Rebuilding the Social Safety Net
The opportunity in front of us is to remove the barriers that exist that prevent families in poverty from reaching success. I am a firm believer that no one wants to live hungry or homeless, yet the systems have been developed over generations with unintentional barriers to success. There exists a set of financial disincentives that discourage families from making wise decisions that have multi-generational impact. Weekly, we hear stories about individuals who cannot accept a fifty cent an hour raise at work because they will lose $6 of benefits that they rely upon to feed their family. We have to not only rethink our social safety net programs to remove these disincentives, but we have to rebuild the distribution model of these resources so that we can meet those we serve where they are instead of requiring them to fall to a level of despair to reach out for help. This approach is not only dignifying, but it is also the economically fiscal approach.
We can make meaningful impact on poverty by removing shackles, allowing families to lift themselves out of poverty.
This video outlines my current thoughts on changing the distribution model for human services to meet people where they are.
