As the United States continues to struggle its way out of the aftermath of the Great Recession, the impact on poverty has increasingly become a subject of both political debate and scholarly research. In this latter vein, Kristen S. Seefeldt and John D. Graham have produced a thorough and enlightening survey of the impact and legacy of the Great Recession on low-income Americans, and the “safety net” of philanthropic and government programmes on which they rely. Stemming from a paper prepared to aid the development of broadcaster Tavis Smiley and Princeton academic Cornel West's The Rich and the Rest of Us: A Poverty Manifesto (2012), Seefeldt and Graham's prose remains accessible and readable even whilst negotiating an array of statistics and complex layers of state and federal government programmes.

America's Poor and the Great Recession is part assessment of how the poor (and those made poor by the Great Recession) have been, and continue to be, impacted by an uncertain economy with low job creation and low wages; part assessment of the effect of fiscal and political realities on the operation of the safety net; and part suggestion of how to improve government programmes to better cope with economic downturns. In these ways, it represents, as its authors hope, a useful reference point for students and teachers of American social and antipoverty policy. Its brief discussions of core issues, such as the difference between structural and behavioural explanations of poverty, provide useful and concise context of particular benefit to students.

From a succinct summary of the Great Recession, Seefeldt and Graham move to discussing its impact on poverty in the US. All the while, they navigate an impressive array of statistics, some of which retain the power to shock even those well versed in the history of American poverty. In one particularly striking example, they note that some 795,000 households in the US were living, at some point in 2011, on less than two dollars per person per day – even with Food Stamps taken into account – thus meeting the World Bank's definition of extreme poverty (27). Their statistics are drawn from a raft of sources, but the authors rightly serve consistent reminders that more recent and comprehensive figures on poverty and the operation of aspects of the safety net need to be collated, something which ought to be a spur to others.

The impressive range of figures deployed continues as the book turns towards the impact of the recession's aftermath on the components of the safety net. In these chapters, Seefeldt and Graham paint a rather bleak picture, demonstrating that the Great Recession did – initially at least – harm philanthropy in America. Philanthropy is a commendable inclusion both in their definition of the “safety net” and in the book itself – not all studies of American social policy pay much heed to it – although it is not the focus of the remainder of their survey.

Instead, their real attention is on government programmes aimed at those on low incomes, and they show how these have been strained by political and fiscal concerns, at both the state and federal level, even as America's hesitating economic recovery continues to impact on the poor. Not only this, they argue, but these programmes are likely to be further constrained in the future: “in the political deliberations that will unfold,” they write, “we expect that the welfare of low-income populations will be at considerable risk” (83).

Rather than leaving such a demoralizing thought to linger, however, Seefeldt and Graham are eager to suggest how government programmes of the safety net may be strengthened. Their suggestions are borne from a deliberately pragmatic approach, through which the authors seek to outline only those suggestions which they deem both helpful and capable of securing “cross-partisan” support. Some may feel that working from this premise is problematic, but Seefeldt and Graham's desire to overcome political stalemate seems particularly farsighted, given the recent impasse over Unemployment Insurance. Indeed, the authors recognize throughout the book that such stalemate is increasingly likely, and their approach is testament to their clear desire to suggest positive and meaningful changes to the American safety net.

Their suggestions, therefore, range from indexing the federal minimum wage to inflation, to reforming certain programmes to better respond to the business cycle, to requiring non-poverty policies to consider their impact on poverty. They comprise a practical and sensible “grand bargain” which aims to move beyond traditionally ingrained “left” and “right” approaches to poverty, and which even subjugates the personal opinions of Seefeldt and Graham to the dictates of political reality (104–5). In taking this approach, it is to be hoped that their proposals receive the attention of policymakers. Certainly, the focus on inequality that appeared to be heralded by President Barack Obama's 2014 State of the Union Address would suggest scope for this work to have an impact outside the academy. Yet as the authors write of their proposals, “we won't bet the ranch that Congress will embrace the bargain tomorrow” (130–31).