Welfare Legends in the United States:
How discourse can be influenced by tall tales
The welfare legend is one of the most pervasive tales in contemporary american folklore. By examining various social groups, both in on-line and offline contexts, we can examine how a tale such as "The Welfare Queen" can affect discourse surrounding the American welfare system and the perceptions harbored towards it.
What are Welfare Legends?
Welfare legends, in their most basic and contemporary form, are tales of welfare recipients abusing the system to use government aid to fund lavish lifestyles and exorbitant purchases. Although welfare tales have likely existed since the inception of English Poor laws in the late 16th century, we can trace more contemporary legends to the 70's with the "welfare crisis". Particularly notable was a speech during the presidential campaign of Ronald Reagan in 1976 (Kohler-Hausmann 2016, 756-771).
Ronald Reagan and the "Welfare Queen"
During his unsuccessful campaign for the republican nomination in 1976...
Reagan infamously tells the story of a chicago woman who went by 80 different names, lived at 30 different addresses, had 12 social security cards, four imagined deceased husbands, and had accrued $150,000 in aid (Mould 2016, 385). Of course this was greatly exaggerated, but nonetheless garnered sensational headlines and soon americans everywhere were buzzing about the "Welfare Queen". A large part of Reagan's campaign was his criticism of the welfare state and it's supposed impact on the american work ethic. This legend was therefore used to further a political agenda, a move that has been repeated ad nauseum well into the 21st century. Reagan here is referring to Lynda Taylor, a woman who was later indicted for fraudulently receiving only $9000 in aid. Despite her other crimes, Lynda Taylor became the racist stereotype for the welfare recipient, one whose presence is felt today.
The Impact...
While the story was originally published two years earlier, this Reagan speech helped build a public archetype of the "undeserving poor", cementing in the minds of americans an image of poor, African American women as lazy and dishonest, living with benefits that come at the expense of the "hardworking, middle-class american." Other stories by Reagan and other members of this folk group also classify African American men as Drug and alcohol users, also stemming from a welfare legend. We can find proof of this stereotype when people say things along the lines of "people on welfare should be drug tested" which was explicitly stated by the folk group in Alamance County, North Carolina. Reagan's speech, along with the fantastical headlines of "welfare chiselers" of the 1940', 50's, and 60's, contributed to the availability heuristic of the public, giving Americans the perceptions of a welfare abuse crisis. With that, it helped spur a flurry of anti-fraud measures, including an increase in random home visits to welfare recipients, incentives for reporting fraud, anonymous tip hotlines, and even the consideration for a fingerprint system to verify the identity of the recipients. Much of the money spend on these campaigns failed to repay their investment, essentially only succeeding in criminalizing more poor people.
Because this type of Rhetoric is so powerful, it greatly influenced public perception and public policy, contributing to welfare reforms such as the major welfare overhaul of 1996 by the Republican dominated White House (Kohler-Hausmann 2016, 756-771).
Who are the folk group of this legend?
Because the welfare legend is such a pervasive and powerful tale, the folk group could consist of nearly anyone and everyone in the United States. I will go into a bit more detail in the section analyzing which the legend tells us about this folk group. There is great scholarship by Tom Mould in defining and analyzing how to classify and research contemporary legends and their folk groups. In summation, Tom claims that with group-targeted work in natural contexts, that is hearing others discuss the legends without provocation from the researcher, allows us to see how contemporary legends differ from group to group while factoring in the context for their discussions, ultimately leading to a greater understanding of both the legend and those who share it. An example he uses for a member of this folk group is a situation where he was in a discussion of the newly passed affordable care act by the Obama administration. The conversation is as follows....
Testimonial
On the subject of Obamacare....
But poor people will still use and abuse the system when they can. I was in the grocery store not too long ago when the woman in front of me tried to buy dog food with her food stamps. She was wearing a fur coat, polished nails, designer handbag. The checkout girl told her she couldn’t do that and this really made her mad. She huffed and puffed and threw the dog food down and said, ‘Fine, then he’ll eat steak instead.’ She marched back to the meat counter while we’re all standing there, waiting for her. The cashier is looking apologetically at us. And here she comes, sure enough, with two steaks.
(Mould 2016, 384)
While this story does seem outrageous, it fits neatly into a pattern that so many other welfare legends follow, leading us to question whether this was a first hand account or simply recalled as one to make the anecdote more impactful. Structures that accompany the most prevalent welfare legends are as follows:
-Welfare recipients using food stamps to buy luxury items and/or alcohol/cigarettes
-Welfare recipients well dressed while using EBT card, driving off in a luxury car afterwards (the "welfare cadillac" legend)
-Woman choosing to have more children instead of working to receive further aid
If you listen closely to many of the stories shared by this folk group, most non first-hand accounts follow one or more of these structures. They differ however, when the individuals are describing someone known to them, as they likely have more empathy towards that person having associated with them previously. These individuals, who are known to the story teller, are also generally classified into the "deserving poor" category. Here, we can hesitantly conclude that the more vague the account, the more likely the story is a derivation of a contemporary welfare legend, such as that of Lynda Taylor.
