It was a tough fight to get the CFPB passed into law. As Congress considered whether to create a new consumer agency, the big banks spent more than a million dollars a day lobbying against financial reform. But a grassroots network of people and organizations came together and fought back, and the Obama Administration stood firmly in support of a strong, independent consumer agency. Now, consumers across the country know there’s an agency in Washington that has their back.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

In the five and a half years since the CFPB has opened its doors, the agency has consistently delivered for working families across the country. It has returned nearly $12 billion directly to families who were tricked by big banks, payday lenders, debt collectors, and other financial institutions. It has acted aggressively to protect service members and their families from illegal foreclosures and other predatory actions. It has fielded more than one million consumer complaints, helping thousands of people in every state quickly and easily resolve disputes and recover unauthorized fees. And it has cracked down on banks that are ripping off their customers—culminating in the agency’s recent settlement and record fine in the Wells Fargo fake accounts scandal.

The consumer agency also plays a critical role leveling the playing field for working families by implementing new rules for financial products. One notable example is with payday lending.

Payday loans are an enormous problem for families and communities across our country. Too often, people obtain these loans to cover things like care for a sick child or a broken car, but then find themselves trapped in a cycle of debt. Americans now spend over $7 billion each year in fees on payday loans, which can have interest rates of 200, 300, or even 400%. And as the CFPB has noted, there are more payday loan storefronts in America than there are McDonald’s restaurants—and that doesn’t even count all the payday lenders that exist exclusively online.

While access to credit is important, too many payday lenders have built their business models around trapping families with debts they can’t ever hope to repay. It’s like throwing bricks to a drowning man. The industry targets communities of color, contributing to the massive wealth disparity between these communities and white communities. Billions of dollars are moving from those who can least afford it directly into the pockets of lenders.

Cracking down on these kinds of payday lenders is one way to give families living in poverty a fighting chance—and that’s exactly what the CFPB is doing. When the agency set out to design a new payday loan rule, it did some of the most extensive research anyone has ever conducted on payday loans. The agency’s data revealed that most people who take out payday loans aren’t able to pay them back by the time they get their next paycheck. Because of that, over 80% of payday loans are renewed after less than two weeks.

The proposed CFPB payday rule is an important step in the right direction. It provides better protections for borrowers—including requiring lenders to assess if a borrower is able to repay the loan—and limits the number of consecutive loans. These restrictions will help ensure that working families can still access payday lending if needed, but the loans will be structured to provide more financial security, not less.

Despite the work the CFPB has done, the fight to protect consumers isn’t over—it’s really just beginning. All the important work the CFPB does—helping defrauded families, cracking down on the most predatory and abusive practices, bringing more transparency and competition to the market—is at risk if the incoming Trump Administration and congressional Republicans have their way. For years, the big banks and their allies have launched one shameless attack after another trying to gut the CFPB. Recently, just days after the CFPB’s settlement with Wells Fargo for cheating consumers was announced, both House and Senate Republicans advanced bills to weaken the agency. It’s up to all of us to fight back against these efforts and protect an agency that’s put billions of dollars back in the pockets of working families.

Wall Street may not like that the CFPB is standing up for consumers and holding big banks accountable—but the American people do. As a new president takes office, it’s critical that everyone who supports a strong consumer agency continues fighting to protect it and to ensure it can build on its record of success during the Obama Administration.

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.

The safety net’s effectiveness was extremely important during the Great Recession in 2008. Thanks in part to President Obama’s work through the Recovery Act, programs like the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), Child Tax Credit (CTC), and SNAP (food stamps)—not counted by the official poverty measure—were particularly effective at protecting people. While the official poverty rate grew by 2.6 percentage points between 2007 and 2010, the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM)—which includes the effects of safety net programs—grew by only a fraction (0.5 percentage points). In contrast, the milder downturn of the early 1990s resulted in the official poverty rate rising 2.3 percentage points, while the SPM was up a similar 2.2 points. All told, the Recovery Act kept nearly 9 million Americans out of poverty.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

The Recovery Act’s expansions of the EITC and CTC were eventually made permanent, and—along with the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion, if preserved—will serve as long-lasting anti-poverty achievements of the Obama Administration. These and other safety net programs will also continue to boost long-term opportunities by raising earnings and improving health outcomes in adulthood for people who received the assistance as children.

Unfortunately, Medicaid and other anti-poverty programs—not to mention labor standards like the Department of Labor’s new overtime rule—will likely be in jeopardy under a Trump Administration and Republican-led Congress. Protecting these programs from unwarranted attacks must be a top goal of advocates in the coming years.

Pursuing full employment must be another top goal. Though 2015 brought the biggest single-year improvements in income and poverty since the late 1960s—3.5 million fewer people were in poverty than during the preceding year, and inflation-adjusted median household income rose by $2,800—one strong year does not make up for years of wage and income stagnation. Real household income still remains lower—and poverty remains higher—than they were in 2007, before the Great Recession. We haven’t yet offset the weak (“jobless” or “wageless”) early stages of the economic recovery.

Full employment is, quite simply, a situation in which most everyone who wants a job is able to find one. The least economically well-off benefit the most from a full employment economy through higher hourly wages and more hours of work. A decrease in the unemployment rate from 7% to 4.9%, for example, would be associated with a 3.2% raise in hourly pay for low-income workers, a 1.3% raise for middle-income workers, and no raise at all for workers at the top.

Full employment also provides low-income, working families with the opportunity to increase the time they spend in the paid labor market. In simulations, for example, a fall in the unemployment rate from 5.3% to 4% correlates with a substantial increase in annual hours worked by single mothers in the bottom third of the income scale, from about 700 hours per year to over 900. Given their average hourly wage of about $10, that increase in hours worked adds $2,000 to their annual income.

These figures demonstrate that labor demand matters—the working class will take advantage of available hours. Far too often, what conservatives label as an unwillingness to work is in reality an absence of ample, remunerative opportunities to work.

So where do we go from here?

To keep the recovery going, the Federal Reserve must support a full employment economy by not overreacting to price pressures and thus preemptively raising interest rates. Congress should pass a deficit-financed job-creating infrastructure program, rather than the president-elect’s proposed infrastructure privatization scheme and tax giveaway to the wealthy. We must also continue to pressure policymakers to pursue better trade deals—which would remove special investor privileges and patent protections and include enforceable environmental standards, human rights provisions, and rules against currency manipulation—and strengthen labor standards, like the minimum wage, that are extremely popular and improve job quality.

Policymakers also need to start preparing for the next recession. One of the best ways to do so would be to strengthen the federal budget’s “automatic stabilizers,” which are features that expand and contract in response to economic need. SNAP, Medicaid, and unemployment insurance already serve this function well, but they can be improved to better stimulate the economy. We recommend building on what Congress and the Obama Administration did in the last recession by improving the existing triggers—or economic indicators—that automatically extend the number of weeks during which people can receive unemployment insurance benefits. New triggers that would temporarily bump up both SNAP benefits and the portion of Medicaid spending that the federal government covers for states should also be added.

Concerns about whether a government controlled by the Republican Party will even consider such reforms are well warranted; politicians who oppose anti-poverty spending in general are not likely to support making more of such spending automatic. But recessions can quickly change the politics of public investments. Both Republican President George W. Bush and Democratic President Obama passed stimulus legislation during the last recession, and Congress has enacted temporary expansions of unemployment compensation in response to every major recession since 1970.

