18
The figures for poor blacks were higher but again indicated that for most benefits
still only a minority of poor blacks were in households receiving welfare benefits.
Approximately 81 percent of poor blacks lived in households that were receiving means-
tested benefits of some kind, 74.9 percent received means-tested benefits other than
school lunches, 33.4 percent means-tested cash benefits, 47.2% food stamps, 65.2 percent
Medicaid, and 32.1 percent subsidized housing.
The rates for poor Hispanics fell between those for blacks and the those for the
total poverty population for in-kind benefits but actually lagged behind both the rates for
blacks and the total population for cash benefits: 77.9 percent of Hispanics resided in
households that received means-tested benefits of any kind, 62.4 percent means-tested
benefits other than school lunches, 18.3 percent means-tested cash assistance, 32.9
percent food stamps, and 57.5 percent Medicaid, and 13.8 percent subsidized housing.
Table 1 underscores that the welfare population, especially the population receiving
means-tested cash assistance, is at any one point in time but a fraction of the broader
poverty population and that this is true for blacks and Hispanics as well as the population
overall.
Table 1 therefore indicates that nonwhites in the post-civil rights era can receive
public assistance at rates even exceeding whites; and so one possible interpretation from
these data are that there is less race discrimination in welfare compared to several
decades ago. Yet, multiple interpretations are possible here as well. The great frequency
of need among nonwhites for public assistance programs that are reserved for the poorest
of the poor may be due to blacks’ greater poverty, itself a troubling racial disparity. Yet
whether this is a sign of the persistence of racial discrimination in the broader society or
Convention