Bloomberg, Champion of the Poor

November 5, 2013

Bloomberg, Champion of the Poor

By MICHAEL B. KATZ

DURING New York City’s mayoral race, criticism of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg for neglecting the poor ignored his bold and unprecedented antipoverty measures. He may not have eliminated inequality or reversed the impact of the Great Recession — over the last two years, the poverty rate has crept up to 21.2 percent from 20.1 percent — but failure to acknowledge what he did in fact accomplish is not only unfair but also shortsighted. Usually depicted as a champion of the rich, Mr. Bloomberg mounted an antipoverty program at a moment when poverty as an issue was off the national radar and even politically toxic.In March 2006, the mayor appointed a 32-member blue-ribbon commission to advise him on antipoverty strategy, at a time when no other mayor of a major American city had made poverty a priority. Mr. Bloomberg’s commission developed an alternative measure of the poverty line, prompting the United States Census Bureau to do the same, which calculated that more New Yorkers were poor in 2009 than the official measures suggested — 19.9 percent compared with 17.3 percent. The commission recommended directing the city’s resources to three groups that were especially at risk: the working poor, young adults between the of ages 16 and 24, and families with children below age 6.

Nine months later, Mr. Bloomberg announced the introduction of citywide antipoverty programs that incorporated virtually all of the commission’s recommendations. Responsibility for the individual programs, previously distributed throughout the various government departments, became the purview of a new Center for Economic Opportunity. The center was supported by an annual $100 million Innovation Fund, a public-private initiative that received more than half of its funding from the city. Programs like the Young Adult Internship Program stressed human capital development — education, job training and workplace skills. A program called $aveNYC offered a 50 percent match to low-income workers for saving a portion of their earned-income tax credit. Mr. Bloomberg also added a conditional cash transfer program, modeled on a program in Mexico and privately financed by foundations, which rewarded families with cash for specific behaviors related mainly to health and education. (This was the most criticized and, arguably, least successful component of his antipoverty effort.)

For the most part, however, the new programs offered few cash benefits. As The Economist observed, the Center for Economic Opportunity “bypassed” the city’s service delivery system by investing “a mixture of public and philanthropic money in social entrepreneurs’ ideas to help lift people out of poverty, particularly by emphasizing personal responsibility.” This market-based approach failed to provide much help for those trapped in deep poverty — an increasing part of the poor population — nor did it deploy redistributive measures that could have reduced economic inequality.

Still, some of the results were impressive. By 2011, the center had implemented more than 50 new programs, many of which had met or even exceeded their goals. A particularly good example is CUNY ASAP, the City University of New York Accelerated Study in Associate Programs, which removes barriers to graduation by offering participating students an array of academic and financial supports. The three-year graduation rate for the 2007 cohort was 55 percent, compared with 24 percent for a demographically comparable group.

Mr. Bloomberg’s approach has even exerted an influence at the national level. The center is replicating five of its successful programs, with an $85 million competitive grant from the federal Social Innovation Fund, in seven partner cities across the country. Other cities — notably Philadelphia and Richmond, Va. — have recently mounted their own antipoverty programs, and under Mr. Bloomberg’s leadership, the center has assembled a network of mayors to explore antipoverty innovations that respond to local needs. The possibilities of these city-based programs remain to be seen, but at least they show a willingness to experiment.

The new mayor will need to refocus attention on the growth of poverty and inequality accelerated by the Great Recession, as well as on those poor New Yorkers outside the regular labor market who remain untouched by the center’s array of programs.

Mr. Bloomberg’s antipoverty approach has tested the limits of human-capital and market-based strategies. As impressive as many of its individual components are, the center’s efforts remain unlikely to result in significant reductions in poverty and inequality. To get outcomes like that, we would need an expanded and repaired safety net; direct job creation through publicly funded infrastructure projects; and new programs designed to provide an adequate guaranteed income for every American.

Michael B. Katz is a professor of history at the University of Pennsylvania and the author of “The Undeserving Poor.”