We the Poor People

Current welfare reforms - including recently enacted federal legislation - are largely symbolic politics, argue two experts in this important new book. According to Joel F. Handler and Yeheskel Hasenfeld, the real problem we face is not the spread of welfare but the spread of poverty among the working poor, a group that includes most welfare recipients. The surest way to solve the problem is to create jobs and supplement low-wage work. The authors offer proposals that would make it possible for individuals to support themselves and their families through working and that would establish a safety net for the relatively few individuals who are unable to do so.

Joel F. Handler is Richard C. Maxwell Professor of Law at the School of Law, University of California, Los Angeles.