Description: In an ingenious exploration of why children from poor families generally do worse than children from affluent families, Susan Mayer examines whether income directly affects children's life chances, or if the factors that cause parents to have low incomes also impede their children's life chances.
Brief description: Susan E. Mayer is Associate Professor, Harris Graduate School of Public Policy Studies, University of Chicago.
Review Quotes: Everyone involved in 'welfare reform' could usefully read What Money Can't Buy, a study by economist Susan Mayer of the University of Chicago. Its message is somber: as a society, we are fairly helpless to correct the worst problems of child poverty. This is not a new insight, but by confirming it, Mayer discredits much of the welfare debate's overwrought rhetoric. `Welfare reform' may raise or lower poverty a bit (we can't say which), but neither its supposed virtues nor its alleged vices are powerful enough to alter the status quo dramatically. What's impressive about Mayer's study is that it contradicts both her politics and her history...[and] demolishes much of the welfare debate's rhetorical boilerplate, liberal and conservative.--Robert J. Samuelson "Newsweek"