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Bribery For Good Parenting In Nyc

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  • Bribery For Good Parenting In Nyc

    NYC to try buying good parenting

    NEW YORK -- Edith Gutierrez is quick to acknowledge her failings as a parent. And she knows what it's like to be poor.

    So for her, a New York City pilot program that will link cash grants to good parenting makes a lot of sense.

    "It could keep parents on the ball," Gutierrez said of Opportunity NYC, which the city plans to start as an experiment in September.

    "A program like that would help parents get more involved in their children's lives, and at the same time it could help them get their own education and learn a trade," Gutierrez said. "Maybe something like that would have helped me stay out of trouble."

    Maybe. But then, there are a lot of maybes connected to Opportunity NYC. Mayor Michael Bloomberg acknowledged as much in unveiling the $50 million, privately funded initiative, the first of its kind in the U.S.

    "It's new. It's innovative. And as with any good idea, there is always the possibility that it won't work," Bloomberg said in March. "But we can't be afraid to try new things."

    The program is modeled after Oportunidades in Mexico, a 10-year-old aid initiative that has been credited with alleviating Mexico's direst poverty.

    The Mexican system, like conditional cash-transfer programs in Brazil and other Latin American nations, makes demands on participants while offering small but meaningful cash rewards.

    The cash goes directly to the family, almost always the mother or other female head of the household. Parents can receive from $40 up to $100 a month if they fulfill such responsibilities as taking their children to the doctor or keeping them in school.

    That approach has won praise across the political spectrum. A centrist government started Mexico's program, but it took off under a conservative administration. Brazil's Family Fund was founded by a fiscal moderate but expanded greatly under a left-of-center government.

    Those on the right applaud the system because it relies on individual initiative and acts as an investment in the future: Children in the program are healthier. They stay in school longer. They grow up with a better chance to become productive citizens.

    Those on the left say the program helps stabilize troubled families and gives poor children more consistent access to society's benefits.

    A business analogy

    Bloomberg, a Democrat until he ran for mayor as a Republican in 2001, drew an analogy to the business world. Just as bonuses and commissions are designed to produce better performance, the mayor said, so can these payments motivate more responsible behavior.

    "The money could make a really big difference in a family's quality of life," Bloomberg said. "More importantly, it's the skills and the habits that families will learn through meeting targets that will pay the big dividends over the long term."

    Yet the mayor is guarded in his optimism. Rather than using city money for the pilot program, he will rely on $50 million raised from private donors and foundations. Bloomberg, a billionaire, contributed an unspecified sum.

    The test program will run two years, possibly three. It is expected to start in September and draw in 5,000 families. Half of the families will be in the control group, receiving a small stipend for their participation, while the other half will be beneficiaries.

    The New York program will greatly resemble Mexico's. Bloomberg called upon the architects of Oportunidades to help New York design Opportunity NYC. He and his team visited Mexico last month to talk with officials and participants.

    Though the health care components will be similar, New York's education side will be more rigorous. Parents might have to attend school meetings. And benefits will be tied not to enrollment, which is mandatory by law, but to achievement and attendance.

    "We want to incentivize attendance because ... in the very poor communities that we are targeting, attendance is lower, and it falls off dramatically in the older school years," said Linda Gibbs, deputy mayor for health and human services.

    "And there are just huge achievement gaps in poor communities, closely correlated to race and socioeconomic status," she said. "We very much want to understand how an incentive might close that gap."

    Gibbs and others acknowledged that the quality of New York's schools must improve along with the dedication of its students if the program is to produce significant results. The hope is the incentives will make students and parents more demanding of their local schools.

    $3,000 to $5,000 a year

    To entice participation, New York will increase benefits substantially. Families will get the chance to receive $3,000 to $5,000 a year. That acknowledges the vast difference in the cost of living between the urban giant and rural Mexican villages, while also making compliance worth it for beneficiaries.

