Details of Mayor Bloomberg's program to pay poor people to behave well (or to stop behaving badly?) were announced Monday by City Hall. Deputy Mayor Linda Gibbs announced three programs which have been widely and confusingly confabulated. Therefore, for clarity, go to the original press release here and an easier to read set of pdf charts here

After you've waded through the public relations guff, ask yourself : Where was it shown that "noncompliance" was a problem for poor people? I've looked a little at the literature and I've yet to find where this very expensive, mostly foundation-funded (many public millions will also be spent) program can be shown to be addressing an actual problem. From my -- admittedly simplistic and perhaps short-sighted -- point of view, what poor people lack is money, not a willingness to comply with rules. Indeed poor people who access public assistance funds are the most blindly compliant group around; the most minor acts of non-compliance gets them shut off.

If you can stand, try reading the more mainstream coverage: Newsday reproduces wire-service stenography, Jenifer Medina in the NY Times and Edwize, the UFT blog, focus on the payments for better school performance. Gothamist's coverage is here.

So far as I can tell, not one of the stories tells of any data which show that noncompliance is a problem for poor people or that paying people for "better behavior" will solve their problems; except, of course, to the degree that it puts more cash in the hands of people who cannot pay their rent or buy food. This is a social psychology experiment on a huge scale; carried out, I assume, under the direction of Rockefeller Foundation President Judith Rodin. I do wish the human subjects review materials had been made part of the press packets (Of have we dispensed with those as Mr. Bloomberg seems to be trying to do with environmental review of his PlaNYC 2030?).

It's hard to argue with anything which puts more cash in the low income people, but -- as Mayor Bloomberg cuts taxes for property owners, leaves the NYC Housing Authority in huge deficits and pays NYC security guards starvation ($10/hour) wages, the smugness of this program is a little tricky to take. One last example, Gotham Gazette and Cityroom note that high schools will have fewer jobs this summer. Last year, according to the report by the Center For An Urban Future 30,000 teens were turned away from summer jobs. This year, with billions in surplus, Scrooge McBloomberg didn't fully fund the Summer Jobs program.

* I borrowed the title from the wonderful Union musical: Pins and Needles. You can listen to snippets including Sing Me a Song With Social Significance here.