Closely connected with the economic causes of dependency are the social causes. The crowding of large numbers of workmen into cities leads to abnormal living conditions, which encourage ill-health, disease, and vice. Among unskilled laborers, poverty and the large number of children often prevent the young from securing a helpful amount of education. The lack of wholesome and inexpensive recreation, and the existence of costly and injurious forms of entertainment, encourage unwise expenditure of savings, and, to that extent, may influence dependency. Child labor and the employment of mothers in industry prevent a normal family life, and may be intimately associated with illiteracy, low moral standards, and pauperism.
Often indistinguishable from social causes are the personal causes of dependency. Laziness, irresponsibility, and thriftlessness figure in from ten to fifteen per cent of charity cases. Penniless old age is often the outcome of bad personal habits in youth and middle life. Idling, gambling, and other vicious habits are important causes of pauperism. Sickness is a factor in at least a third of charity cases, while disease figures in seventy-five per cent of such cases. Physical or mental defect is of great importance in dependency, often accompanying bad personal habits as either cause or effect. The feeble-minded, the epileptic, and the insane constitute a serious burden upon the community.
Defects in government have in some cases either encouraged dependency, or have perpetuated it. In so far as we have neglected legislation designed to reduce the force of industrial maladjustments, political factors may be said markedly to influence dependency. Our tardiness in protecting the labor of women and children is certainly responsible for a share of dependency. Our failure to adopt a comprehensive program of social insurance has added to the burden upon charity. Housing is receiving more and more attention in our cities, yet the living quarters in many districts continue to be sources of ill-health and vice. Probably we shall eliminate a share of dependency when we shall have established a comprehensive system of state and Federal employment bureaus. The wise restriction of immigration is also important, as is the matter of vocational education for the unskilled classes.
282. THE GIVING OF ALMS.—Until the period of the Reformation in Europe, the distribution of alms by the clergy and by pious laymen was the chief method of dealing with the problem of dependency. Then the Reformation crippled the temporal power of the Church, and ecclesiastical almsgiving declined in importance. The place formerly held by the Church was filled, partly by public almshouses or workhouses, and partly by indiscriminate and unorganized almsgiving on the part of kind-hearted individuals. Individuals distributed alms chiefly to dependents with whom they were personally acquainted, and whose needs could be effectively met without their being removed to an institution. Wandering dependents, and unfortunates whose needs were relatively serious and permanent, were cared for in the almshouse. This latter institution developed very early in England, and appeared in colonial America in the seventeenth century. Until about 1850 it was often the only institution in American communities which cared for the helpless adult dependent. The almshouse, as it existed in this country a few decades ago, has been described as a charitable catch- all, into which were crowded paupers, the insane, the feeble-minded, the blind, the orphaned, and other types of dependents.
283. ALMSGIVNG PROVES INADEQUATE.—The attempt to meet the problem of modern dependency solely by the giving of alms illustrates the difficulty of employing an ancient and simple method of treatment for a disease which has become highly complex.
Almsgiving by individuals very often pauperizes rather than helps the individual to help himself. When the dominant aim of the almsgiver is to satisfy himself as to his piety, it is only by accident that the alms really help the recipient. Very often what is needed is not money or material aid in other form, but wise direction and friendly advice. There is still a great deal of unwise and indiscriminate almsgiving by individuals, but the spread of new ideals of social help is probably cutting down the amount.
The almshouse, as it existed in the last century, was productive of much evil. Very often superintendents were allowed to run these institutions for personal profit, a practice which allowed the exploitation and neglect of the inmates. The practice of herding into this generalized institution every variety of dependent had great drawbacks. Specialized care and treatment were impossible. Disease was transmitted, and vice encouraged, by the failure properly to segregate various types of dependents. Inmates were in many cases allowed to enter and leave the institution at will, a privilege which encouraged shiftlessness and improvidence.
284. THE EVOLUTION OF NEW IDEALS.—After the middle of the last century our attitude toward the dependent classes began to change rapidly. There was a gradual abandonment of almsgiving as the sole method of attacking dependency. Rising standards of conduct contributed to the development of new ideals, some of them now fairly well established, and some of them still in the formative process. The general content of these new ideals may be briefly described as follows:
The primary aim of those who come in contact with the dependent classes should be to help those classes, rather than to satisfy pious aspirations or to indulge sentimental promptings. Rather than believing that alms are helpful because they are gratefully received, we should first discover what will help the dependent, and then train ourselves and him to take satisfaction in that which is helpful.
Poverty is not to be taken for granted. It is neither inevitable nor irremedial. It is a social disease which we must attack with the aim of destroying.