Much of our job over the next few years will be to protect vital gains we have made in the fight against poverty. But recognizing those gains—and how much work remains to be done—should provide us with all of the motivation we need to continue that fight.

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.

Francesca was lucky. Most of the millions of low-income Americans faced with catastrophic events—like an abusive partner, the potential loss of a home or a job, or lack of health care—don’t get the legal help they need. Paying for legal assistance is out of the question, since lawyers cost $200 to $300 per hour on average. Legal aid options exist, but they’re stretched painfully thin: There’s less than one legal aid attorney available per 10,000 Americans living in poverty. As a result, an estimated 80% of low-income Americans’ legal needs go unmet.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

Our justice system—and our ability to achieve a wide range of federal priorities—depends on people getting the services they need to address their problems. That’s why four years ago the White House Domestic Policy Council and the Department of Justice created a federal interagency group to identify the federal programs, policies, and initiatives that would be more effective with civil legal aid. Last year, President Obama recognized the power of civil legal aid by making the effort a White House initiative and expanding its reach to 22 federal agencies.

In his Presidential Memorandum establishing the White House Legal Aid Interagency Roundtable, President Obama noted:

Federal programs that are designed to help the most vulnerable and underserved among us may more readily achieve their goals if they include legal aid among the range of services they provide. By encouraging Federal departments and agencies to collaborate, share best practices, and consider the impact of legal services on the success of their programs, the Federal Government can enhance access to justice in our communities.

The tight match between federal agencies and legal aid happens throughout the federal government. The Department of Labor, for example, has a vested interest in making sure Francesca—and the millions of Americans like her—can find and keep a job. The Department of Veterans Affairs needs to make sure that veterans receive their benefits so they can keep a roof over their heads; the Department of Justice needs to help victims of elder abuse escape their abuser; and the Federal Trade Commission’s work to combat consumer scams needs support from legal aid providers who are often the victims’ first responders.

Thanks to the Roundtable, the Corporation for National and Community Service and Department of Justice teamed up to launch Elder Justice AmeriCorps, the first ever army of lawyers to help victims of elder abuse; Department of Labor-funded American Job Centers can offer legal help to remove obstacles to employment; the Department of Justice-Department of Housing and Urban Development Juvenile Reentry Assistance Program gets legal help to young adults in public housing to give them a second chance to succeed; and the Department of Veterans Affairs’ Supportive Services for Veteran Families program helps ensure homeless veterans get the legal aid they need to get into stable housing.

Studies have shown time and again that legal aid makes a difference. Representation in housing cases increases the chance a family stays in their home; domestic abuse victims are more likely to break the cycle of violence when they have legal help; and people with criminal records are more likely to find employment if a lawyer gets their old record expunged.

Just as it’s wise to plug up a leaky roof before water seeps into the walls and causes extensive damage, civil legal aid saves public dollars by preventing problems that can be costly and harmful. For example, studies show that legal aid can improve health outcomes and drive down healthcare costs, and accelerate children’s transition from foster care to a forever family, reducing direct payments to foster parents and the expense of monitoring them.

We’re at the end of an administration that has fought to ensure Americans have access to justice and to get the best results possible for the low-income and other vulnerable people we serve. Although much has been accomplished, we must continue to expand access to civil legal aid and enhance the quality of life for all families and communities.

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.

Despite the president-elect’s claim that there are “no jobs,” the labor market has improved at a remarkably steady rate as the country worked its way out of the deep recession. During the past six years, there has been job growth each and every month, and a 5 percentage point drop in the unemployment rate. In part, that’s due to President Obama’s Recovery Act, which stimulated growth, provided aid to states, and invested in infrastructure. The rescue of the auto industry saved at least 1 million jobs, and kept an entire region out of a severe depression.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

In 2015, most Americans finally started to feel the benefits of the recovery. Income rose for the typical American household, and the poverty rate saw one of the largest single-year declines in almost 50 years—primarily due to improvements in the labor market.

As steady as the recovery has been, the United States has not yet reached a full employment economy. There are still too few jobs, too few hours, and too slow wage growth for millions of people who are willing and able to work. Along with a strong safety net, decent jobs and wages for low-income people and their families is one of the most effective methods of reducing poverty.

If the next administration genuinely wants to create decent jobs, it will need to do much more than strike piecemeal deals with individual companies. It should work with the Federal Reserve to prioritize full employment, and make sure that we get there by keeping interest rates low until there is consistently strong wage growth. It should also take steps—some of which were taken by President Obama—to make sure these jobs make it possible for people to support themselves.

Raise the Minimum Wage

Despite what some policymakers and pundits suggest, a significant share of poor people already work—and their wages and benefits from that work are their main source of income. The problem is that their wages are too low. Full-time, year-round minimum wage workers don’t make enough to support a single person, much less a family. For people who rely on the federal tipped minimum wage of $2.13 per hour—disproportionately women and people of color—the struggle can be even harder.

Congress has failed to raise the federal minimum wage for seven years, so Obama relied on executive action when he could. He raised the minimum wage to $10.10 for all federal contractors, many of whom work at poverty-level wages. Some individual states also raised their minimum wages, which is correlated with faster wage growth for low-wage workers.

The rest of the country is long overdue for a raise too, and Trump has—at times—promised to give it to them. However, given how opposed Trump’s pick for Labor Secretary is to even a modest increase, it’s unlikely that the new administration will take this action on behalf of workers.

Enforce and Update Labor Standards

Workers lose tens of billions of dollars a year due to wage theft, when employers fail to pay minimum wage, overtime, payroll taxes, or worker’s compensation premiums. Stolen pay can add up quickly for low-wage employees, and it can make the difference between making rent or facing eviction. Stronger enforcement of labor standards that guard against wage theft, and updates to outdated standards—such as increasing the overtime threshold and eliminating the tipped minimum wage—would especially benefit low-income workers.

Under Obama, the Department of Labor (DOL) implemented contracting regulations that include not only a higher minimum wage, but also address wage theft, on-the-job health and safety hazards, sexual harassment, race discrimination, and wage transparency. In addition, the Obama DOL applied the minimum wage and overtime regulations to the home health care industry, whose almost 2 million care workers are generally women of color and immigrants earning wages at or below the poverty line.

End Irregular Scheduling

Irregular work scheduling denies workers any dependability in their schedule or pay. That makes it nearly impossible for working parents to find child care, know whether they are going to get the hours they need, or coordinate schedules between multiple jobs. These employment practices are also more likely to affect low-wage workers who lack the leverage to push for better wages and hours, which leaves them facing job and income insecurity and a higher likelihood of falling into poverty. To remedy these problems, policymakers could enact laws to require minimum reporting pay and advance notice of worker schedules, allowing people to plan their lives and meet family responsibilities.

Provide Paid Sick and Family Leave

Seventy-three percent of the lowest wage private-sector workers lack a single paid sick day, and 96% do not have paid family leave through their employers. That leaves workers—particularly low-income workers—in an impossible position where they have to choose between getting paid or caring for themselves or their families. At best, a missed paycheck leads to many families and individuals making tough choices among expenses on basic needs; at worst, it can lead to hunger, homelessness, or worsening illness.

