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Abandoned Families: Social Isolation in the Twenty-First Century
Education, employment, and home ownership have long been considered stepping stones to the middle class. But in Abandoned Families, social policy expert Kristin Seefeldt shows how many working families have access only to a separate but unequal set of poor-quality jobs, low-performing schools, and declining housing markets which offer few chances for upward mobility. Through in-depth interviews over a six-year period with women in Detroit, Seefeldt charts the increasing social isolation of many low-income workers, particularly African Americans, and analyzes how economic and residential segregation keep them from achieving the American Dream of upward mobility.
Seefeldt explores the economic and political obstacles that have altered the pathways for opportunity. She finds that while many low-income individuals work, enroll in higher education, and attempt to use social safety net benefits in times of crisis, they primarily have access to subpar institutions, which often hamper their efforts to get ahead. Many of these workers hold unstable, low-paying service sector jobs that provide few paths for advancement and exacerbate their social isolation. Those who pursue higher education to gain qualifications for better paying jobs often enroll in for-profit schools and online programs that push them into debt but rarely lead to secure employment or even a degree. And while home ownership was once the best way to establish wealth, Seefeldt finds that in declining cities like Detroit, it can saddle low-income owners with underwater mortgages in depopulated neighborhoods. Finally, she shows that the 1996 federal welfare reform and other retrenchments in the social safety net have made it more difficult for struggling families to access public benefits that could alleviate their economic hardships. When benefits are difficult to access, families often take on debt as a way of managing. Taken together, these factors contribute to what Seefeldt calls the “social abandonment” of vulnerable families.
Abandoned Families is a timely, on-the-ground assessment of hardship in contemporary America. Seefeldt exposes the shortcomings of the institutions that once fostered upward mobility and shows how sweeping policy measures—including new labor protections, expansion of the social safety net, increased regulation of for-profit colleges, and reparations—could help lift up those who have fallen behind.
Seefeldt explores the economic and political obstacles that have altered the pathways for opportunity. She finds that while many low-income individuals work, enroll in higher education, and attempt to use social safety net benefits in times of crisis, they primarily have access to subpar institutions, which often hamper their efforts to get ahead. Many of these workers hold unstable, low-paying service sector jobs that provide few paths for advancement and exacerbate their social isolation. Those who pursue higher education to gain qualifications for better paying jobs often enroll in for-profit schools and online programs that push them into debt but rarely lead to secure employment or even a degree. And while home ownership was once the best way to establish wealth, Seefeldt finds that in declining cities like Detroit, it can saddle low-income owners with underwater mortgages in depopulated neighborhoods. Finally, she shows that the 1996 federal welfare reform and other retrenchments in the social safety net have made it more difficult for struggling families to access public benefits that could alleviate their economic hardships. When benefits are difficult to access, families often take on debt as a way of managing. Taken together, these factors contribute to what Seefeldt calls the “social abandonment” of vulnerable families.
Abandoned Families is a timely, on-the-ground assessment of hardship in contemporary America. Seefeldt exposes the shortcomings of the institutions that once fostered upward mobility and shows how sweeping policy measures—including new labor protections, expansion of the social safety net, increased regulation of for-profit colleges, and reparations—could help lift up those who have fallen behind.
232 pages, Paperback
Published December 25, 2016
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About the author
Kristin S. Seefeldt
4 books1 followerKristin S. Seefeldt is the associate director of Poverty Solutions and an associate professor of social work, with a courtesy appointment at the Ford School. She holds a PhD in public policy and sociology from the University of Michigan.
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August 28, 2018
Major takeaways:
1. Low-income families have been abandoned by social institutions that traditionally have promoted upward mobility. Many are saddled with high-cost, high-fee mortgages. Others are educated by online, for-profit institutions that leave graduates in debt with few job prospects.
2. Many positions in the secondary labor market are inherently isolating. (Home health aides, for instance, work alone with minimal supervision.) The positions are of poor quality—they have low wages, security, and benefits, as well as odd hours. Working alone means no community building, no unionization, and preemptive distrust of employers. (See Judith Levine for more on this.)
3. Even living in suburban neighborhoods is isolating for low-income families who flee cities in order to access opportunity. Such households typically reside in far-flung apartment complexes that are removed from the amenities that make these neighborhoods worthwhile.
Seefeldt provides an important corrective to William Julius Wilson’s landmark work, The Truly Disadvantaged. Wilson focused on the “underclass,” those betraying the so-called culture of poverty; Seefeldt discusses urban “strivers,” families who work hard and play by the rules, yet still can’t get ahead. I was dyspeptic while reading this—much of it hit close to home.
We need a new compact between workers and their employers, between government and the governed: federal jobs guarantee, universal basic income, single payer, etc. A winning strategy will address the neoliberal policies that have transformed the world of work since the 1970s, while also instituting new social supports fit for maintaining broad-based economic security. Anything else is merely a bill of goods.
1. Low-income families have been abandoned by social institutions that traditionally have promoted upward mobility. Many are saddled with high-cost, high-fee mortgages. Others are educated by online, for-profit institutions that leave graduates in debt with few job prospects.
2. Many positions in the secondary labor market are inherently isolating. (Home health aides, for instance, work alone with minimal supervision.) The positions are of poor quality—they have low wages, security, and benefits, as well as odd hours. Working alone means no community building, no unionization, and preemptive distrust of employers. (See Judith Levine for more on this.)
3. Even living in suburban neighborhoods is isolating for low-income families who flee cities in order to access opportunity. Such households typically reside in far-flung apartment complexes that are removed from the amenities that make these neighborhoods worthwhile.
Seefeldt provides an important corrective to William Julius Wilson’s landmark work, The Truly Disadvantaged. Wilson focused on the “underclass,” those betraying the so-called culture of poverty; Seefeldt discusses urban “strivers,” families who work hard and play by the rules, yet still can’t get ahead. I was dyspeptic while reading this—much of it hit close to home.
We need a new compact between workers and their employers, between government and the governed: federal jobs guarantee, universal basic income, single payer, etc. A winning strategy will address the neoliberal policies that have transformed the world of work since the 1970s, while also instituting new social supports fit for maintaining broad-based economic security. Anything else is merely a bill of goods.
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