    "People are practical," said Lilliam Barrios-Paoli, a former city services official who now runs Safe Space, a non-profit children's aid group. "Poor people are poor; they are not dumb. And when you give them an incentive to do the right thing, nine out of 10 times they will."

    As for critics who object to paying people to do what they should be doing, supporters of Opportunity NYC say that kind of thinking fails to recognize how fine the line is between success and failure for the poor.

    Harvey Lawrence runs the Brownsville Multi-Service Family Health Center in Brooklyn where Bloomberg officially announced the program in March. Lawrence said the targets outlined in the program are things most of his poor clients at the clinic would do anyway, or at least try to do.

    "This provides them with more of an incentive, it keeps them moving in the right direction," he said. "The cost of not doing these things is cumulative. Missed opportunities begin to compound.

    "A number of things might happen, and now the parent feels guilty that he or she cannot care for the child," Lawrence said. "That takes a toll. And that leads to other behaviors by the parents that make it even worse."

    - - -

    Opportunity NYC

    What: A pilot program to test whether cash payments used as incentives can help families break the bonds of poverty.

    When: Scheduled to start in September.

    Who: 5,000 families from various New York City boroughs will participate, with half receiving benefits and half serving as a control group.

    How: Families will receive cash grants of up to $5,000 for taking care of their health, doing well in school and bettering their job prospects.

    Cost: $50 million over two to three years, to be provided by private donors and foundations.

    Why: Mexico and other Latin American nations have reported success with conditional cash transfers, inspiring New York to become the first U.S. city to try the approach.
    Linked Here
    "To dream of the person you would like to be is to waste the person you are."-Sholem Asch

    "I always turn to the sports page first, which records people's accomplishments. The front page has nothing but man's failures."-Earl Warren

    "I didn't intend for this to take on a political tone. I'm just here for the drugs."-Nancy Reagan, when asked a political question at a "Just Say No" rally

    "He no play-a da game, he no make-a da rules."-Earl Butz, on the Pope's attitude toward birth control

  • #2
    The cash goes directly to the family, almost always the mother or other female head of the household. Parents can receive from $40 up to $100 a month if they fulfill such responsibilities as taking their children to the doctor or keeping them in school.
    HERE'S A THOUGHT:

    How about taking kids that are NOT being taken care of by the parents away and let them live with people who want them and who will take care of them without having to be bribed into it?

    Then how about we go in and sterilize those parents who were not taking care of their kids so that they cannot procreate any further?

    I am irritated beyond what I can express that people have to be bribed to take decent (not even exceptional, but just decent) care of their children! No one should have to bribe a parent to take their kid to the Dr.

    Unbelievable.
    "To dream of the person you would like to be is to waste the person you are."-Sholem Asch

    "I always turn to the sports page first, which records people's accomplishments. The front page has nothing but man's failures."-Earl Warren

    "I didn't intend for this to take on a political tone. I'm just here for the drugs."-Nancy Reagan, when asked a political question at a "Just Say No" rally

    "He no play-a da game, he no make-a da rules."-Earl Butz, on the Pope's attitude toward birth control

    Comment


    • #3
      Originally posted by THL View Post
      Then how about we go in and sterilize those parents who were not taking care of their kids so that they cannot procreate any further?
      Gordon Bennett you liberals are harsh
      In the realm of spirit, seek clarity; in the material world, seek utility.

      Leibniz

      Comment


      • #4
        THL,

        I strongly disagree with you. I despise the Department of Child Welfare or Family because they have the unilateral power to remove children from their parents if they suspect without any concrete proof and do not have to answer for their mistakes when they cause so much grief and emotional trauma. Your statements are the reason why we have this despised agency.

        Comment


        • #5
          People shouldn't be rewarded for what they should do anyway! Its a given that you should care for your children, since when is it an option? This is a perfect example of how simple minded alot of lawmakers are... "If they're not doing the right thing lets give them a reward for doing what they should anyway!"

          Comment


          • #6
            I agree that we should not bribe parents but we do anyway like in form of tax credits and other incentives we use.

            Comment

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