INSTRUCTIONAL “MYTHS”

In this blog, I usually address content issues in the curricular field of civics. I find from time to time that content issues border on instructional concerns. That's the case with this posting. We have the President to thank for that. President Barack Obama gave civics teachers a good suggestion for a set of lessons during his speech this past Wednesday on the expanding gap in income and wealth distribution between the rich and the not so rich. In his speech, he identified what he called three myths regarding this issue. Let me paraphrase: one, low income is a problem of minority populations such as African-Americans, Hispanics, or some other ethnic groups; two, policies that are aimed at securing equality in income or wealth are detrimental to economic growth; and three, efforts by government to ameliorate or solve lower income or wealth rates do not accomplish their aims and, therefore, are not useful. What civics or other social studies teachers can do is look at these claimed myths as hypotheses and have students test them to see whether these claims are true or whether they are, in fact, myths.

The first of these “myths” seems fairly easy to test. One can readily gather demographic information that identifies those portions of the population that earn near or below poverty rates and then see what percentage of those people are non-Hispanic whites, blacks, Latinos/as, Asians, or any other nationality or ethnic grouping the teacher would want to identify for the lesson. For example, CBS news reports that “[f]our out of 5 U. S. adults struggle with joblessness, near-poverty or reliance on welfare for at least parts of their lives, a sign of deteriorating economic security and an elusive American dream.”¹ While non-whites are becoming a majority in the population, one can mathematically determine that if the four out of 5 figure is correct, many of those who make up disadvantaged segments of the population are non-Hispanic whites. As a matter of fact, survey results show that “[p]essimism among that racial group [non-Hispanic whites] about their families' economic futures has climbed to the highest point since at least 1987. In the most recent AP-GfK poll, 63 percent of whites called the economy 'poor.'"² This type of information is readily available from what are considered objective sources. US Census and IRS information sources can be highly helpful.

In terms of the second “myth,” policy aimed at promoting equality counteracts economic growth, one can view historical efforts historians consider serious efforts at promoting equality. I would include in that list the Progressive efforts of the early twentieth century, the New Deal initiative of the 1930s, and the War on Poverty/Great Society programs of the 1960s. One can see what the resultant economic indicators show governmental efforts had on income and wealth distribution as well as the overall economy. One can also look at efforts to undo those “progressive” initiatives such as during the 1920s during the administrations of Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover and of that of Ronald Reagan's administration and see what resulted from those efforts. Did income and wealth distribution gaps increase, decrease, or stay the same? I believe the most telling statistic that gives a quick view on how evenly distributed income is is the median wage; that is, the wage level at which half of the incomes of households fall below that mark and half fall above that mark. If the median wage increases during a segment of time when the GDP is growing, one can say that the economy is growing and that that growth is somewhat more evenly distributed than is the case if the median wage were going down. Another telling statistic is the percentage of the population living below the poverty rate. Of course, if the poverty rate is going up, one can say, unless there is a drastic lowering of GDP, that the lower classes are not benefiting from economic growth. A more sophisticated study can trace income levels of the five quintile³ groups – the division of the workforce according to twenty percent groupings of the population from the lowest income earning group to the highest – over time. These income levels or poverty rates can be matched to prevailing economic policies, particularly those that are aimed at shrinking the distribution gap. A warning needs to be stated: this type of analysis can be misleading in that it is difficult to determine when policies take effect and have any meaningful influence on economic conditions. But what one can easily determine is whether policies that are aimed at equality have a meaningful, negative effect on economic growth. Does one see, for example, a drastic downturn in the GDP or in the median income in the years during and immediately after the onset of the Great Society programs? Students can do such calculations.

Closely related to myth number two is myth number three. To study this hypothesis, that government cannot help conditions of inequality, a teacher can have students do case studies of particular government programs that were designed to ease or solve some condition of inequality. For example, did Medicare solve the problem of the elderly not being able to afford healthcare? Or, does raising the minimum wage assist lower income people in securing living wage employment? In this type of instruction, the teacher should take care as to how he or she poses the question to be studied. So, in the case of the minimum wage issue, asking whether raising it results in higher income, the question misses an important element in the debate over the minimum wage. Many argue that raising the minimum wage will result in fewer jobs since employers will cut back on this factor of production due to its higher cost. By asking about the policy change in terms of securing employment, as I suggest above, the number of jobs employers are willing to offer is taken into account. Well-stated questions can have students test how effective government programs can be.

These three “myths” or hypotheses reflect important issues. The American people usually indicate that their most important issue at any given time is the economy, at least according to their responses on surveys. As such, politicians of all stripes manipulate their language to advance their economically related positions in order to make what they say more amenable to interested voters. I heard a politician today say that the minimum wage should not be raised because this would discourage businesses to hire teenagers, even though vast majority of the jobs in question are held by people 20 years and older. This type of manipulation can be combated by students doing the type of studies I reviewed above. And civics teachers, if they choose to take advantage of the recent help provided by the President, should offer, if only under their breath, a “thanks” to – what should we call him? – Instructor-in-Chief.

1See http://www.cbsnews.com/news/80-percent-of-us-adults-face-near-poverty-unemployment-survey-finds/ .

2Ibid.

3According to the Free Dictionary, “[s]tatistics the portion of a frequency distribution containing one fifth of the total sample.”