President Obama issued paid sick leave and paid family leave to federal workers and contractors, and while this is a step in the right direction, millions more workers need the same support. Extending earned sick leave and paid family leave to all workers will greatly impact the lowest-wage workers, who are 4.5 times more likely to lack paid sick time compared workers at the top of the wage distribution.

A Strong Safety Net

We need a strong and effective safety net for people who are unemployed, can’t work, or have jobs that pay poverty wages. For example, Obama’s expansions of the Earned Income Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit target working families and kept 9 million people out of poverty between 2009 and 2011; his extension of emergency unemployment compensation and extended unemployment insurance benefits lifted 2.5 million people out of poverty in 2012; and last year, Social Security benefits alone lifted 26.6 million people above the poverty line. Without stronger wage gains, particularly for lower-income workers, the safety net will need to continue to work harder every year simply to keep poverty rates from increasing.

But the safety net faces the possibility of historic cuts under a Trump Administration, with Social Security, housing assistance, Medicaid, and nutrition assistance all at risk. And that’s not even including the threat to the Affordable Care Act, which has reduced the share of Americans without health insurance to a record low and increased millions of Americans’ economic security.

As a new administration takes the baton, we need to strengthen efforts to help workers and reduce poverty.

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.

Yet we also have much unfinished business, in part because so many of the administration’s promising initiatives—such as comprehensive immigration reform, a significant investment in child care and early childhood education, and a major youth employment initiative—were not enacted. And unfortunately, the ideas currently proposed by leaders in Congress and the President-elect’s transition team would tear apart not only President Obama’s successes but also the core of our safety net.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

Here are five areas where the Obama administration sought to drive progress for children and families—and what we expect from the next administration.

Expanding Health Insurance

Children’s health insurance has increased dramatically under the current administration. Thanks largely to the Affordable Care Act (ACA), about 1.7 million children gained coverage from 2013 to 2015. Now more than 95% of children are insured—a record high.

These improvements in health insurance have long-term positive consequences. There are obvious benefits like reductions in infant mortality and childhood deaths, improved health, and reduced disability. But there are subtler effects, too: expanding health coverage for low-income children improves high school and postsecondary success, and also employment over the long haul. Plus, children’s life chances are improved when parents are able to get the care they need, like treatment for depression (which is widespread among low-income mothers of young children).

Despite the mounting evidence of lifetime benefits for children, President-elect Trump and Republican leaders in Congress have vowed to repeal the ACA. If they succeed, the number of uninsured children will double—even without accounting for the additional cuts now being discussed for Medicaid, which is especially important to low-income families.

Reducing Child Poverty

During the worst of the Great Recession, more than 21% of children lived in poverty—15.6 million in total. By 2015, the number had dropped by about one million, and the child poverty rate was down to 19.7%. While that rate is still far too high, the improvement reflected an economic recovery that helped all families.

The Obama administration fought to protect key safety net programs that support families when they are most economically vulnerable—such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly food stamps)—and successfully expanded the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and Child Tax Credit (CTC). These programs are crucial for low-income children—in 2015, SNAP reduced child poverty by 2.7 percentage points and the EITC and CTC together reduced it by 6.5 percentage points. As with health insurance, these programs pay off for a lifetime: children getting this help have improved health, education, and employment outcomes.

Despite this strong evidence, Congress and others have argued to sharply cut SNAP or change its structure to a block grant—a fixed amount of money that states can spend for various purposes. That fixed dollar amount—which doesn’t increase during tough economic times—leaves families and communities without resources when they need them the most.

Addressing Disparities for Children of Color

Despite some progress, disparities for children of color remain stark. About 1 in 3 African American children and 3 in 10 Hispanic children live in poverty, even with high levels of household work effort. That’s more than double the poverty rate for white children. Fixing these disparities matters more than ever to the nation’s future, because of who today’s children are: almost half are children of color (a milestone already reached for young children), and about one-quarter are children of immigrants.

The Obama administration made important commitments to build ladders of opportunity for children and families of color, though the work remains unfinished. The administration made strides on educational equity, beginning with early childhood education up through improved access to postsecondary education and job training. It also focused on justice reform, with the goal of reducing interactions between students of color and law enforcement in schools.

In addition, more than 5 million U.S. children have at least one parent who is an unauthorized immigrant. In an effort to keep these families together, the administration issued an executive action providing temporary protected work status for parents of children who are American citizens or long-term residents—but court action blocked it. Now these children remain at risk of separation from their parents, which creates high levels of stress and undercuts their development and their families’ economic security.

Fair Wages and Working Conditions for Families

About two-thirds of poor children live with a working adult. These families typically must confront a combination of low wages, volatile and inadequate work hours, and insecure jobs.

Over the past eight years, dozens of states and cities have passed paid sick time, paid family leave, and scheduling laws that make a big difference to these families. The administration’s commitment to paid leave—including strong support for the federal Healthy Families Act and its “Lead on Leave” campaign—helped fuel change at the local and state level. Moreover, the administration’s paid sick days and minimum wage executive orders for government contractors and the overtime rule are crucial expansions of labor protections that could benefit millions of workers.

But while bills to take the paid leave, scheduling, and minimum wage provisions nationwide were introduced, none has passed the divided Congress—and the President-elect’s announcement of a Labor Secretary who is sharply critical of regulations to help low-wage workers suggests the modest steps taken so far could be rolled back.

Stalled Budget Investments in Children

Unfortunately, what has not improved nearly enough in these eight years is public investment in children through child care and Head Start, as well as youth development activities and career opportunities (with the exception of modest increases in Pell grants).

The administration’s strong budget proposals to provide all low-income infants and toddlers with access to high-quality care, and to expand other early learning programs, were never enacted. In fact, even though Congress did enact important bipartisan measures to improve the major federal program that helps low-income parents with child care—such as streamlining rules so parents can keep child care support despite unstable work hours, and strengthening training for child care workers—it never provided funding to support the changes. Today, less than 1 in 6 eligible children receive child care assistance, less than half of eligible preschoolers benefit from Head Start, and Early Head Start serves less than 7% of eligible infants and toddlers. This lack of action flies in the face of resounding evidence that early childhood investments pay off both for children and the economy over the long run.

Overall, the agenda being discussed by Congressional leaders and the President-elect’s transition team fails to build on the administration’s accomplishments. It also proposes denying basic help like health care and nutrition to a generation of children, which would have lifelong consequences. All Americans need to fight back against these devastatingly shortsighted choices, which would place children’s own healthy development, education, and work success at risk—along with our nation’s economic future.

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.

As President Obama prepares to leave office, the United States still holds the dubious honor of having the highest incarceration rate in the world, with 2.2 million people behind bars. In order to assess his impact on the criminal justice system, it’s necessary to examine the policy shifts that got us here in the first place.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

In 1980 there were 24,000 people in the federal prison system, about 25% of whom were serving time for a drug offense. By the time Obama was elected in 2008, that number had ballooned to 201,000 people, nearly half of whom were locked up for a drug offense.

There are two key reasons for the population explosion—both rooted in the war on drugs. First, President Reagan encouraged federal law enforcement agencies and prosecutors to emphasize drug arrests. Second, Congress adopted mandatory sentencing policies—frequently applied to drug offenses—that established a “one size fits all” approach to sentencing. Federal judges were obligated to impose prison terms of 5, 10, 20 years—or even life—largely based on the quantity of drugs involved. They were not permitted to take any individual factors, such as histories of abuse or parenting responsibilities, into account to mitigate those sentences.

