Use of cars can help families reduce poverty, large study finds

Pioneer Press/WAPO ^ | 4-4-14 | Emily Badger

[TurboZamboni]

In many circles -- including advocates for cleaner air, safer streets, public transit -- it's a major policy goal to get people out of cars.

Reduce car use, and you reduce pollution. Reduce car use, and we'll need fewer costly roads and parking garages. Reduce car use and shift more people onto bikes and trains, and maybe we'll all spend less of our lives idling in traffic.

That line of thinking, however, seldom considers a group of people for whom more car use might actually be a good thing: the poor.

A group of researchers at the Urban Institute, the University of Maryland and UCLA broach this topic in a large new study of low-income families in 10 cities that participated in two federal housing voucher programs, which were tracked over time by the government. Those programs, the Moving to Opportunity for Fair Housing program and the Welfare to Work Voucher program, attempted to give families access to greater opportunities through stable housing in high-quality neighborhoods.

But it turned out that much of the opportunity in places with better schools, lower poverty and less crime is hard to unlock without a car, the study found.

[TurboZamboni]

But cars are evil planet-killing death machines! Trains will solved all our "sprawl" problems.

[knarf]

Every boy since the invention of the infernal combustion engine was invented knew this and used it to wheedle a car into his possession.

Girls were happy to ride with us until they got uppity and wanted their own.

Is this a study that actually got paid to determine?

I'm in the wrong business.

[MCF]

I check out the “Jobs” section on craigslist from time to time. One of thing that is prominent in the ads is “reliable transportation”.

[Chode]

problem is, WE will be the ones that have to pony up for the cars, insurance, tags, inspections and maintenance of said cars for the poor...

[rightwingintelligentsia]

This means they probably want to give the poor “Obamacars” next.

[TurboZamboni]

In Eurofrisco they get flipped.

http://dfm.twincities.com/article/someone-is-flipping-over-smart-cars-in-san-francisco/281d1612e3d7fea9a81bf9f3191cdb5e

[Aevery_Freeman]

Several crucial differences emerged between families that had access to a car and those that did not. The families with cars moved to neighborhoods with less poverty and were more likely to stay there. They lived in neighborhoods with less unemployment, higher median rents, more access to green space and lower levels of cancer risk. By the end of the government's survey, these families also lived in neighborhoods with better-performing schools.

They are describing suburbia - lefties hate suburbia. Unless, as it seems, they believe that the populations should be switched.

[ilovesarah2012]

I guess they don’t hire GM owners.

[Gaffer]

But, for the ‘poor’ now, personal mobility is a right. Just like TANF, SNAP, WICs, Section 8, ObamaPhone, UIC, EITC and all the other forms of welfare and private charity.

When it is THEM that gets, who the hell cares about the environment. The few (growing larger everyday), the chosen, the defiantly demanding entitled. Nothing else matters.

[tbw2]

It also could be interpreted to mean moving people to a “good neighborhood” doesn’t unlock the benefits unless you can drive to the jobs, civic activities, schools, etc. Just putting them in a middle class house doesn’t make them members of the mobile, spread out community.

[duckworth]

Bikes! Always cracks me up. Uppity smug academics who watch old “films” are obsessed with images of the european proletariat pedaling to town ringing their little bicycle bells. How romantic. How superior.

[Mich Patriot]

Obama cars coming soon! Having a car is a basic right, just like a phone and healthcare! /s

[snoringbear]

“This means they probably want to give the poor “Obamacars” next.”

For sure. Add it to the “free stuff” list.

[IronJack]

Now a car will become a constitutional right, just like cable tv and an obamaphone.

[DIRTYSECRET]

“Poor people don’t need gas. They don’t drive’”

[catfish1957]

More research money spent to prove something blatantly obvious. Up next.... $5M to prove water is wet.

[Sooth2222]

They are describing suburbia - lefties hate suburbia. Unless, as it seems, they believe that the populations should be switched.

The lefties really DO hate those safe, clean, well-armed, Republican, low tax suburban and rural areas!

The population switch experiment has already been demonstrated by the French.

In France, the cities may be the preferred choice for the wealthy live and the suburbs are where the poor and minorities tend to live.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/23/french-intifada-arab-banlieues-fighting-french-state-extract

"Poor" households in the US have more cars than middle-class households almost everywhere on the planet. Poverty in the United States in 2014 doesn't have much (if anything) to do with money.

[BobL]

I suggest that people here take SCREEN SHOTS of this article...it will not be posted very long.

[TurboZamboni]

It's been proven over and over that in most places with light rail built to “serve the poor” that it would be more cost effective to buy them all a new car.

Not that I suggest doing this-no stake or pride in ownership= no maintenance or upkeep.

[IMR 4350]

I’ve got a great idea, I call it “cash for clunkers”.

Let’s offer people that are wealthy enough to buy a new car cash for their good reliable used car.

We’ll take the good reliable used car, turn it into junk and deny people that can’t afford a new car good reliable used cars for transportation to work.

We’ll drive the price of used cars, even cars that really are pretty much junk, through the roof and make them so expensive people can’t afford to get good reliable cheap transportation to work.

Since these people won’t have any way to get to work they will get on the govt dole and vote democrat.

Gosh I’m smart.