Why Is It So Hard to Escape Poverty? – Ann-Helen Bay

The summary is that welfare traps are situations where people who are unemployed receive government benefits, but when they find a job, the pay is not enough to cover expenses and they lose access to the benefits. This creates a cycle of poverty that can be hard to break out of. Economists call this the welfare trap, one of the many poverty traps that perpetuate poverty for generations. Some solutions to this problem include allowing people to continue receiving benefits for a period after finding a job, phasing out benefits gradually as income increases, or providing universal benefits such as education, childcare, or medical care to all citizens. A universal basic income, which would provide a fixed benefit to all members of society regardless of wealth or employment status, is the only known policy that could entirely remove welfare traps.