The most egregious of these policies were tied to crack cocaine offenses. Someone possessing as little as five grams of the drug (about the weight of a sugar packet) would face a minimum of five years in prison. That threshold was significantly harsher than the mandatory penalty for powder cocaine, which required a sale of 500 grams of the drug (a little over a pound) to receive the same penalty. Since 80% of crack cocaine prosecutions were brought against African Americans, the racial disparities from these sentencing policies were particularly extreme.

Momentum for reforming the crack cocaine mandatory minimum laws predated the Obama administration, and had growing bipartisan support when the President took office. The President signed the Fair Sentencing Act into law in 2010, reducing sentencing severity in a substantial number of crack cases. Then in 2013, Attorney General Eric Holder issued a memorandum to federal prosecutors calling on them to avoid seeking mandatory prison terms in low-level drug cases, which has cut the number of cases with such charges by 25%.

While the changes in sentencing laws have helped to reduce the federal prison population, the highest profile of Obama’s reforms is his use of executive clemency to reduce excessively harsh drug sentences. That is a story of both politics and policy. During Obama’s first term he used his clemency power far less than his predecessors—a pattern that was sharply criticized by many reform groups and editorial boards. But after launching a “clemency initiative” in 2014, the President has commuted the drug sentences of more than 1,100 individuals (with promises of substantially more by the time he leaves office). Notably, in about a third of these cases, the individuals had been sentenced to life without parole due to mandatory sentencing policies.

The President’s efforts to make sure people can return to their lives after they have been incarcerated are noteworthy as well. A pilot program at the Department of Education is addressing the consequences of the ban on the use of Pell Grants for higher education in prison (a provision of President Clinton’s 1994 crime bill). The new initiative restores access to this funding on a limited basis, and will reach about 12,000 incarcerated students. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission also made it easier for people with criminal records to find work, by cutting down on the rampant misuse of an individual’s criminal justice history during job application processes. For example, employers may no longer inquire about arrests that didn’t lead to a conviction, and an offense may only be considered if it is relevant to the job at hand. Additionally, employers need to take into account when a conviction occurred, so that people are not continuously punished for an offense committed long ago.

Perhaps the most significant aspect of President Obama’s work in regard to criminal justice reform has been his role in changing the way we talk about the issue. After a disappointing first term in which these issues received only modest attention, Obama’s last years in office framed criminal justice reform as a top priority. Among a series of high-profile events during his second term was the President’s address on mass incarceration at the NAACP national convention, at which he concluded that “mass incarceration makes our country worse off.”

Mass incarceration did not come about because there is a shortage of ideas for better approaches to public safety—it was the result of a toxic political environment where legislators favored political soundbites over evidence. By using the bully pulpit to frame justice reform as a major issue, Obama provided some coverage for mainstream legislators to support sound policy options.

It is difficult to be optimistic that the incoming administration will look favorably on criminal justice reform. Leading Republicans, such as House Speaker Paul Ryan, may be persuasive in making the conservative argument for reform. But President-elect Trump’s “tough on crime” rhetoric, which paints many incarcerated people as “bad dudes,” suggests progress at the federal level will be a challenge.

Realistically, opportunities for justice reform are more likely at the state level. Many local officials are already convinced of the need for sentencing reform and reentry initiatives, and they may be less influenced by the political climate in Washington. If so, such changes at the local level may ultimately gain traction in a Trump White House as well.

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.

President Obama promised a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. His efforts to pass comprehensive immigration reform were blocked by Congress, but his executive action—Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA)—provided temporary status for 741,000 young people who came to the US as children. The initiative protected those who were eligible from deportation and granted them temporary work authorization. A proposed expansion of the program would have extended protections to an estimated 330,000 more people, including the family members of DACA recipients. It was blocked by the courts despite its clear legality.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

The data already demonstrates that DACA empowers young people to pursue their education, and makes a dramatic difference in the opportunities available to them. Nationally, undocumented immigrants often have to rely on low-wage jobs: Nearly 20% are employed in the leisure and hospitality industry, more than 15% are employed in construction, and 5% are in agriculture. DACA recipients, on the other hand, are most likely to work in educational and health services—only 5% are in leisure and hospitality, 3% are in construction, and less than 1% work in agriculture.

DACA also benefits US workers more broadly, because it makes it more difficult for employers to undercut wages. Since they are unable to assert their labor rights, undocumented workers are more vulnerable to wage theft, non-payment of minimum wage and overtime, and other forms of exploitation. DACA helps ensure that good employers who play by the rules aren’t competing with bad actors who minimize costs and maximize profits through labor violations.

President Obama’s legacy on immigration is not all positive, however. He presided over the largest number of removals ever in the United States. Not only does deportation break families apart, but it threatens their economic well-being. The loss of a breadwinner can mean the difference between paying rent and being homeless, feeding a family or facing hunger. President Obama enforced a flawed immigration system, and many advocates were angry that he didn’t push for comprehensive immigration reform when the Democrats controlled the House and Senate.

However, it is House Republicans who bear most of the blame for the broken system that remains in place. In 2013, the Senate passed comprehensive immigration reform. The bill increased the number of border patrol agents, made common sense reforms to our visa system, and provided a path to citizenship for the 11 million undocumented immigrants. But House Republicans failed to act. Their inaction not only has consequences for immigrant families, but for the entire economy. It is estimated that greater labor mobility and stronger workplace protections would increase the average undocumented immigrant’s earnings by nearly $1,900 each year. For the typical family with an undocumented immigrant, that increase in earnings is equal to 37% of average food expenditures, or 27% of average transportation costs. These additional resources lift-up families and stimulate local economies.

While President Obama’s legacy on immigration will get mixed reviews, President-elect Trump’s vision is unequivocally myopic, enforcement-minded, and cruel. His advisors—like Kris Kobach (author of Arizona’s notorious SB 1070) and Attorney General-nominee Jeff Sessions—support virulently anti-immigrant policies, and one of Trump’s signature campaign promises was to build a literal wall to keep undocumented immigrants out of the country.

Trump’s proposal to deport all 7 million unauthorized workers is not just divorced from reality—it would be deeply damaging to the economy. Removing DACA recipients alone from the workforce would cost $433.4 billion in lost GDP over a decade. If all unauthorized workers were removed, the damage would be even wider spread. Industries ranging from construction to leisure to hospitality to wholesale retail would suffer. All told, a policy of mass deportation would immediately reduce the nation’s output by $236 billion—$4.7 trillion over 10 years—which is almost two-thirds of the decline experienced during the Great Recession.

Ultimately these policies are about people, not numbers. It’s possible to measure the loss in GDP due to deportation, but you cannot encapsulate the grief of being separated from a family member or the exhilaration of pursuing a college education and the job you have always wanted. And numbers cannot express the difference to our national psyche between welcoming immigrants and recognizing their contributions to our communities and the economy, and going backwards to a climate of fear and hostility.

As President Obama takes a last look at the Oval Office, he knows his work on immigration was incomplete. It will be up to the rest of us to make sure that what he did accomplish isn’t undone, and to push for the solutions we know will benefit our entire nation.

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.