In addition to first hand accounts of individuals, Mould and his team analyzed these legend discussions in two other contexts: At a breakfast club in North Carolina and in an online forum dedicated as a place to let people proclaim their biggest frustrations. The latter group took place in a natural setting, allowing us to examine how conversations of contemporary legends take place as they would in other natural contexts, as most would have experienced them.
Interpreting welfare legends:
While there is some challenges in defining which people constitute this folk group, I am going to utilise the group "general public", which can be refined to anyone who is likely to discuss current affairs in a group setting, such as the average "working-class american". Anyone who has political affiliations, pays taxes, is employed, or is on public aid constitutes members of this folk group, however those who spread and share welfare legends would likely be those who aren't currently on aid, and have at least some reservations about the welfare system in general. The breakfast club folk group in North Carolina was described as six, caucasian, businessmen, so I will use them as an example. What might this legend tell us about this group? Based on the stories they were sharing (many which mirrored the structure of the welfare queen, and most fell along the lines of criticising the "undeserving poor"), there is likely an underlying motive to these accounts. While circulating of this legend might not be done so with explicit malicious intent, it nonetheless reinforces negative stereotypes of an already marginalized group.
There is no definite answer to the question "what does the welfare legend tell us about those who share them", partially due to the sheer scale of the group. Nonetheless we can draw some observations from the field work done by Mould and his colleagues. Welfare anecdotes, it seems, are typically passed along in order to serve a particular point of view or established beliefs, whether political, economic, racial, or class-based. Welfare legends can be used to insinuate character flaws of the poor, attempt to show how the welfare system is broken, or even reinforce a prominent racial stereotypes. They can be outlets of frustration for the working class, as these stories seems to indicate people who work less are able to afford more, as evinced by the quote "they got ribeyes, we got hamburgers" (Mould 2016, 397). This sentiment occurs frequently in the online forum, as one user writes "There are too many hard working americans who have to pay for people being f***ing lazy and reap the benefits" (Mould 2016, 404). Many working class people shared stories of when they fell into hard times and recieved aid, however claiming they would never purchase luxury products while they were struggling. Many recounted all of the luxurys they had to give up when these times came, saying others who receive aid should act similarly. Again, these might not be said with malicious intent, however they often impact others' perceptions
The variation of purposes this legend serves makes it difficult to conclude anything about the group, along with the fact that each group differs greatly from the next. One thing is for certain however, that is there is little doubt of how pervasive and powerful contemporary legends can be on public perception. I believe it is important study such legends as these, so that one may be able to differentiate fact from fiction, especially considering the consequences for many struggling Americans.
Sources (including images)
Adair, Vivyan. 2000. From Good Ma to Welfare Queen: A Genealogy of the Poor Woman in American Literature, Photography, and Culture. New York: Garland Publishing Inc.
Bettmann. November 17, 1974. Linda Taylor. From Getty Images. https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/holding-her-hat-against-the-wind-mrs-linda-taylor-leaves-news-photo/515383804?adppopup=true
Covington, O. April 17, 2019. From Elon University. http://www.elon.edu/E-Net/Article/172959
Halstead, D. February 11, 1987. Ronald W. Reagan. From Getty Images. https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/pres-ronald-w-reagan-holding-up-from-dependency-exec-branch-news-photo/50586009?adppopup=true
Hancock, Ange-Marie. 2004. The Politics of Disgust : The Public Identity of the Welfare Queen. New York: New York University Press. Accessed August 11, 2019. ProQuest Ebook Central.
Kohler-Hausmann, Julilly. 2015. “Welfare Crises, Penal Solutions, and the Origins of the “Welfare Queen”. Journal of Urban History 41 no. 5: 756-771 https://doi-org.ezproxy.proxy.library.oregonstate.edu/10.1177/0096144215589942
Levin, Josh. 2019. “The Queen” Slate Magazine, Apple Podcasts, May 2019. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-queen/id1462685560
Mould, Tom. 2016. “The Welfare Legend Tradition in Online and Off-line Contexts”. The Journal of American Folklore129 (514): 381-406. Project MUSE.
https://muse-jhu-edu.ezproxy.proxy.library.oregonstate.edu/article/635087