Bad news about Philadelphia’s long standing and expensive social ills is not hard to find.

On Friday January 26th a federal judge ordered the City “to immediately provide prisoners with clean cells, toilets, showers, beds and medical attention”. According to the article, with 8,900 people in custody (as of July) the prison system was 1,000 people over capacity and living conditions as a result violated constitutional protections against cruel and unusual punishment. According to another Inquirer article from June it costs $88 dollars a day per inmate, and total costs are up 34 percent from 2001. On the same day with temperatures well below freezing volunteers fanned out across the city to encourage the homeless to seek out shelters. Many of the homeless choose instead to endure the cold that night because they felt the shelters were a “haven for drug addicts and criminals who may steal from them or worse.”

Last Thursday the Inquirer reported that a study of test scores found that schools managed by private firms “have failed to deliver higher test scores than the district despite costing an extra $90 million”. On the same day it was reported that there are few options for Philadelphia parents in need of evening or overnight care for their kids. With an hour of this care costing $5.63 many parents “turn down jobs or a chance to make money by working the third shift, because they couldn't find night care
for their children”.

Child care, the schools, the homeless, crime and punishment are all urgent issues to grapple with today but as you do it’s important to remember that these problems which cost real money today are themselves the result of bad decisions often made decades ago by policy makers and individuals. Or as a new report frames it:

“Neglecting our less advantaged families and their children is a deceptive savings, a time bomb of social deficits destined to become budget deficits in a generation.”

The report by PathWaysPa and the Keystone Research Center, found that in 2005, 42 percent of Philadelphia’s working families had incomes less than 200 percent of poverty. These families have incomes which are too low to meet their basic needs. The report proposes removing the barriers preventing working families from achieving self-sufficiency through the following set of changes in state policy:

“Give all Pennsylvanians access to two years of postsecondary education and training.”

“Make permanent the new industry training partnerships that promote skill development and the improvement of jobs and productivity in key industries.”

“Fund industry partnerships explicitly to promote career advancement for low-income workers and link adult literacy and welfare programs with the state’s career building strategy.”

“Implement business subsidy accountability that requires that companies receiving state subsidies pay decently, locate in places accessible to low-income communities, and disclose basic information regarding the jobs they create.”

“Assess and develop plans to improve job quality in low-wage industries that receive economic development resources, including agriculture and tourism.”

“Ensure access to affordable child care and health care for all low-income working families.”

“Transform Pennsylvania’s unemployment insurance system into an employment and income insurance system—a trampoline that would launch workers back into family sustaining careers instead of a frayed safety net that inadequately cushions job loss.”

“Index the Pennsylvania minimum wage to the cost of living so that low-wage workers enjoy the same pay packet protection from inflation as state legislators.”

“Establish a Task Force on the Pay of Working Families to explore the full range of public policies, from occupation-specific wage standards to innovative forms of worker voice, which could restore the broken link between productivity and wages.”

“Create a minimum standard for paid sick leave and paid family and medical leave for Pennsylvania’s workers.”

“Make Pennsylvania’s state tax system less regressive through a state earned income tax credit and a modification to the Pennsylvania constitution that permits shifting income taxes towards those with greater ability to pay.”

Check out the full report for a complete description of each of these recommendations.

The recommendations of this report are focused largely on changes in state policy. Although it is tempting to view the problems of working families in Philadelphia as exclusively a state problem, the reality is that changes in state policy are not enough. Creating broadly shared prosperity in Philadelphia will also require local action. In that spirit the question I would put to YPP readers is what three policy changes would you recommend the City of Philadelphia pursue in order to help working poor families overcome the many barriers to self-sufficiency?

Mark Price is a Labor Economist who specializes in the study of construction and child care labor markets. In his day job he works at the Keystone Research Center (http://www.keystoneresearch.org) a research and policy development institute, which was created to broaden public discussion on strategies to achieve a more prosperous and equitable Pennsylvania economy. The views expressed here are his alone.