From his first day in the White House, President Obama worked towards achieving this vision. It’s easy to forget that his presidency began in the depths of the Great Recession and the worst financial crisis in 80 years. President Obama recognized that bank bailouts, begun by his predecessor, were not enough to revitalize the economy, and they would do nothing to relieve the human suffering already caused by the financial collapse. In the administration’s view, economic growth and resilience required investments in America’s greatest asset—its people—and in the opportunities and resources everyone needs to thrive and succeed.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

The $800 million economic stimulus program—enacted just a month after the president took office—focused on job creation and improvements in transportation infrastructure, two critical underpinnings of opportunity. The administration followed that legislation with the hard-won Affordable Care Act, which gave millions of people access to health care—the most basic of resources for living a healthy, productive life.

These early broad-stroke moves signaled an historic federal commitment to creating a fairer, more just, more inclusive and equitable America. Over two terms, the Obama Administration would double down on that commitment with innovative initiatives aimed at enabling people at the bottom of the ladder to move up.

President Obama was not the first U.S. leader to pay attention to poverty and inequality. But the administration understood the full dimensions of the challenges facing people living in areas of concentrated poverty, and the need for comprehensive solutions. After all, Obama had cut his teeth in the world of community organizing, and he knew the nation hadn’t moved the needle much on poverty by building affordable housing or creating job training programs in neighborhoods cut off from good schools, jobs, transportation, and other essential services.

So the Obama administration changed the old, misguided antipoverty playbook.

In one of the most significant shifts in federal domestic policy since the War on Poverty in the 1960s, turf-conscious federal departments and agencies forged cross-sector solutions to build communities of opportunity in inner cities, aging suburbs, tribal communities, and rural regions. And to a degree unprecedented in the federal bureaucracy, agency leaders listened to the wisdom, voice, and experience of community leaders in shaping policy and implementing programs. For people of color in particular, who are often spoken to or spoken about by the government—rather than spoken with—this represented a dramatic change.

Leaders in HUD, Treasury, USDA, the Department of Education, Health and Human Services and other agencies wove together smart policies in transportation, housing, health, food, sustainability, and economic development to revitalize struggling communities and change the systems that hold back low-income people and people of color. Agencies expanded access to healthy food and public transit in low-income neighborhoods that had lacked these essentials for years. Housing policy shifted focus from financing affordable dwellings in economically barren neighborhoods to aligning with investments in transportation, sustainability, and employment opportunities. Education investments went well beyond making long-overdue improvements in failing schools to put in place systems that support low-income children and children of color from cradle to college to career. These investments catalyzed local communities to provide children with everything it takes to succeed in school and life, from health care to mentorship to enrichment programs outside school.

The White House also challenged the nation to re-think the policies of mass incarceration that have locked more than 2 million people—60% of them people of color—behind bars. The administration urged us to re-imagine the prospects for people returning from prison to their families and communities, and to recognize their value.

The national discourse on poverty shifted too. The U.S. presidency is often called a bully pulpit. President Obama transformed it into a pulpit for dignity and respect. “We are true to our creed when a little girl born into the bleakest poverty knows that she has the same chance to succeed as anybody else, because she is an American,” he declared in his second inaugural speech. “She is free, and she is equal, not just in the eyes of God but also in our own.”

President Obama’s grace, intelligence, and unwavering moral compass changed the way America talked about race, justice, and the potency of inclusion. He changed the tenor of conversation about people of color, women, gays, lesbians, immigrants, and transgender people. Some might call it political correctness, but I found the new language to be as refreshing as the wind—a wind that I had hoped would blow racists and hate-mongers to the fringe. I will always think of the past eight years as a moment when America tried to discover its best self.

All of this is at stake as we brace for the new administration. If the incoming president fulfills his campaign promises—and his Cabinet picks suggest he will—the nation will turn back the clock on economic policy, consumer protection, health care, civil rights, voter rights, immigration, and everything else I hold dear. Already, fear and hate are undermining the hope for building healthy communities of opportunity throughout America.

Hope seems elusive. But our resolve cannot be. Progressives, people of color, and fair-minded Americans everywhere must stand together to do four things:

Resist. The immediate targets of the incoming administration are likely to be Muslims and Mexicans. Americans of all colors, backgrounds, lifestyles, and ages must mount fierce, unified resistance to unconstitutional and unjust acts against any group. When one is attacked or reviled, everyone is.

Protect. We must safeguard the essentials we need for the health and future of people, places, and the planet. That means fighting to preserve access to health care for vulnerable groups, robust public education systems, and nearly a half-century of environmental protections. It also means redoubling efforts to protect voter rights, the foundation of American democracy.

Find openings. Even as we organize, advocate, sue, and march to oppose the worst of what may come, we must be alert to policies and programs that offer even small opportunities to build stronger, more sustainable communities.

Innovate. The nation did not change on Election Day. The vision of equity—of a nation in which all can participate, prosper, and reach their full potential—remains powerful, and it is more urgent than ever. Guided by that vision, we can continue to innovate in local communities and at the state level. As we demonstrate what works, we will press the new administration to support these new approaches in order to lift up all communities.

Together, we will show Washington that America does not need to build walls. It needs to build ladders of opportunity.

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.

More than 22 million uninsured people gained health coverage, resulting in the lowest uninsured rate in U.S. history. People with pre-existing health conditions can no longer be denied coverage by insurance companies. Annual and lifetime caps in insurance payouts are barred, thereby protecting people with major illnesses and accidents. Health care coverage must be comprehensive—it cannot be filled with holes. Women can no longer be discriminated against in premium costs. Young adults can stay on their parents’ insurance plans until their 26th birthday. Preventive care is provided at no cost.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

These changes have made a huge difference in the lives of millions of people. Because of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), all Americans are far less likely to go bankrupt after a major accident, or be penalized for chronic conditions, or have a minor illness spiral into a serious medical problem. There has also been remarkable progress in extending coverage to low- and moderate-income families and individuals.

To be sure, the new law is far from perfect. There are still millions of people who don’t have health coverage, in part because 19 states have refused to expand Medicaid. In the individual private insurance marketplace, fewer insurers are selling coverage and premiums are rising at unacceptable rates. High-quality care still has too high of a price tag. But the ACA established a strong foundation that we can build on.

Unfortunately, the progress we have made may soon be reversed. President-elect Trump and congressional Republicans are determined to repeal the law. They also want to convert the Medicaid program—which currently serves more than 73 million low-income people—into a block grant with significantly diminished funding. These changes to Medicaid would kick people off of the program, reduce its coverage, and lead to deductibles and co-payments that recipients cannot afford.

For nearly seven years, we have heard from conservatives that they will repeal and replace the ACA. While congressional Republicans now have a clear plan to repeal the law—in short, to repeal it in early 2017 but delay implementation so that people don’t start losing their insurance until after the 2018 midterms—they have not put forward a unified proposal on what to replace it with. That means when they vote to repeal the bill, they will have no idea what the changed health care system will ultimately look like.

If Congress moves forwards with this half-baked plan, an estimated 30 million people will lose health coverage, while the wealthy receive massive tax breaks. That would more than double the uninsured rate, and flip the country from having its lowest uninsured rate in history to its highest in decades. Eighty-two percent of the people who will lose coverage are in working families, and four out of five don’t have college degrees. These numbers will be even higher if the ACA repeal is combined with the proposed restructuring of Medicaid.

