Wilson disputed the liberal stance that the “black underclass” (a term he later abandoned) owed its existence to entrenched racial discrimination; he also disagreed with the conservative view that African American poverty was due to cultural deficiencies and welfare dependency. Instead, Wilson implicated sweeping changes in the global economy that pulled low-skilled manufacturing jobs out of the inner city, the flight from the inner city of its most successful residents, and the lingering effects of past discrimination. He believed the problems of the underclass could be alleviated only by “race neutral” programs such as universal health care and government-financed jobs. Wilson was a MacArthur Prize fellow from 1987 to 1992, and he was awarded the National Medal of Science in 1998. In 2003 he received the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Talcott Parsons Prize for his contributions to the social sciences.