Overcoming Racial Disparities and Social Determinants in the Maternal Mortality Crisis
Ways and Means, Thursday, May 16, 2019
The problem of racial disparity occurs because of access to care, which is caused by poverty and social class. Once poverty is accounted for, race is a lesser variable. Most modern healthcare workers provide good care to everyone, although one can imagine that in some facilities, staff may still harbor racism, which does impact care.
Hunger affects maternal mortality and it is also caused by poverty. Maternal hunger is caused by the inadequacy of the Food Stamp program. The program punishes the poor in many ways.
First, the benefits are inadequate to feed an individual or family. This was by design so that states could not raise food stamp entitlements to offset cuts and penalties in Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, which target women for service industry jobs that leave them hungry and hopeless, including training them to provide nursing home care to old white people (to be blunt about it).
Many of the poor and hungry are disabled, either due to poor educational outcomes from underfunded schools or diseases of the poor, like Type Two Diabetes. For the vast majority of the disabled (both SSI and SSDI recipients), the monthly entitlement is inadequate to even cover rent, but are too high to receive anything but a pittance from SNAP.
Two, because many on Food Stamps get no cash subsidy at all, they are forced to sell their stamps for fifty cents on the dollar, which is the standard rip-off. If a cash benefit were added and coverage expanded for such things as toilet paper – along with much more funding for housing and energy, families would not struggle for cash.
Third, because SNAP is inadequate, diets are low in protein and high in carbohydrates, which trigger diabetes in mothers and children. If families cannot afford milk, they serve soda. If they work in low wage jobs, fast food with soda is often dinner. Such a diet endangers pregnant women, increases blood pressure before and during pregnancy, leading to complications like pre-eclampsia.
Such medical complications may require either early delivery, which hurts the later development of children or the need for therapeutic abortion. Improving the diet of poor people should be looked upon as a pro-life issue. Sadly, it is not. Many in the Pro-Life movement also adhere to views on social welfare which punish the poor for what is seen as a lack of motivation, as if starvation made work easier.
Pregnant women and new mothers need family support; not from their mothers, but from their husbands or partners. The limitation on benefits excluding homes with a father have their basis in punishing the poor, especially racial minorities. The War on Drug Users is another factor in the problem of absent fathers. That this war is related to preventing minority voters from exercising their voting rights is not lost on any of us in the civil rights movement.
The War on Drugs, inadequate benefits and attacks to voting rights are all examples of deliberate governmental failure – or more adequately, sabotage – by reactionary legislators. Sadly, when progressives take power, nothing is changed.
In policy analysis, the leading cause of poverty is not enough money. Giving more income to families actually helps them survive and even find work – especially if such items as the child tax credit are tied to either a job, a benefit or an educational program. The Child Tax Credit should be large enough to take care of current children and to prevent the need to abort additional children. It should provide a middle-class existence (ending the need for government grant programs). Current U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates stay in the $1000 per month per child range, although any tax credit should be adjusted for inflation. Even using the Chained CPI is better than nothing at all.
Again, this is a right to life issue. The movement should treat it as such or go away.
We further address the problems of poverty in Attachment One, Leveling the Playing Field for Working Families: Challenges and Opportunities, March 7, 2019, which repeat our May 2016 comments. Sadly, we have gone backwards. We have updated our four-part tax proposal, which is referenced in the Attachment.
The problem of racial disparity occurs because of access to care, which is caused by poverty and social class. Once poverty is accounted for, race is a lesser variable. Most modern healthcare workers provide good care to everyone, although one can imagine that in some facilities, staff may still harbor racism, which does impact care.
Hunger affects maternal mortality and it is also caused by poverty. Maternal hunger is caused by the inadequacy of the Food Stamp program. The program punishes the poor in many ways.
First, the benefits are inadequate to feed an individual or family. This was by design so that states could not raise food stamp entitlements to offset cuts and penalties in Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, which target women for service industry jobs that leave them hungry and hopeless, including training them to provide nursing home care to old white people (to be blunt about it).
Many of the poor and hungry are disabled, either due to poor educational outcomes from underfunded schools or diseases of the poor, like Type Two Diabetes. For the vast majority of the disabled (both SSI and SSDI recipients), the monthly entitlement is inadequate to even cover rent, but are too high to receive anything but a pittance from SNAP.
Two, because many on Food Stamps get no cash subsidy at all, they are forced to sell their stamps for fifty cents on the dollar, which is the standard rip-off. If a cash benefit were added and coverage expanded for such things as toilet paper – along with much more funding for housing and energy, families would not struggle for cash.
Third, because SNAP is inadequate, diets are low in protein and high in carbohydrates, which trigger diabetes in mothers and children. If families cannot afford milk, they serve soda. If they work in low wage jobs, fast food with soda is often dinner. Such a diet endangers pregnant women, increases blood pressure before and during pregnancy, leading to complications like pre-eclampsia.
Such medical complications may require either early delivery, which hurts the later development of children or the need for therapeutic abortion. Improving the diet of poor people should be looked upon as a pro-life issue. Sadly, it is not. Many in the Pro-Life movement also adhere to views on social welfare which punish the poor for what is seen as a lack of motivation, as if starvation made work easier.
Pregnant women and new mothers need family support; not from their mothers, but from their husbands or partners. The limitation on benefits excluding homes with a father have their basis in punishing the poor, especially racial minorities. The War on Drug Users is another factor in the problem of absent fathers. That this war is related to preventing minority voters from exercising their voting rights is not lost on any of us in the civil rights movement.
The War on Drugs, inadequate benefits and attacks to voting rights are all examples of deliberate governmental failure – or more adequately, sabotage – by reactionary legislators. Sadly, when progressives take power, nothing is changed.
In policy analysis, the leading cause of poverty is not enough money. Giving more income to families actually helps them survive and even find work – especially if such items as the child tax credit are tied to either a job, a benefit or an educational program. The Child Tax Credit should be large enough to take care of current children and to prevent the need to abort additional children. It should provide a middle-class existence (ending the need for government grant programs). Current U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates stay in the $1000 per month per child range, although any tax credit should be adjusted for inflation. Even using the Chained CPI is better than nothing at all.
Again, this is a right to life issue. The movement should treat it as such or go away.
We further address the problems of poverty in Attachment One, Leveling the Playing Field for Working Families: Challenges and Opportunities, March 7, 2019, which repeat our May 2016 comments. Sadly, we have gone backwards. We have updated our four-part tax proposal, which is referenced in the Attachment.
posted by Michael Bindner at 10:00 AM
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