Table Of ContentTHE ROUTLEDGE HANDBOOK
OF POVERTY IN THE UNITED STATES
In the United States, the causes and even the meanings of poverty are disconnected from the
causes and meanings of global poverty. The Routledge Handbook of Poverty in the United States
provides an authoritative overview of the relationship of poverty with the rise of neoliberal
capitalism in the context of globalization.
Reorienting its national economy towards a global logic, United States domestic policies
have promoted a market-based strategy of economic development and growth as the obvious
solution to alleviating poverty, affecting approaches to the problem discursively, politically,
economically, culturally, and experientially. However, the handbook explores how, rather
than alleviating poverty, it has instead exacerbated poverty and pre-existing inequalities—pri-
vatizing the services of social welfare and educational institutions, transforming the state from
a benevolent to a punitive state, and criminalizing poor women, racial and ethnic minorities,
and immigrants.
Key issues examined by the international selection of leading scholars in this volume include:
income distribution, employment, health, hunger, housing, and urbanization. With parts focus-
ing on the lived experience of the poor, social justice and human rights frameworks—as opposed
to welfare rights models—and the role of helping professions such as social work, health, and
education, this comprehensive handbook is a vital reference for anyone working with those in
poverty, whether directly or at a macro level.
Stephen Nathan Haymes, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor in the College of Education and
an affiliated faculty member of the Department of Peace, Justice and Conflict Studies Program
and the Department of International Studies at DePaul University, Chicago. Professor
Haymes’ areas of research interest are Africana philosophy, postcolonial theory, forced migra-
tion, and education, conflict, and development. Currently, he is working on a project related
to place-based education and eco-justice with displaced Afro-descendent communities and
a Colombian Human Rights NGO. He serves as the co-editor of The Journal of Poverty:
Innovations on Social, Political and Economic Inequalities, a quarterly peer review publication of
the Taylor & Francis Group.
María Vidal de Haymes, Ph.D., is a Professor in the School of Social Work and Director of
the Institute for Migration and International Social Work at Loyola University Chicago. She is
the co-editor of The Journal of Poverty: Innovations on Social, Political and Economic Inequalities. She
teaches courses in areas of social welfare policy and migration studies and her research addresses
the economic and political incorporation of Latino immigrants in the United States; the impact
of migration on family relationships, roles, and functioning; forced migration; the role of faith-
based organizations in the pastoral and social accompaniment of migrants; child welfare; and
social work education.
Reuben Jonathan Miller, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor of Social Work at the University of
Michigan. His research, writing, and advocacy work focus on the well-being of former prison-
ers living in large urban settings and the ways in which criminal justice and social welfare policy
is experienced daily by urban poor populations.
THE ROUTLEDGE HANDBOOK
OF POVERTY IN
THE UNITED STATES
Edited by Stephen Nathan Haymes,
María Vidal de Haymes, and Reuben Jonathan Miller
First published 2015
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2015 Stephen Nathan Haymes, María Vidal de Haymes,
and Reuben Jonathan Miller
The right of the editors to be identified as the authors of the editorial
material, and of the contributors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in
accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known
or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without
intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
The Routledge Handbook of Poverty in the United States / edited by Stephen
Haymes, Maria Vidal de Haymes and Reuben Miller.
pages cm
1. Poverty—United States. 2. United States—Economic conditions. 3. United
States—Social conditions. 4. United States—Economic policy. 5. United States—
Social policy. I. Haymes, Stephen Nathan. II. De Haymes, Maria Vidal. III. Miller,
Reuben Jonathan.
HC110.P6R68 2014
362.50973—dc23
2014009636
ISBN: 978 0 41 567344 0 (hbk)
ISBN: 978 1 31 575551 9 (ebk)
Typeset in Bembo
by GreenGate Publishing Services, Tonbridge, Kent
This book is dedicated to the memory of our dear friend and colleague, Alfred L. Joseph.
