(2021-02-21) Caplan What Does The Success Sequence Mean

Bryan Caplan: What Does the Success Sequence Mean? If you live in the First World, there is a simple and highly effective formula for avoiding poverty:

• 1. Finish high school.
• 2. Get a full-time job once you finish school.
• 3. Get married before you have children.

Researchers call this formula the “success sequence.” Ron Haskins and Isabel Sawhill got the ball rolling with their book Creating an Opportunity Society, calling for a change in social norms to “bring back the success sequence as the expected path for young Americans.” (coming apart)

The highest-quality research on this success sequence to date probably comes from Wendy Wang and Brad Wilcox. In their Millennial Success Sequence, they observe: 97% of Millennials who follow what has been called the “success sequence”—that is, who get at least a high school degree, work, and then marry before having any children, in that order—are not poor by the time they reach their prime young adult years (ages 28-34).

One common criticism is that full-time work does almost all the work of the success sequence

Single parenthood makes it very hard to work full-time. (single-parent family)

different criticism, however, challenges the perceived moral premise behind the success sequence

“The success sequence shifts much of the moral blame for poverty from broad social forces to individual behavior.”

critics still hear this argument loud and clear – and vociferously object.

Focusing on the choices and not the underlying conditions is akin to a doctor treating only the visible symptoms without dealing with the underlying disease.

the leading researchers of the success sequence seem to agree with the critics! Wang and Wilcox: We do not take the view that the success sequence is simply a “pull yourselves up by your own bootstraps” strategy that individuals adopt on their own

I beg to differ…

What the Success Sequence Means - Econlib

Everyone – even the original researchers – insists that the success sequence sheds little or no light on who to blame for poverty. And since I’m writing a book called Poverty: Who To Blame, I beg to differ.

you should blame people for problems they do have a reasonable way to avoid. And the steps of the success sequence are eminently reasonable

Outside of severe recessions, American labor markets offer ample opportunities for full-time work. Is this still true?

I’m not saying that we should pretend that individuals are morally responsible for their own actions to give better incentives. What I’m saying, rather, is that individuals really are morally responsible for their actions. Better incentives are just icing on the cake.

Does empirical research on the success sequence really show that the poor are entirely to blame for their own poverty? Of course not!

Research on the success sequence clearly makes people nervous. Few modern thinkers, left or right, want to declare: “Despite numerous bad economic policies, responsible behavior is virtually a sufficient condition for avoiding poverty in the First World. And we have every right to blame individuals for the predictable consequences of their own irresponsible behavior.” Yet if you combine the rather obvious empirics of the success sequence with common-sense morality, this is exactly what you will end up believing.