situation
- Education
- The HEA (1968) helped 11m students - esp low income/ poorly funded black colleges
- New Federalism: Nixon's attack on the Great Society (1969-72)
- Disparity in what Nixon said and did
- wanted to save taxpayers' money by eliminating wasteful/inefficient programmes of the 'welfare mess'
- 8.4m recieving AFDC in 1970
- Also grew up in poverty- sympathy meant he spent he spent more on social programmes than Johnson
- The Great Society: "The War on Poverty" (1964-68)
- Antithesis: The situation of those who lived in poverty did not improve in the years 1963-72
- Watts Riots, 1965 - 'a class revolt of underprivileged against privileged - the main issue is economic' - freedom was 'economic equality' to king - seen in his Chicago Campaign (1966)
- Black Panther's ghetto programmes - breakfast clubs for poor black schoolchildren
- Limitations of the 'war on poverty'
- If it was so successful, then why wasn't he re-elected?
- Vietnam War
- America could afford both the Great Society and the war, but the War on Poverty became a casualty of the war on Vietnam
- ... that's what killed the Great Society... it wasn't public opinion
- America could afford both the Great Society and the war, but the War on Poverty became a casualty of the war on Vietnam
- Politically unrealistic promises
- Vietnam War
- Criticism of excessive federal expenditure - cost more to put a 'ghetto' youth through Job Corps than Harvard
- Criticism of under funding was generally disregarded
- Increased dependency
- little impact on American cities and even less on rural areas
- Failed to eradicate poverty: 1/3 of non-whites lived below the poverty line (unemployment/ infant mortality rates were x2)
- Weakness in planning/ implementing anti-poverty programmes
- Confusion of which areas of the Great Society were 'anti-poverty programmes'
- e.g. the ESEA (1965) - half of expenditure went to kids above poverty line
- Example of Johnson ignoring how legislation worked/ difficulties of extending federal gov into schools
- e.g. the ESEA (1965) - half of expenditure went to kids above poverty line
- If it was so successful, then why wasn't he re-elected?
- Watts Riots, 1965 - 'a class revolt of underprivileged against privileged - the main issue is economic' - freedom was 'economic equality' to king - seen in his Chicago Campaign (1966)
- Introduction
- All aspects of the Great Society were attempts to holistically implement the 'war on poverty' and piece together piecemeal/Republican acts that stagnated since the New Deal
- "For the first time in all the history of the human race, a great nation... is willing to make a commitment to eradicate poverty among... the forgotten fifth'
- 'If his reforms did not lead to a Great Society, they have at least made for a better society'
- Relationship with congress
- Status as master of the senate
- Symbolic rather than substantive
- 'So little I have done.. so much I have yet to do'
- Both Johnson/ Nixon grew up in poverty
- Thesis: The situation of those who lived in poverty improved in the years 1963-72
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