The net result is a lose-lose-lose-lose proposition. Millions of Americans would be priced out of the care they need. Many hospitals, especially those in rural and low-income communities, will need to close because they cannot afford to care for uninsured patients. And the health care sector will face enormous job losses, which would have a major ripple effect throughout the economy. Finally, states would not only lose significant federal revenues, they would face an increase in expenditures to help pay for some care for the newly uninsured.

A new coalition, “Protect Our Care,” is focused on helping the public understand the harmful consequences we would face if the ACA is repealed and Medicaid is gutted. The coalition aims to ensure that its education and mobilization effort effectively reaches the public, opinion leaders, and policymakers before it is too late.

It behooves people of good will, from both political parties, to work together to ensure that we continue to improve our health care system—not take large steps backwards that would create chaos.

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.

From my seat in the United States Senate, I can attest that the last eight years have certainly not been free of strife or confrontation, to say the least. But despite all the political posturing and polarization, the past eight years have also shown us at our best. We have sought to build up our fellow citizens and fellow human beings instead of tearing them down, and made progress in the face of adversity.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

Nowhere is the hope and promise of the last eight years better exemplified than in the progress we have made in achieving equality for the LGBTQ members of our American family.

In January 2009, when President Obama first took office, it was not a federal hate crime to attack someone because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. Same-sex marriage was only legal in two states. LGBTQ people could not serve openly in the military, or access their partners’ survivor benefits or health insurance. They were anxious and unsure—should a crisis arise—about whether they would be allowed to make medical decisions for their families, or see them in the hospital during an emergency, or keep their home if their partner died.

For over two hundred years, the story of America has been one of striving to live up to our founding ideal “that all men are created equal.” Slowly—often too slowly—we have broken down the barriers that divide us; that say some of us are more equal than others.  For the LGBTQ community, many of the biggest, most daunting barriers that they had faced for generations finally came down during President Obama’s administration. The millions of men and women within the LGBTQ community, who struggled for so long to be treated equally and enjoy all the same rights and opportunities as their fellow citizens, can attest to just how momentous the last eight years have been.

With the historic passage of the Affordable Care Act, it is no longer legal to deny health coverage to anyone because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. The President also decided that the government would no longer defend the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in court, even before the Supreme Court struck it down as unconstitutional. He took this path because he believes, as he said during his second inaugural address, “that the most evident of truths—that all of us are created equal—is the star that guides us still.” And when the Supreme Court finally affirmed that “love is love” by ensuring marriage equality in every corner of our nation, President Obama declared it “a victory for America” and his administration moved quickly to implement the court’s ruling.

From my position at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, I have been privileged to work with the President and members of his administration to advance the rights of the LGBTQ community in Congress. We worked together to pass the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act, repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” and reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act with new protections for the LGBTQ community. In an historic, bipartisan vote, we passed the Employment Non-Discrimination Act in the Senate to ensure employers could no longer fire someone for who they are or whom they love. And though the House failed to act on this legislation, President Obama issued an executive order in July 2014 that secured this right for the 28 million Americans working for federal contractors.

But President Obama and I both know that as long as anyone is scared to put their spouse’s photo on their desk at work, or fears being evicted from their apartment if they have a same-sex partner, then our nation has not come far enough or broken down enough barriers.

That’s why I have worked with my House and Senate colleagues, President Obama’s administration, and an extraordinary coalition of grassroots and civil rights groups to craft the Equality Act, landmark legislation that would extend the same non-discrimination protections that so many of us take for granted in employment, housing, public accommodations, and more to our LGBTQ brothers and sisters.

We are proud President Obama endorsed our bill, one that his White House described as “historic legislation that would advance the cause of equality for millions of Americans.”

When the new administration comes into office on January 20, we will face a White House that is indifferent at best and hostile at worst when it comes to LGBTQ rights. It’s a daunting moment, especially in the face of all our gains over the last eight years. But these new challenges only make it more important for Americans who care about the rights of our fellow citizens to keep fighting—not just to fiercely defend the gains we have made, but to continue pushing on for full equality.

On the day we introduced the Equality Act, I knew the struggle to pass it would not be an easy one.  But I was convinced then, and I remain convinced today, that we will ultimately succeed. The arc of the moral universe is long, as Martin Luther King Jr. said, but it bends towards justice. But, it only bends when good people fight for justice. President Obama’s legacy on LGBTQ rights shows us that with hard work and struggle, we can bend the arc quite far in just a few years.

Now, it’s up to the rest of us to keep up the struggle, to do everything we can to ensure that justice reigns in our nation—and that every American, regardless of race, color, creed, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, or gender identity, can live freely and equally in the eyes of the law.

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.

Our public school system has always been fundamental to that promise.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

Three weeks into the new administration, President Obama signed a law providing $100 billion in additional funding for education. While most of that money went to states to protect teaching jobs, support low-income and special needs students, and provide college grants, $5 billion was set aside to drive reform and innovation, and another $3 billion for turning around our lowest-performing schools. President Obama also made a number of significant investments over the course of his tenure, including increasing funding for Pell Grants by more than $50 billion and increasing investments in early childhood programs by more than $6 billion.

Today, much has changed for the better in American education. Others can decide how much change is due to our efforts, but America’s progress since 2008 is undeniable:

• Most states have higher learning standards and better assessments.
• We have more children in early learning programs.
• We have more high-quality school options available.
• We have countless examples of evidence-based innovation to learn from.
• Students enjoy greater protections from violence, discrimination, and inequity thanks to an invigorated Office of Civil Rights.
• Many more students have high-speed internet access.
• Test scores for the lower grades are up.
• We have cut “dropout factories” with unacceptably low graduation rates by 40%, and the nation’s high school graduation rate is at an all-time high of 83%.
• We have more young people in college and more college graduates from low-income families.
• Many of our community colleges are better aligned to the needs of local employers.
• All colleges—public, private, and for-profit—face more pressure to graduate their students instead of merely enrolling them and allowing them to drop out.

But, this is no “mission accomplished” moment. We still have many unmet challenges:

• Too many children show up in kindergarten behind their peers due to a lack of access to pre-K programs and other factors.
• Too many young people are still trapped in underperforming schools.
• Too many schools lack the needed resources to serve the growing low-income population.
• We still disproportionately suspend and expel students of color.
• Inequality persists in funding and access to rigorous college prep courses.
• High school test scores are mostly flat and many high school graduates are not ready for college or careers.
• We don’t do nearly enough to prepare young people in high school to go straight to work, if that’s what they want to do.
• Too many college students and graduates are struggling with student debt while too many low-income students are priced out of college altogether.

Congress and the President have helped lay a foundation to address some of these issues. We have a new federal education law that makes needed and important changes. For the first time, states must adopt challenging academic standards that are aligned with college entry requirements and career-ready standards, so it’s unlikely that states can retreat. The new law also acknowledges that learning starts at birth, and encourages investment in early learning programs.

The law moves us away from accountability based on a single test score to one based on multiple factors, like graduation rates. I have often said that the prior version of the law, known as No Child Left Behind, was “loose on goals but tight on means,” because it didn’t demand high standards and it was too prescriptive about how to improve. The new law flips that around and gives states more flexibility to implement reform and accountability.

