Raja Krishnamoorthi Questions Witness On Reform To Promote Marriage Amid Welfare Disincentives

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During a House Oversight Committee hearing last week, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL) questioned Mr. Indivar Dutta-Gupta, an advisor at Community Change and Doris Duke Distinguished Visiting Fellow at McCourt School of Public Policy of Georgetown University, about reforms to incentivize marriage.

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00:00But first of all, Mr. Christmorthy, do you want to say anything else?

00:04Briefly.

00:06Are you going to yield us five minutes total?

00:09Total, yeah.

00:11Okay, I'll yield myself one minute.

00:13Let me ask Mr. Dutta Gupta.

00:19Look, I think that there's a misconception that somehow Democrats would

00:29want to discourage marriage or harm the institution of marriage.

00:35As you know, in my own particular story, my parents remained married,

00:39and then we exited successfully from public housing and went on to live a middle-class life.

00:45But to address the issues that Dr. Kars and others raised, what is a reform that you would suggest?

00:55Well, for one thing, we have a lot of evidence of programs that do reduce divorce,

01:05which we need to think about too, and facilitate marriage with positive outcomes.

01:10These are not, unfortunately, the Bush-era healthy marriage programs,

01:16some of whom actually increase domestic and intimate partner violence.

01:19These are really jobs and income programs.

01:23So we have a track record with some jobs and income programs, particularly in the Midwest,

01:29that by helping people have health coverage, decent-paying jobs, which the United States has way too few of,

01:37in fact, we found that then people chose to get married at higher rates,

01:42and they chose to stay together and avoid divorce at higher rates.

01:45So jobs and income support programs can be the best way to promote that outcome.

01:51I yield back to you.

01:53Okay, we'll kind of...

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