My Opinion
Privatizing welfare, cutting red tape will feed the hungry

Like the situation in Vietnam by around 1970, in the war on poverty we now have no nice option. If we "stay," and continue the war at the federal level, we face mounting casualties. Despite everything we've tried, the conflict still has no visible end. On the other hand, if we "go," we face the question so many thoughtful people ask us: Who will provide for the poor if the government does not?

Welfare reform, as Roman Catholic leaders recently asserted, "will be a test of our nation's values and our commitment to 'the least among us."' Unfortunately, as many have asserted, it may take a measure of blind optimism to think that Americans today have the moral character to assume responsibility on their own for the needy. As a result, the Roman Catholic leaders condemn the status quo, yet still maintain that the federal government has a necessary welfare role.

But the fact remains, federal programs have not stopped the number of welfare recipients from dramatically rising. According to author Marvin Olasky, in 1964 Lyndon Johnson's advisers warned that if no federal action was taken, the poverty rate could be as high as 13 percent by 1980. Yet despite 16 years of funding multi-billion dollar programs, the rate at the end of 1980 was -- 13 percent.

The programs began at the close of World War II. Americans truly got a new deal: Meet the government's requirements and you are entitled to a chunk of tax dollars. At first, folks shunned handouts. People considered dependency dishonorable, writes Olasky, and roughly half of those who qualified for welfare didn't take it; many took only part of the money to which they were entitled.

For various reasons, though, the poor started to take advantage of the new system, demanding -- legally -- their money from the government. The welfare roles exploded. In 1965, 4.3 million folks received Aid to Families with Dependent Children. In 1974, AFDC recipients numbered 10.4 million.

So Uncle Sam tried to wean people off of welfare through job training programs. That was 1967. We've played variations on the same tune ever since. The 1988 Job Opportunities and Basic Skills (JOBS) program is the most recent example. Yet despite widespread claims that jobs programs provide hope, and despite the fact that states qualified for 83 percent of federal JOBS funding, welfare roles have grown 31 percent since 1989.

What should we do? First, we've got to stop fiddling with the rules at the federal level. For the last quarter century, rules changes haven't made a lick of improvement in the number of America's poor. It was the same in Vietnam: flexible response, war of attrition, peace with honor; the sinkhole in Southeast Asia was immune to any new doctrine.

Unfortunately, both the Clinton plan and the House welfare plan propose new federal rules on who can receive what when. Generic mandates include a two-year time limit on benefits, work for aid ("workfare") programs and cutoffs of benefits to new unwed mothers. Scrap those ideas. Or, if those kinds of stipulations must be made, do it at the state level, where the legislation can be more geographically appropriate.

Then, end cash assistance and switch to vouchers. Vouchers for goods and services from private institutions would discourage dependency on the government and encourage people to patronize the private sector. In the private sector the source of compassion is often a volunteer and likely a more helpful care-provider than a 9-to-5 government employee.

Lastly, the Republicans are right to cap spending increases at 3.5 percent. As Jack Kemp's speechwriter told me, if you stop benefits all at once, people starve.

We've got to carefully pare back the bloated welfare bureaucracy. If the war on poverty has made anything demonstrably clear, it's that the bureaucrat fails as the fountainhead of compassion. In the long run, government programs must be skeletalized.

Many respond that people won't give to the poor unless they're forced. That may be true. Americans may not change their helping or giving habits with such measured reforms. If it is, we're stuck.