The Instant Formula for Poverty

When asked about television’s most famous unwed mom, the fictional Murphy Brown, Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala gave an answer not typically expected from a liberal: “I don’t think anyone in public life today ought to condone children born out of wedlock . . . even if the family is financially able.”

Shades of Dan Quayle! She’s right, and so was Dan Quayle on this issue--as long as they both remember that no child should have to suffer because of parents’ missteps. The answer about Murphy Brown got the spotlight, but it is Shalala’s comments about real-life teen-age unwed mothers that merit serious attention.

“Approximately 80% of the children born to teen parents who dropped out of high school and did not marry are poor,” Shalala testified this week before Congress. “In contrast, only 8% of the children born to married high school graduates aged 20 or older are poor.”

But marriage is not the choice of increasing numbers of Americans. Now-Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-N.Y.) identified growing illegitimacy among black families in 1965. Back then he was pilloried, but the trend he noted turned into an epidemic and crossed racial lines. Today 30% of all American children are born to unwed mothers.

To reduce welfare dependency, the current Administration and previous ones granted federal waivers to encourage states to experiment. The vigorous experimentation has often proven good for the states and the nation, which share welfare costs. But these efforts may be jeopardized because of a recent federal appeals court ruling.

It held that California welfare cuts in 1992 were invalid because federal authorities did not consider the hardship the reductions in welfare checks could impose on 2.7 million parents and children who receive Aid to Families with Dependent Children. This newspaper opposed the repeated reductions in welfare payments for some of the same reasons but strongly supported other steps that also require federal waivers, such as the increase in income and savings allowed welfare recipients. The good must not be lost with the bad.

Shalala must now consider how to get more families off of welfare and keep them off. Her prescription of marriage for teen-age mothers, though not realistic for all, is clearly part of the solution.