Why I Am Not a Liberal

When it comes to how to help people, the left in the US doesn't grasp reality in all its fullness.

- David Brooks

Last May, a study came out suggesting that merely giving people money doesn't do much to lift them out of poverty.

Families with at least one child received US$333 (S$427) a month. They had more money to spend, which is a good thing, but the children fared no better than similar children who didn't get the cash.

They were no more likely to develop language skills or demonstrate cognitive development. They were no more likely to avoid behavioral problems or developmental delays.

These results shouldn't have been a big surprise. As journalist Kelsey Piper noted in an essay for The Argument, a different study published in 2024 gave families US$500 a month for two years and found no big effects on the adult recipients' psychological well-being and financial security.

A study that gave US$1,000 a month did not produce better health, career, education or sleep outcomes or even more time with their children.

Way back in 1997, Professor Susan E. Mayer, a University of Chicago sociologist and behavioral economist, published What Money Can't Buy.

She began her research believing that cash transfers would make a big difference in people's lives but was persuaded by the evidence that, even if you doubled a family's income, it would have a limited effect on their children's dropout and teenage pregnancy rates or other outcomes.

She stated her findings clearly: "The results in this book imply that once children's basic material needs are met, characteristics of their parents become more important to how they turn out than anything additional money can buy."

She added: "Parental income is not as important to children's outcomes as many social scientists have thought."

Rising out of poverty also requires the non-material qualities we now call human capital, such as skills, diligence, honesty, good health and reliability.