As noted in blog #1, the national poverty debate has had a long and convoluted history, so let me pick up the story with a local perspective … the Wisconsin Idea or scholarship in the service of the public good. The underlying concept goes back to the early decades of the University in Madison, especially toward the end of the 19th century. Among its promoters were Charles Van Hise, an early president of the school, and Robert LaFollette, the great progressive politician and reformer. The two were classmates and became lifelong friends. Fighting Bob would become a U.S. senator and an iconic figure in national politics. The Public Policy school at Wisconsin is named after him.

Another early UW president, Thomas Chamberlain, captured the normative foundation of the Wisconsin Idea as follows: ‘scholarship for the sake of scholars is refined selfishness. Scholarship for the sake of the state and the people is refined patriotism.’ A wonderful sentiment to be sure, but I seriously doubt he would get tenure today.

During what was called the ‘Progressive Era’ early in the 20th century, UW faculty members such as John Commons, Charles McCarthy, and Richard Ely worked with members of the Wisconsin legislature on a number of issues that later became national initiatives. These include a workers compensation program, a progressive income tax, unemployment insurance, and various labor market improvements. Wisconsin had become the ‘laboratory for democracy’ as President Teddy Roosevelt would assert.

Perhaps more importantly, these Wisconsin scholars helped elevate the professionalism of the state legislature by developing an independent and skilled staff capability, on occasion taking such supportive positions themselves. These structural reforms wrested control of the bill-writing process from powerful corporate special interests who previously had drafted legislation for their own narrow purposes. Legislation now aimed at the common good became more feasible.

One of Ely’s students, Willard King, wrote a tractor titled Wealth and Income of the People of the United States. His work spurred interest in determining how much of the nation’s income was concentrated in the top 1 percent of the population. He and others who followed his lead found that inequality was growing during this period, with the top 1 percent commanding 18 percent of all income in 1913 before rising to a 24 percent share by 1928, just before the onset of the Great Depression. (It might be noted that a similar high in the concentration of wealth was reached in 2007, just before our most recent economic crash.)

The 1930s saw the economic crash of all crashes. The economy was in ruins, with at least one-quarter of the labor force unemployed, and poverty rates estimated in the neighborhood of 60 percent using contemporary standards (which did not exist at that time). Quite naturally, economic want resurfaced as a dominant public issue. When President Roosevelt wanted academic help to confront this national emergency, he turned once again to the University of Wisconsin. He tapped Ed Witte, a student of John Commons, to head the Committee on Economic Security. Witte, in turn, brought several other Wisconsin experts to D.C., including Arthur Altmeyer and Wilbur Cohen. Members of this team drafted and helped implement the Social Security Act, which reversed the existing consensus by establishing a dramatically expanded federal role for dealing with economic matters in this nation.

Fast forward a quarter of a century. Robert Lampman, a student of Ed Witte and also an economics professor at Wisconsin, was serving on President Kennedy’s Council of Economic Advisors. Along with Burt Weisbrod, Bob wrote the seminal chapter in the annual economic report to the President that has often been credited with inspiring the subsequent declaration of a War on Poverty by Kennedy’s successor … Lyndon Johnson.

Arguably, ideas and scholars from Wisconsin had, in fits and starts, fundamentally altered the public sector’s role in economic life. The Dickensian laissez-faire free for all that prevailed for the most part in the 19th century had been challenged. In its place, a more vigorous role for government had been instituted, one designed to ensure a reasonable playing field and which mitigated the worst outcomes associated with unfettered free markets. This new consensus enjoyed wide support in the post WWII period. Even Republican President Dwight Eisenhower endorsed this broadened role for government.

Now, however, a more ambitious role for the public sector had been set … the total elimination of want and economic security. Had an unreachable goal been set? Was failure inevitable? Was this a bridge too far?