The economy leading up to the year of 1964 was doing very well. Unemployment was below four percent Gross National Product was growing at approximately six percent. Inflation was less then three percent. The setting was ripe for the president to create "A War on Poverty.".
In the beginning of LBJ's tenure as president he continued Kennedy's work in developing programs to help society in many aspects. The programs that he devised were called the Great Society. Lyndon proposed "A War on Poverty" with the Economic Opportunity Act. The programs under the act consisted primarily of: the Job Corps; community action programs; volunteers against poverty; financial aid to low income families; and Medicare. Sub programs included racial injustice and education. .
The Job Corps were created to help younger students to advance in careers who were unable to go to college for one reason or another. It developed the skills that they had and prepared them for a better quality of life through work study and work training programs. The program is still in existence in 2003 and helps over 70,000 students a year. .
All over the country Community Actions Programs would be used to attack poverty at the home level. Each community would have its own program tailored for that community. The residents for the community would develop the plan to attack poverty and stomp it out. This was a good plan as it would be created by the people who it was affecting the most. The government would not have to come in and create a fix for multiple places. A plan would be provided to the government by the people who were affected. That way the problem would be specialized to the area and not just generalized to cover the whole country. After approval plans were mostly funded by the government to get them started. .
Where would all these people come from for the Job Corps and the Community Action Programs? Volunteers against poverty would be requested by the government to help in the undertaking of poverty in America.