Now it falls to the next administration to maintain a high bar, continue the progress, and stay focused on our national goals. These four goals are neither Democratic or Republican, left or right, liberal or conservative:

• Leading the world in early childhood education.
• Boosting high school graduation rates to 90% and beyond.
• Making sure 100% of high school graduates are truly college and career-ready.
• Leading the world in college completion.

While state and local governments will always play the predominant role in education, the new administration needs to understand the historic role that the federal government has played in driving equity, and promoting excellence and innovation.

Thanks to the federal government, we have a world-class system of public universities. Thanks to the G.I. Bill, we won the peace after World War II. Thanks to the federal government, millions of low-income students can go to college.

Thanks to the Supreme Court, segregation in public schools is no longer the law of the land. Thanks to the federal government, America protects the rights of students with disabilities and it dedicates funds for English-language learners, and homeless, migrant, and rural students.

Parents don’t care all that much which level of government pays for education, makes the rules, or holds the system accountable. They just want what’s best for their kids—and that’s what we should all want.

It’s a new day in Washington, and change can be perilous or promising. The perils are obvious: a retreat from accountability, an unwillingness to defend the most vulnerable, and a divided country that no longer views education as a shared opportunity to lift all boats. Instead, education is rationed to those with the means to acquire it—rather than extended to all those with the talent and the will to gain the most from it.

The promise, on the other hand, is infinite—a world where every child has the opportunity to rise from nothing to something, to fulfill his or her destiny and to realize the American dream. If we want to reduce income inequality and increase social mobility, the only way to do that is to give every child a world class education. It’s the best investment we can make.

As a citizen of the greatest country in the world, I always root for the success of those who serve, regardless of political affiliation. But, let’s remember that success in education is measured not by laws or rules, courtroom battles, political campaigns, or the size of the federal footprint, but by student outcomes.

Let’s keep our eyes on the prize.

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.

President Obama’s action gave women a stronger tool to fight for equal pay, and it made them more financially secure. It also signaled clearly that our president was going to spend his term fighting for a woman’s right to have the same chance as a man to succeed, to have a better shot at escaping poverty, and to create a better life for themselves and their families.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

Facing opposition from an unfriendly Congress, President Obama signed executive orders granting federal workers and contractors a higher minimum wage and paid sick days, making pay more transparent by requiring government contractors to give their employees the necessary information each pay period to make sure they are getting paid what they are owed, and making workplaces safer by allowing victims of sexual assault or harassment their day in court. These reforms were key for women, who make up the majority of minimum wage workers and who are often tasked with caring for dependents when they are sick. Making pay transparent also helps employees to know if their pay is lower than other similar employees—which could be an indication of pay discrimination.

President Obama also enacted one of the most significant anti-poverty measures in years when he expanded the Earned Income Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit in the stimulus bill. Between 2009 and 2011, these expansions kept 9 million people out of poverty. They were particularly crucial for women and their families, who would have lost over $8 billion in tax assistance if the reforms had been allowed to expire.

Additionally, President Obama vigorously enforced civil rights laws, which removed impediments to opportunities for women and girls. The Obama administration stepped up enforcement of Title IX to combat sexual assault in universities and colleges, as well as K-12 schools. He also fought for and signed the 2013 reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act, which was expanded to better protect all women, including LGBTQ individuals, American Indian and Alaskan Native women, and women who are undocumented immigrants.

But arguably no legislation during the Obama years did more for women’s equality than the Affordable Care Act (ACA). For many years prior to the passage of the ACA, health care costs were the leading cause of bankruptcy filings—meaning that many women and families were just one medical emergency away from financial ruin. Additionally, simply being a woman was considered a pre-existing condition, which allowed insurance companies to charge women more for health coverage. In fact, before the ACA, 92% of health insurers gender-rated their plans—charging women more than men for their plans—even when maternity coverage was excluded. Women are unfortunately used to paying more for things labeled as “for women,”—for jeans, razors, or beauty products, for example—but health insurance is no longer one of those things.

In total, nearly 10 million women gained health coverage since the enactment of the Affordable Care Act. Medical bankruptcies decreased, as did the share of Americans struggling to pay their medical bills. Insurance companies can no longer charge women more than men because of their gender. And through Medicaid expansion—in the 32 states and DC that expanded Medicaid as the law intended—low-income women gained access to health care and mandated coverage of many core preventative services, including contraception.

These significant achievements have made a real difference in women’s lives. Thank you, Obama. Really. Thank you a million times over.

Now, as Obama concludes his presidency, much of the progress of the past eight years is threatened. We have replaced our unabashedly feminist president with a president who isn’t quite convinced that women should be allowed to work. Additionally, President-elect Trump and Congressional Republicans have made repealing the ACA their banner cry, and Trump has promised to appoint a Supreme Court justice who will overturn Roe v. Wade. Meanwhile, Speaker Ryan has argued for the block granting of Medicaid, housing, nutrition assistance, school lunches and more, and for dramatic cuts to social safety net programs—all while potentially slashing taxes for big corporations, millionaires, and billionaires.

The fight ahead to preserve our progress is daunting, but we’re ready. The well-being and economic security of women and families are worth fighting for with everything we’ve got.

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.

But we had to fight for it. And now we are going to have to fight again.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

During his presidential campaign, Donald Trump spoke about America’s inner cities in dystopian terms, rendering a picture even more dire than the real one (which is plenty bleak). He promised that he would fix everything, without providing any specifics. But city leaders were quick to point out that he wasn’t really speaking to the residents themselves, who understand the challenges their communities face on a daily basis. Instead, he chose to play up stories about crime and violence to appeal to the worst instincts of white voters.

If President-elect Trump had a real interest in addressing concentrated urban poverty, he could build on President Obama’s record and learn about the important work that is already happening in every major city.

Instead, we will soon see an all-out attack on virtually every federal program that helps low-income people, from cradle to the grave, wherever they live. It will put millions of Americans at risk, whether it’s losing food or health care or housing. Anyone who cares needs to join in fighting back—those who are directly suffering, and those who have the privilege to remain untouched by retrogressive policy. At the same time, we can’t limit ourselves to defensive action—we need to put forth a vision for our future and work toward its realization.

Many of the policies that low-income neighborhoods need do not focus on them exclusively. A real full-employment policy would help beached boats float wherever they are, and raising the minimum wage would help low-wage workers across the country climb out of poverty.

President Obama took us forward on these matters, sometimes in big steps and sometimes small. He had many other significant efforts blocked by Congress—such as his most recent jobs proposal, an increased minimum wage, and comprehensive immigration reform. His housing initiatives reflected his commitment to people having a genuine choice about whether to stay in their current community with improved economic conditions or move to opportunities elsewhere. He did not achieve radical change, but he understood that the quality of life in high-poverty places depends on a mosaic of policies—and he was heading in the right direction.

The Obama administration undertook place-based work that targeted rural, urban, and tribal communities. In fact, its efforts to support neighborhood revitalization have been more impressive than any previous administration—even given the funding limitations imposed by the Republican-majority Congress that has been in place since 2010.

Obama’s creation of Promise Neighborhoods, based on the work of Geoffrey Canada and the Harlem Children’s Zone, was a significant innovation towards that end. The initiative uses schools as hubs for community partnerships, where cradle-to-career educational programs and family supports are designed to improve educational and development outcomes for children. Since 2010, a dozen Promise Neighborhoods have received sizable five-year grants for implementation and are operating on a substantial scale.

