(Re)producing Inequality: The Persistence of Poverty in Contemporary America, Using Opportunity NYC as a Case Study

Abstract

This thesis theorizes Opportunity NYC, the first conditional cash transfer program outside the developing world. This program is contextualized within the history of U.S. public policy toward the poor, as well as within the contemporary intellectual and political climate. I argue that Opportunity NYC is problematic insofar as it reinforces a cultural explanation for poverty in the U.S. and disguises structural factors that contribute to the generational poverty it seeks to combat.