Four Public Policy Implications from The Other Wes Moore and Hillbilly Elegy

Four Public Policy Implications from The Other Wes Moore and Hillbilly Elegy

Introduction: After several weeks of election-related coverage, I'm finally ready to go back to The Other Wes Moore and Hillbilly Elegy, two books I initially covered in October. That initial post synthesized several common policy themes between the two books, some of which will be reiterated in today's post. With those themes in mind, today's post will go over several significant policy implications I found when reading both books, especially relating to social and economic policy. 

Social Policy Implications:

• Ensuring all teenagers can finish high school is just as important as emphasizing college enrollment: Between Hillbilly Elegy and The Other Wes Moore, while both respective authors ended up attending college and becoming successful, both note instances of classmates and subjects who didn't finish high school, or came close to not. In Hillbilly Elegy, the chaotic family situation facing J.D. Vance led his academic performance to suffer in his first two years of high school, which almost led him to drop out (Vance 127-130; 151; 155). At the end of Hillbilly Elegy, Vance talked with teachers from his hometown, who expressed concern over society's heavy focus on college, noting that many students come from backgrounds unable to complete college, and need critical interventions much earlier in life (Vance 244-245). Meanwhile, in The Other Wes Moore, the other Wes Moore and his brother Tony became school dropouts early, turning to a life on the streets of Baltimore (Moore 56-59). Even when he returned to school after an incident that got him locked up briefly, his stint at school was short, and he returned to the streets (Moore, 109-110). These experiences show, in connection with the third policy implication, that while college is increasingly important to achieve the American Dream, if a teenager cannot finish high school, then they cannot achieve a college degree, much less find a high-quality job. 
• Social capital is critical to help teenagers and young adults in achieving success, especially those from working- or low-income backgrounds: This policy implication was already discussed in detail on the first post, so I won't go into it too much. Nonetheless, as both Moore and Vance note in their respective books, social capital they gained through external experiences (e.g. college, the military) helped them on their respective paths to success, which would have been more difficult without. 
• What happens outside school can have significant consequences on youth development: This implication can also apply as a theme that I didn't cover last time, but is one I consider critical to understanding Vance's and both Moores' (both the author and the "other") backgrounds, and what factors influenced their personal development. In particular, while both authors extensively talk about their educational experiences while growing up, a similar amount of time is spent talking about their non-educational life, and how said experiences contributed to their development. When growing up in the Bronx, while Author Moore was enrolled in an elite private school, he spent a significant amount of non-school (and school) time on the street, which included involvement in criminal activity that led to an encounter with the police (Moore 48, 76-84). Meanwhile, the other Wes Moore infrequently attended school before dropping out, and even when he did attend school, his non-school life was chaotic, as his father was absent from his life, his mother was a busy working mom, and much of his time was spent on the street (Moore 17-19, 30, 56-59). At the end of his book, Vance explicitly states that society and public policy (especially education policy) needs to increasingly consider what goes on in the non-school life of youth from communities experiencing socio-economic decline (Vance, 244-245). 
• Unintended pregnancy, especially among teenagers, has serious negative externalities: In both books, Moore and Vance discuss cases of teenage pregnancy in their communities and the effects that it has on the parents and their personal and professional development. Most notably, after becoming a high school dropout, the other Moore impregnated his two teenage girlfriends multiple times, which put significant strain on his personal decisions and outlook (Moore 99-101, 110, 137-138). Going further, author Moore speculated that having several children to support may have been the downfall of other Moore, causing him to return to a life of crime post-Job Corps (Moore 181-182). In Vance's family, his cousin Gail was on track to enter college right after high school when she got pregnant, which threw her life into chaos, which included a straining of relations with her family (Vance 240-241). Fortunately, her life bounced back after she got a job, returned to school, and remarried (Vance 241). As these cases show, unintended pregnancies can have significant negative impacts on families and individuals, including family members and acquittances. 

Works Cited:

Moore, Wes. The Other Wes Moore. Spiegel and Grau: New York, 2011.

Vance, J.D. Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis. HarperCollins: New York, 2016.

     Nathan Parmeter

     Author and Host, The Parmeter Politics and Policy Record