Free Republic

Math, unfortunately for some of us, matters. And numbers, unfortunately for all of us, can mislead. For example, President Biden’s recent $1.9 trillion “American Rescue Plan” was sold as a COVID-19 relief bill. But the bill provided less than $200 billion to actually fight the virus. Billions more will go toward new stimulus payments and expanded child tax credits in the months and years ahead. Supporters call these provisions the new War on Poverty. And, just like the old War on Poverty, our eyes will look at the poverty rate as a scorecard. In the tornado of conjecture, opinion, and...

It's often thought to be beyond question that black political power is necessary for economic power and enhanced socio-economic welfare. That's an idea that lends itself to testing and analysis.Between 1970 and 2012, the number of black elected officials rose from fewer than 1,500 to more than 10,000. Plus, a black man was elected to the presidency twice. Jason Riley, a fellow at the Manhattan Institute, tells how this surge in political power has had little beneficial impact on the black community.In a PragerU video, "Blacks in Power Don't Empower Blacks," Riley says the conventional wisdom was based on the...

A couple of years ago, President Barack Obama, speaking on the economy, told an audience in Osawatomie, Kansas: "'The market will take care of everything,' they tell us. ... But here's the problem: It doesn't work. It has never worked. ... I mean, understand, it's not as if we haven't tried this theory." To believe what the president and many others say about the market's not working requires that one be grossly uninformed or dishonest. The key features of a free market system are private property rights and private ownership of the means of production. In addition, there's a large...

The U.S. Census Bureau puts the number of Americans in poverty at levels not seen since the mid-1960s when President Lyndon B. Johnson launched the federal government’s so-called War on Poverty. As President Barack Obama began his second term in January, nearly 50 million Americans — one in six — were living below the income line that defines poverty, according to the bureau. A family of four that earns less than $23,021 a year is listed as living in poverty. The bureau said 20 percent of the country’s children are poor.

An abiding—make that the primary—goal of the Obama Administration has been to reduce income inequality. When the Affordable Care Act finally passed, White House economists and liberal pundits did a victory dance in their favorite publications boasting about how the bill would spread the wealth. So how's that inequality project working out? One answer came yesterday with the Census Bureau's annual snapshot on living standards. The official poverty rate—defined as a family of four earning less than $22,314—rose to 15.1%. That's up from 14.3% in 2009 and 12.5% in 2007. The official rate significantly overstates poverty by missing government income...

The typical American household saw its income fall for the third straight year in 2010 and the poverty rate clicked up to its highest level since 1993 as the aftermath of the latest recession continued to take a toll. The median household income—what the statistical middle earns in a year—fell 2.3% to $49,445 in 2010, adjusted for inflation, according to the Census Bureau's annual snapshot on living standards released Tuesday. This comes on the heels of a so-called lost decade for earnings: Inflation-adjusted household income is down 7.1% from its 1999 peak, and 2010 was the first time since 1997...

It's an article of faith among liberal journalists that Ronald Reagan's economic policies were bad for African-Americans - though, in fact, government statistics show that nothing could be further from the truth. "As he left office, a Lou Harris poll found nearly 80 percent of blacks considered his administration oppressive," CNN correspondent Adaora Udoji noted to the Rev. Jesse Jackson Tuesday night. Jackson readily concurred, acknowledging that Reagan's relationship with blacks was "very hostile." In an earlier CNN interview Jackson observed, "Reagan believed in states' rights and Jefferson Davis, I believe in the Union and Abraham Lincoln." Even in less...