Through executive action, President Obama also created Promise Zones. These low-income neighborhoods receive preference for funding from a variety of existing federal programs. The marshaling of funds that are already appropriated means that program money is spent where it is needed most, and that’s something that should appeal to progressives and conservatives alike.

The Obama Administration also reconstituted the first President Bush’s HOPE VI into a version 2.0, called Choice Neighborhoods. Had it been properly funded, it would have had more reach in helping to build stronger communities through mixed-income housing, including housing for people with the lowest incomes. This was a key effort given that rental assistance to families with children is at its lowest point since 2004, and homelessness of school-aged children is at a record high.

Support from the Obama Administration—including grants from these place-based programs—have fostered the growth of a number of sophisticated, multifaceted inner-city organizations and partnerships, all doing valuable work for children and families, the elderly, and people with disabilities.

The Youth Policy Institute (YPI) in Los Angeles—which focuses on poverty reduction through support services, educational opportunities, and job training and career support—has been able to use this funding from Washington to further develop its model and reach, and to engage thousands of families with services and supports. The organization’s work includes five of its own schools, after-school programs at 78 schools, and 83 public computer centers. It also offers Early Head Start, teen pregnancy prevention, job readiness, and job placement services. YPI works with families on parenting skills, financial planning, and computer literacy. They help day laborers and teach community agriculture. In all, YPI has 1,600 staff serving more than 100,000 youth and adults at 125 program sites. It works with 60 partners, and has a budget of $41 million annually—and its partners’ budgets add up to a much greater sum.

Because YPI is three decades old and receives state, local, and private funding, it will likely weather a Trump storm; but many newer organizations may face rougher sailing. The competitive funding they’ve received from the Obama administration for the last eight years has been a major factor in their growth.

Indeed, now all of the Obama Administration’s place-based work (and more) is at risk.

The Affordable Care Act, Medicaid, SNAP, housing vouchers, and many more critical programs all face the prospect of being totally axed or turned into block grants—either way, it means far less people having access to basic needs like food, housing, and healthcare. Support for good schools and accessible transportation, aggressive enforcement of anti-discrimination laws, and true criminal justice reform—all critical for urban residents—are on the block for deep budget cuts and gutting through executive action.

These cuts, and the weakening of community-based organizations, place children in particular in deep jeopardy. Without a real jobs program and investment in communities that have been stripped of their wealth, families will not have the resources to support the developmental needs of their children. Trump has put out a so-called jobs initiative, but the purported infrastructure plan is nothing but a tax cut to make the rich richer.

Perhaps the threatened Trump cuts reveal the road map we need to fight back. The federal policies helping people—and the initiatives revitalizing neighborhoods—serve millions of people, through thousands of organizations. Businesses and faith leaders, foundations, local public officials and community leaders, and regular people—if we are organized—can stand up and fight back against those who would do us harm.

We’ve done it before and now we must do it once again. This is not over yet.

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.

Severe economic pain was widespread—more than 10 million people were unemployed, up from 7 million before the crisis.  No one was hit harder than communities of color, where residents who should have qualified for prime loans had been targeted and steered toward higher-priced exotic subprimes, then lost their homes to foreclosure. As reporter Jamelle Bouie put it, the loss of wealth represented “a generation’s worth of hard work and progress wiped out.”

This was the economy our nation’s first African-American president inherited.

Get TalkPoverty In Your Inbox

Barack Obama’s work to respond to hardship and deprivation began before he even took the oath of office, when he ordered his transition team to develop what would become the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (Recovery Act).  He signed the bill into law in February 2009.

The Recovery Act was one of the most powerful pieces of antipoverty legislation passed in decades. It extended tax credits to more people who worked in low-paying jobs—a reform that eventually became permanent, and helped lift nearly 10 million people out of poverty last year alone. It prevented more than a million home foreclosures, saved or created up to 3.6 million jobs, and helped families and communities survive the economic havoc that had been unleashed by a reckless Wall Street.

Princeton economist Alan Blinder and Moody’s Chief Economist Mark Zandi estimate that without the Recovery Act we might have faced a depression, with 17 million lost jobs (instead of about 8 million), and a peak unemployment rate high of nearly 16 percent (instead of 10 percent).  The Recovery Act’s expansion of the safety net also kept more than 6 million Americans out of poverty.

Immediately following passage of the Recovery Act, the President began work on healthcare reform, eventually signing the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) into law in March 2010. The legislation established historic economic protections. Gone is the ability of insurance companies to reject people for coverage on the basis of pre-existing conditions.  Gone was the chance that Americans would be too poor to afford insurance, but not poor enough to qualify for Medicaid (until the Supreme Court got involved).  And gone is the chance that young adults would be cut off from their parents’ plans.

More than 22 million Americans have gotten health insurance through Obamacare, and the share of Americans without health insurance has dropped to a record low.  The law also protects millions of low- and moderate-income families who would otherwise be a single health crisis away from poverty.  Vice President Joe Biden described the significance of the legislation perfectly when he said, “This is a big f—ing deal.”

Once the Affordable Care Act was in place, Obama began working with Congress to tackle some of the root causes of the Great Recession—including the actions of “too big to fail” financial institutions. The Dodd-Frank financial reform law established the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to protect consumers from unfair, deceptive, or abusive practices, and to take action against companies that break the law.

Throughout his term, President Obama worked tirelessly to make sure Americans have a fair chance at success. He launched the Promise Neighborhood and Promise Zones initiatives to improve economic opportunity in high-poverty communities—whether urban, rural, or tribal.  He signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which makes it easier for women to file an equal pay lawsuit. He issued Executive Orders to raise wages for federal government contractors, updated a meek Overtime Rule in order to raise working-class wages, took executive action to help ensure that people aren’t held back by a criminal record, and created the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program to protect undocumented children and young adults from deportation.

The president also drew attention to issues that have been neglected for far too long, ranging from criminal justice reform, longstanding federal policy failures on American Indian and Alaskan Native issues, and science-based nutrition standards for school meals.  And he accomplished all of this while most Republicans in Congress refused to cooperate on virtually any of his proposals—a tactic stated explicitly by Senator Mitch McConnell, among others.

To be sure, the legacy is not all positive and the work is not complete. The economic recovery following the Great Recession was extraordinarily slow and painful for far too many of us—and many people haven’t recovered at all. He could have prevented more foreclosures by forcing banks to modify mortgages.  DACA and the Overtime rule were blocked by the courts, food and nutrition assistance programs were cut nearly as quickly as they were expanded, and revenues were never increased sufficiently to meet the nation’s long-term antipoverty and infrastructure needs.

That said, President Obama’s legacy is one that demonstrates a tireless commitment to making the American Dream accessible to all Americans.

As we now approach the swearing-in of President-elect Donald Trump, just about everything we have alluded to here, and much more, is in jeopardy.

That’s why in the coming weeks, TalkPoverty’s series examining Obama’s legacy will focus not only on poverty and inequality, but on what’s at risk under a Trump administration. It will address how we can protect—and eventually expand—the gains we have made over the past eight years.

No one will be more vulnerable to the changes proposed by Trump and his Republican allies than people who are already struggling. We need to be ready to fight as if lives are at stake—because they are. 

Editor’s note: TalkPoverty presents this series in collaboration with the Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality.