"No country ever got out of poverty because of income redistribution"

"While money can help in the short run, the truth is that no country ever got out of poverty because of income redistribution (a point economist Thomas Sowell took great pains to demonstrate in his work). If such ‘redistribution’ could deliver such a happy outcome, the U.S. should have no child poverty at all. As Robert Rector of the Heritage Foundation recently noted, 'before the COVID-19 recession, the U.S. spent nearly $500 billion on means-tested cash, food, housing, and medical care for poor and low-income families with children. This is seven times the amount needed to eliminate all child poverty in the U.S., according to Census figures.'
    "This is in part due to the fact that most of these benefits aren’t counted as income in official government poverty reports. But the reality is that, to make a noticeable improvement on the poverty front, people need to improve their ability to earn and move up the income ladder."

~ Veronique de Rugy, from her article 'Poverty Isn't Just About Money: Expanding the Child Tax Credit'