If you ever visit the remote hills and hollows that make up the far southeastern corner of Appalachian Ohio, you will find the poorest counties in the state. There will be roads you can barely drive on, schools that are chronically underfunded, and legions of people who are unemployed or consigned to jobs that lack the income and benefits needed for a secure life. Because of the structural poverty of the region, many families receive help from the state’s Department of Job and Family Services, formally called the Department of Human Services and known by everyone but the bureaucrats as “the welfare office.”
