It Takes a Family, by Rick Santorum: on Welfare & Poverty
Rick Santorum:
Great Society barely budged poverty but fractured families
Liberals tried for forty years to help low-income Americans through Great Society welfare programs. I have to give them credit for trying, but their experiment has failed. And the worst part of their failure is NOT that trillions of tax dollars have
barely budged the poverty rate. No, the worst part of their failure is that their welfare policies fractured families and pulled apart communities, pulverizing the foundation both of individual success and the common good.
While conservatives have always recognized the difficulties facing low-income families, we also resisted government involvement. That resistance has meant, in practice, that we simply allowed the liberals to design our nation's social policies,
and that has hurt the poor even more. The real solution, the conservative solution to the problems of low-income America, is to structure all our programs around the family, to work with the family rather than against it.
Source: It Takes A Family, by Sen. Rick Santorum, p. 45-46
Apr 30, 2006
Rick Santorum:
One Percent Solution: increase charitable giving to 2.5%
So what's the status of America's social capital account? Church membership in this country rose steadily from the 1930s to about 1960. Since then it has dropped about 10% from the 1960s to the 1990s. We are also less likely to have friends over to
our house today than in past years. These trends hold true for our generosity, as well. As a percentage of our income, Americans' donations to charity steadily increased from after the Depression until 1960. But since then they have steadily declined.
As of last year, we gave only one and one-half cent of every dollar made in America to charity, down from over two cents several decades ago.
And on this score, I have joined Congressman George Radanovich in an effort he calls the One Percent Solution, to increase the charitable giving rate to 2.5 percent.
Source: It Takes A Family, by Sen. Rick Santorum, p. 61-62
Apr 30, 2006
Rick Santorum:
AmeriCorps "volunteers" do build social capital
I was pleasantly surprised to see AmeriCorps workers seeded throughout the City Year program. I say surprised, because early on I was not a supporter of AmeriCorps. When I ran for the U.S. Senate in 1994, I said it was a waste to spend precious federal
dollars on "volunteers" so that they could sit around a campfire singing "Kumbaya."I still think President Clinton was wrong to call people being paid "volunteers." But I came to realize that these energetic, mostly young people could play an
important coordinating role with community and nonprofit service organizations to help build up social capital. So after being one of AmeriCorps' harshest critics, I began working to move the program in a more
community-oriented direction.
AmeriCorps is by no means perfect, and I am working on ways to get more volunteers into community-based non-profits. I am also a supporter of President Bush's USA Freedom Corps.
Source: It Takes A Family, by Sen. Rick Santorum, p. 63-64
Apr 30, 2006
Rick Santorum:
Discriminatory to NOT give money to faith-based groups
In the Welfare reform Act of 1996, many liberal churches supported the concept of charitable choice, and it was about doing good works for the poor with the government still controlling the purse strings, but nevertheless, they were still supporting an
idea that STRENGTHENED CHURCHES. It wasn't until 2001, that "armies of compassion" would be eligible for social service grants.What happened between the late 1990s and 2001? America had elected a president who was actually going to
IMPLEMENT the 1996, 1998, and 2000 charitable choice laws.
Liberal senators have now effectively blocked any expansion of charitable choice, claiming that it promotes discrimination.
I argue that not giving money to faith-based organizations to perform social services, services that serve the common good, is the real discrimination.
Source: It Takes A Family, by Sen. Rick Santorum, p.104-105
Apr 30, 2006
Rick Santorum:
Support time-limits for able-bodied welfare recipients
Bill Clinton promised in 1992 to "end welfare as we know it." But by late 1993, he had all but shelved his plan to reform welfare. Our Minority Whip Newt Gingrich asked me to get together a group of members to draft our own welfare reform bill. The bill
we drafted was an integral part of the now famous Contract with America.When we introduced our bill, the liberals savaged it, calling it cruel, heartless and mean-spirited. We had actually had the audacity to call for TIME LIMITS on welfare for the
ABLE-BODIED! Not only that, but we wanted to require them to work or else lose their benefits.
So-called welfare rights groups weren't the only ones who raged against our bill. Senator Ted Kennedy opined, "There is a right way and a wrong way to reform
welfare. Punishing children is the wrong way. The Senate is on the brink of committing legislative child abuse."
Despite the opposition, welfare reform passed. After two votes, it was finally signed into law by President Clinton in 1996.
Source: It Takes A Family, by Sen. Rick Santorum, p.131-134
Apr 30, 2006
Rick Santorum:
Promotes Individual Development Accounts set up by churches
Sen. Lieberman and I have been promoting Individual Development Accounts. IDAs act like a 401(k) program for low-income individuals. These programs are set up, many by faith-based organizations, with a mix of federal, state, and private dollars. These
organizations help their low-income clients set up accounts at their local banks, provide training on how to manage these accounts, and then match individual contributions dollar-for-dollar up to $500 a year. These accounts earn tax-free interest and can
be used to pay for education, to buy a home, or to start a business. In other words, these accounts launch low-income people into the asset accumulation game.Our legislation will create approximately $2 billion in tax credits for financial institution
and private investors that create IDAs. We have tried for years to create a federal IDA tax credit as part of a broader initiative called the Charity Aid Recovery Empowerment (CARE) Act, which would help charitable organizations help the poor.
Source: It Takes A Family, by Sen. Rick Santorum, p.151-152
Apr 30, 2006
Rick Santorum:
Black entrepreneurship vanished with liberal welfare policy
it is wrong to believe the African-American story is one of victimhood only. To think in those terms is to deny the real accomplishments of the black community in our history. And not the least of these accomplishments has
been a tradition of business acumen and entrepreneurship.Why did it seemingly vanish?
It's hard to place the blame on ongoing racism, since racism was at least as much of a problem during the heyday of black enterprise in the early decades of the twentieth century as it is today. No, what really changed the economic terrain for
African-Americans was something else: the arrival of liberal welfare policies, the liberal cultural of victimhood, and poorly thought-out liberal urban renewal.
Source: It Takes A Family, by Sen. Rick Santorum, p.189-190
Apr 30, 2006
Ted Kennedy:
Welfare reform bill commits legislative child abuse
Bill Clinton promised in 1992 to "end welfare as we know it." But by late 1993, he had all but shelved his plan to reform welfare. Our Minority Whip Newt Gingrich asked me to get together a group of members to draft our own welfare reform bill. The bill
we drafted was an integral part of the now famous Contract with America.When we introduced our bill, the liberals savaged it, calling it cruel, heartless and mean-spirited. We had actually had the audacity to call for TIME LIMITS on welfare for the
ABLE-BODIED! Not only that, but we wanted to require them to work or else lose their benefits.
So-called welfare rights groups weren't the only ones who raged against our bill. Senator Ted Kennedy opined, "There is a right way and a wrong way to reform
welfare. Punishing children is the wrong way. The Senate is on the brink of committing legislative child abuse."
Despite the opposition, welfare reform passed. After two votes, it was finally signed into law by President Clinton in 1996.
Source: It Takes A Family, by Sen. Rick Santorum, p.131-134
Apr 30, 2006
Page last updated: Feb 24, 2019