Let Them Eat Ketchup is the book by Sheila Collins, written in 1996 about poverty in the United States. In her book, she deals with poverty in many different ways. For one, the book introduces a middle class, which is the generalization for all those in society that aren’t extremely rich or poor. This middle class is defined by Collins as “having the promise of continuous upward mobility”. This middle class, which was supported by Presidents such as Reagan and Nixon, is a part of the American Dream, a dream of a classless society. This middle class or “classless society” is a myth, according to Collins, told to Americans in order to stir productivity, and lead us away from the real differences in our world: income, wealth, power.
Sheila Collins suggests in her book that the USA is a “deeply divided society”, in which factors such as race, gender, education or sexual orientation determine what class we are categorized in. Class is described as “differences between people that are based on economic position-income, wealth, occupation group etc.” Much of this division within society also relates to power, and although the government could act upon these differences, they (differences) have been widely ignored. The class of an individual ultimately represents the degrade of poverty; surveys such as the Census Bureau take place on a regular basis to examine the income measure and inequality of over 60,000 households. The results from this survey show a lopsided income distribution, and according to Collins, blacks, females and indigenous people are of worst in facing inequality. Therefore, the idea of equality in America is a myth, told to society to enable harder workers and maintain social control.
Additionally, the biggest topic expressed in this book is poverty. In order to combat poverty however, the term “poor” must first be defined. This is difficult since different countries or communities have different viewpoints on poverty. The Native Americans for example had none of the “luxuries” the Western World enjoys today (such as TV, Radio, etc.) but they had more than enough to survive and didn’t consider themselves poor. Therefore there are different definitions for poverty 1) “the absolute deprivation of the resources needed to sustain life” 2) “a deprivation in relation to some culturally defined standard of need (status, self-esteem, education, jobs, political power, income, etc)”. Poverty is a national problem, but in order to combat it the question arises “who is considered poor?” The measurement for poverty is taken from the Poverty Line, and anyone falling under it is poor according to the State. This Poverty Line is not always accurate since it doesn’t consider families, farmers in rural areas, older people or single mothers. As a result, the Poverty Index was created as an adjustment to the Poverty Line. The formula for the Poverty Index was drawn up by Mollie Orshansky, who tried to adjust the poverty measurement to also fit family size and type. Now that poverty is defined and measurable, it canh theoretically be fought.
The Culture of Poverty Thesis, drawn up in the 1960s by anthropologist Oscar Lewis, sociologist Patrick Moynihan, and political scientist Edward Banfield, was an early attempt to eradicate poverty. Although all three believe that “persistently poor people are culturally different in their behavior, values and attitudes”, their origin or solution to the poverty problem differ. Lewis believes that the origin for poverty is the ‘subculture’ the really poor have created for themselves, which hinders them to change their condition. He sees the solution in class-consciousness, in which the poor become aware of their situation and struggle for their rights (through Unions for example). Moynihan relies on a totally different way of combating poverty. The reason for poverty, in his eyes, is the female-headed family in the USA. According to him, the way to solve the problem is “the promotion of stable, male dominant family structures”. The third contributor, Banfield, refused the existence of poverty in the US altogether. According to his research, the different social classes within society all profit the country, and therefore no changes will have to be made to the “issue of poverty”.
With the publication of the Culture of Poverty Thesis, liberals started to draw up the “dysfunctional welfare state” thesis, in which different people argue about ‘who to blame for poverty’. While most liberals blame the New Deal or President Johnson’s War on Poverty, certain writers found the blame somewhere else. George Gilder, for instance, sees the capitalist system as a “promise of endless opportunity for those willing to work hard”. According to him, poverty is attributed to failure to work hard, failure of appropriate family modeling, and lack of faith. Charles Murray on the other hand believed that poverty is a state that individuals get themselves into due to their lazy and amoral nature. People, as he states, do not work hard to improve their living condition unless coerced. The writer Lawrence Mead thought the “liberal welfare state is not necessarily too big, it is simply too permissive”. Another study called The Bell Curve, suggest that inheritance also influences the ‘state of poverty’ for the individual.
Still not enough has been fully done against the issue of poverty. The US has the highest poverty rate in the world, maybe since the American ideologies hinder reality. Other reasons might be the free-market or the limited government. Collins believes that the American history in slavery and class bias are aspects that have hindered the elimination of poverty in the past. Although Roosevelt’s New Deal or Johnsons War on Poverty were steps in the right direction, others have stopped or hindered further developments in the area. Collins believes that the problem of poverty isn’t unbeatable; there are lots of weak points. An immediate solution will sadly not be found, since abolishing poverty will take a long time.
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