‘This Handbook is a treasure trove. Yes, it marshals the data on U.S. poverty, providing an
indispensable reference guide. Even more valuably, it theorizes U.S. poverty anew, demon-
strating how U.S. destitution and its “surplus populations” are shaped by neoliberalism’s global
projects and logics, its economic mandates and powers of enforcement. The Handbook is thus
also a compendium of knowledge for all who fight to end poverty. This is the book I want my
students to have as they work in impoverished communities. It is also the book that all scholars
of poverty and globalization will need to keep ready to hand.’
Mark Lewis Taylor, Religion and Society, Princeton Theological Seminary
CONTENTS
List of figures xiv
List of tables xv
List of appendices xvii
Editor biographies xviii
Notes on contributors xix
General introduction
Stephen Nathan Haymes, María Vidal de Haymes,
and Reuben Jonathan Miller 1
PART I
From the production of inequality to the production of destitution:
the U.S. political economy of poverty in the era of globalization 5
Introduction 7
María Vidal de Haymes, Stephen Nathan Haymes, and Michael Lloyd
1 Beyond coincidence: how neoliberal policy initiatives
in the IMF and World Bank affected United States poverty levels 11
Pamela Blackmon
2 The discursive axis of neoliberalism: debt, deficits, and austerity 19
Shawn Cassiman
3 Deindustrialized small cities and poverty: the view from Camden 26
Andrew Seligsohn and Joan Maya Mazelis
4 Transnational factors driving U.S. inequality and poverty 33
Rubin Patterson and Giselle Thompson
Contents
5 Globalization and the trends in inequality of poverty
in the United States in the last decade 43
Ashish Singh
6 The house always wins: how state lotteries displace American
tax burdens by class and race 56
Kasey Henricks and Victoria Brockett
7 Predatory financial services: the high cost of being poor
in America 75
Howard Karger
8 Consumer credits as a quasi-welfare system for failed neoliberals’
trickle-down policies between the 1980s and 2000s 83
Intae Yoon
PART II
Discourses of poverty: from the “culture of poverty”
to “surplus population” 93
Introduction 95
Stephen Nathan Haymes and Eduardo Vargas
9 The problematic conceptualizations and constructions of poverty:
select global analysis 101
Ali A. Abdi
10 Neoliberal economics and undergraduate poverty education 108
Kevin D. Blair and Gabriel A. Santos
11 The importance of context to the social processes around
material hardship 120
Colleen M. Heflin
12 Welfare dependency and poverty: neoliberal rhetoric
or evidence-informed choice? 130
Philip Young P. Hong and Brenda Crawley
13 Babies as barriers: welfare policy discourse in an era of neoliberalism 143
Linda Houser, Sanford F. Schram, Joe Soss, and Richard C. Fording
14 We are the 99 percent: the rise of poverty and the decline
of poverty stigma 161
Joan Maya Mazelis and Brendan M. Gaughan
viii
Contents
PART III
From the welfare state to the neoliberal state:
from regulating to imprisoning the poor 171
SECTION I
Transformation of the welfare state: education 173
Introduction 175
Stephen Nathan Haymes and Emily Shayman
15 Neoliberalism and African Americans in higher education 179
Kimya Barden
16 How neoliberalism subverts equality and perpetuates poverty
in our nation’s schools 190
T. Jameson Brewer and Paul S. Myers
17 Invisible students and the issues of online education 199
An Chih Cheng
18 Poverty reduction through education: an analytical framework
for cash transfers for education 208
Elena Delavega and Monit Cheung
19 Students that lag or a system that fails? A contemporary look
at the academic trajectory of Latino students 218
Jessica Martone
20 The new two-tiered education system in the United States: expanding and
commodifying poverty and inequality 226
Kenneth J. Saltman
SECTION II
Transformation of the welfare state: cash transfers, housing,
nutrition, and health 233
Introduction 235
María Vidal de Haymes, Erin Malcolm and Celeste Sánchez
21 Neoliberal globalization: social welfare policy and institutions 239
Michael J. Holosko and John R. Barner
22 The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act
of 1996 (PRWORA) 249
Richard K. Caputo
ix
Description:In the United States, the causes and even the meanings of poverty are disconnected from the causes and meanings of global poverty. The Routledge Handbook of Poverty in the United States provides an authoritative overview of the relationship of poverty with the rise of neoliberal capitalism in the co
