As more people fell into poverty, more people appealed to the local welfare officials for support.

Taxpayers, meanwhile, bemoaned the rising costs of welfare, especially the pension system. Why would anyone work, they asked, if the government was just handing out money? Were people really unable to work, or were they just fooling the Guardians of the Poor? There was a pervasive sense that scammers were bleeding coffers dry.

In 1817, a citizen group called the Pennsylvania Society for the Promotion of Public Economy launched an investigation into the system. It sent a survey to charities and government officials asking, “What do the poor allege as the cause of their poverty?”

The charities and officials reported back: “In most instances want of employment is the alleged cause…[A]lthough this may temporarily operate, idleness, intemperance, and sickness are the most frequently the real causes.”

The citizen committee’s report concluded that “the people of colour; the lower classes of Irish emigrants; the intemperate and day labourers” were wasting taxpayer dollars.

While the committee at times highlighted gender wage gaps, high costs of living and other real challenges, it focused foremost on individual behaviors and personal choice. Poor people, the authors believed, were being reckless with their money: They gambled, hired sex workers and drank themselves into poverty.

The report sparked a series of further investigations. In 1821, a state committee was founded to look into the poor laws, and in 1827 the Guardians of the Poor published the results of their own investigation.

They all echoed the same narrative: The wrong people were taking advantage of welfare.

To cure these social ills, the citizens committee proposed ending pension payments and institutionalizing the poor. Reformers argued it would be far cheaper to house the poor together, where they would be fed, clothed and housed at scale.

In Philadelphia, that meant shifting poor taxes to create the Blockley Almshouse, a 3,000-bed facility that served as an almshouse, orphanage, hospital and workhouse on the west bank of the Schuylkill River – an area that at the time was on the outskirts of the city, far from most residents’ families and communities.

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