Today, a college education is increasingly viewed as the gateway to the American Dream—a necessary prerequisite for social mobility. Yet recent policy reforms in the United States effectively steer former welfare recipients away from an education that could further their career prospects, forcing them directly into the workforce where they often find only low-paying jobs with little opportunity for growth. In Putting Poor People to Work, Kathleen Shaw, Sara Goldrick-Rab, Christopher Mazzeo, and Jerry A. Jacobs explore this troubling disconnect between the principles of "work-first" and "college for all." Using comprehensive interviews with government officials and sophisticated data from six states over a four year period, Putting Poor People to Work shows how recent changes in public policy have reduced the quantity and quality of education and training available to adults with low incomes. The authors analyze how two policies encouraging work—the federal welfare reform law of 1996 and the Workforce Investment Act of 1998—have made moving people off of public assistance as soon as possible, with little regard to their long-term career prospects, a government priority. Putting Poor People to Work shows that since the passage of these "work-first" laws, not only are fewer low-income individuals pursuing postsecondary education, but when they do, they are increasingly directed towards the most ineffective, short-term forms of training, rather than higher-quality college-level education. Moreover, the schools most able and ready to serve poor adults—the community colleges—are deterred by these policies from doing so. Having a competitive, agile workforce that can compete with any in the world is a national priority. In a global economy where skills are paramount, that goal requires broad popular access to education and training. Putting Poor People to Work shows how current U.S. policy discourages poor Americans from seeking out a college education, stranding them in jobs with little potential for growth. This important new book makes a powerful argument for a shift in national priorities that would encourage the poor to embrace both work and education, rather than having to choose between the two. Institute for Research on Poverty Affiliated Books on Poverty and Public Policy">An Institute for Research on Poverty Affiliated Book on Poverty and Public Policy

Laura Smith argues that if there is any segment of society that should be concerned with the impact of classism and poverty, it is those within the “helping professions”—people who have built their careers around understanding and facilitating human emotional well-being. In this groundbreaking book, Smith charts the ebbs and flows of psychology’s consideration of poor clients, and then points to promising new approaches to serving poor communities that go beyond remediation, sympathy, and charity. Including the author’s own experiences as a psychologist in a poor community, this inspiring book: Shows practitioners and educators how to implement considerations of social class and poverty within mental health theory and practice.Addresses poverty from a true social class perspective, beginning with questions of power and oppression in health settings.Presents a view of poverty that emerges from the words of the poor through their participation in interviews and qualitative research.Offers a message of hope that poor clients and psychologists can reinvent their relationship through working together in ways that are liberating for all parties. Laura Smith is an assistant professor in the department of Counseling and Clinical Psychology at Teachers College, Columbia University. “Gripping, heartbreaking, and ultimately hopeful, [this]is an impassioned charge to mental health professionals to advocate in truly helpful ways for America’s poor and working-class citizens . . . beautifully written and structured in a way that provides solid information with digestible doses of in-your-face depictions of poverty . . . Smith’s appeal to the healing profession is a gift. She envisions a class-inclusive society that shares common resources, opportunities, institutions, and hope. Smith’s book is a beautiful, chilling treatise calling for social change, mapping the road that will ultimately lead to that change. . . . This inspired book . . . is not meant to be purchased, perused, and placed on a shelf. It is meant to be lived. Are you in?” —PsycCRITIQUES magazine “Smith does not invite you to examine the life of the poor; she forces you to do it. And after you do it, you cannot help but question your practice. Whether you are a psychologist, a social worker, a counselor, a nurse, a psychiatrist, a teacher, or a community organizer, you will gain insights about the lives of the people you work with.” —From the Foreword by Isaac Prilleltensky, Dean, School of Education, University of Miami, Florida “This groundbreaking book challenges practitioners and educators to rethink dominant understandings of social class and poverty, and it offers concrete strategies for addressing class-based inequities. Psychology, Poverty, and the End of Social Exclusion should be required reading for anyone interested in economic and social justice.” —Heather Bullock, University of California, Santa Cruz

The real-life Nickel and Dimed—the author of the wildly popular “Poverty Thoughts” essay tells what it’s like to be working poor in America. ONE OF THE FIVE MOST IMPORTANT BOOKS OF THE YEAR--Esquire “DEVASTATINGLY SMART AND FUNNY. I am the author of Nickel and Dimed, which tells the story of my own brief attempt, as a semi-undercover journalist, to survive on low-wage retail and service jobs. TIRADO IS THE REAL THING.”—Barbara Ehrenreich, from the Foreword As the haves and have-nots grow more separate and unequal in America, the working poor don’t get heard from much. Now they have a voice—and it’s forthright, funny, and just a little bit furious. Here, Linda Tirado tells what it’s like, day after day, to work, eat, shop, raise kids, and keep a roof over your head without enough money. She also answers questions often asked about those who live on or near minimum wage: Why don’t they get better jobs? Why don’t they make better choices? Why do they smoke cigarettes and have ugly lawns? Why don’t they borrow from their parents? Enlightening and entertaining, Hand to Mouth opens up a new and much-needed dialogue between the people who just don’t have it and the people who just don’t get it.

In Welfare Reform, Jeffrey Grogger and Lynn Karoly assemble evidence from numerous studies to assess how welfare reform has affected behavior. To broaden our understanding of this wide-ranging policy reform, the authors evaluate the evidence in relation to an economic model of behavior.

"From New York Times bestselling author and economics columnist Robert Frank, a revelatory look at the power and potential of social context. As psychologists have long understood, social environments profoundly shape our behavior, sometimes for the better, but often for the worse. Less widely noted is that social influence is a two-way street: Our environments are in large part themselves a product of the choices we make. Society embraces regulations that limit physical harm to others, as when smoking restrictions are defended as protecting bystanders from secondhand smoke. But we have been slower to endorse parallel steps that discourage harmful social environments, as when regulators fail to note that the far greater harm caused when someone becomes a smoker is to make others more likely to smoke. In Under the Influence, Robert Frank attributes this regulatory asymmetry to the laudable belief that individuals should accept responsibility for their own behavior. Yet that belief, he argues, is fully compatible with public policies that encourage supportive social environments. Most parents hope, for example, that their children won't grow up to become smokers, bullies, tax cheats, sexual predators, or problem drinkers. But each of these hopes is less likely to be realized whenever such behaviors become more common. Such injuries are hard to measure, Frank acknowledges, but that's no reason for policymakers to ignore them. The good news is that a variety of simple policy measures could foster more supportive social environments without ushering in the dreaded nanny state or demanding painful sacrifices from anyone"--

Inclusive." --Résumé de l'éditeur.

Examines the economic underworld of migrant farm workers, the aged, minority groups, and other economically underprivileged groups.