Welfare reform 2.0: Rep. Jim Jordan’s plan to fight poverty

In the time since President Lyndon B. Johnson launched his War on Poverty, now more than 50 years ago, government programs have dedicated more than $20 trillion to eradicating poverty. We now spend around $1 trillion per year. Observers on both sides of the aisle see the need for change, and on Monday, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) took to the stage to offer some.

Jordan, speaking during the Conservative Policy Summit at the Heritage Foundation on Monday — or, as Jordan put it, “the greatest policy think tank in the whole dang world”— discussed his soon-to-be-reintroduced Welfare Reform Act.

To work on poverty, Jordan suggested, Americans need to look for three things: strong families, free markets and work. The last of these drew the majority of Jordan’s attention, and he blasted Democrats for embracing a hard line of “less work, more help from government.”