3/8/20161 Family Sociology Welfare Reform

3/8/20162 Families & Poverty  The percentage living below poverty has changed little over the past 20 years

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4 Family Policy Debates  Ending welfare was not an issue until the 1970s as:  Divorce rate doubled  Women working outside the home  (60% of married women with children under 6 by 1980)  Single parent families  11% of white children and 50+ % of black were born to unmarried women by 1980

3/8/20165 What Caused Sweeping Reform?  Attitudes towards women’s roles Acceptable for women to work Since other mothers were out working, those on welfare should be too  Characteristics of recipients Not widowed, but rather, single mothers  Divorced or never married Deserving vs. undeserving poor  Hand-up vs. hand-out  Racial composition had changed

3/8/20166 TANF Population by Race/ethnicity 2008

3/8/20167 Welfare Reform  In 1996 the Clinton administration enacted the most sweeping reform in the welfare system in the U.S.  Clinton vows “to end welfare as we know it”  Did this happen? YES!

3/8/20168 Families & Poverty  Welfare Reform is instituted to combat these problems  What are the major objectives of the 1996 Welfare Reform Bill?  Enact strong work requirements  Introduce time limits on assistance  Reduce welfare dependency  Encourage two-parent families & parental responsibility

3/8/20169 Families & Poverty  Welfare Reform is instituted to combat these problems  What are the major changes of the 1996 Welfare Reform Bill?  Make work pay: extends child care and/or Medicaid benefits (health insurance for the poor) to families after they leave the welfare rolls

3/8/ Families & Poverty  Major changes of the 1996 Welfare Reform Bill?  Make it TEMPORARY: AFDC: Aid to Families with Dependent Children changes to TANF: Temporary Assistance to Needy Families  Devolution – transfer of power from the Federal government to states in the form of Block Grants

3/8/ Families & Poverty  Major changes of the 1996 Welfare Reform Bill?  Enact Mandatory Work Requirement & Time Limits  Move from welfare to work: 1) Recipients must secure employment within two years or lose benefits 2) Five year lifetime limit

3/8/ Families & Poverty  Major changes of 1996 Welfare Reform Bill  Encourage Parental Responsibility  Greater enforcement of child support  Incentives to encourage teen parents to regularly attend and graduate from high school  Higher minimum cutoffs for two-parent families  So if you get married, you don’t automatically lose your cach benefits  No additional funds for children born after 1997

3/8/ CHANGE IN TANF CASELOADS:

Big Reduction of Welfare Caseloads after /8/ Note that the number of caseloads declines sharply after welfare reform of 1996

3/8/ How do we measure the success of welfare reform?  A clear outcome of welfare reform has been the decline in the welfare caseloads in every state  National caseload declined 56 percent from peak in 1996 to 2001  

3/8/ How do we measure the success of welfare reform?  TANF is finally reauthorized in 2005  Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt said:  "Welfare reform is helping millions of people climb out of poverty. Now, we want to go the next step and help them climb the job ladder by creating more opportunities for education and job training.“  

3/8/ How do we measure the success of welfare reform?  But how are the families doing that left welfare?  This is only a good sign if their income has not seriously declined and if they are moving toward self-sufficiency  We also must consider their post welfare: Income Employment Poverty status

3/8/ How do we measure the success of welfare reform?  National Studies have found that 60 percent of mothers who left welfare are employed and 75 have been employed some of the time since they left welfare  In addition, research shows that the number of single mothers who are working has increased by 25 percent since 1993  Even more impressive is 50 percent increase in NEVER-MARRIED mothers (those who tend to have the lowest education and longest spells on welfare) who are employed

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3/8/ How do we measure the success of welfare reform? Another major issue is poverty status: Are those leaving welfare better off?  Overall the rate of child poverty and black child poverty decreased during the late 1990s  However, this decrease has slowed in past few years  The child poverty rate remained steady at 17.6% from 2004 to

3/8/ Effects on Income  In terms of income – welfare to work is no guarantee that mothers will be able to lift their families out of poverty  Most mothers leaving welfare receive low wages, on average $6.75 an hour.  And these jobs have no health benefits – thus many remain on Medicaid

3/8/ Welfare Reform  Is welfare Reform a success?  How do we measure success ?  If we want to lower the welfare rolls (# of caseloads), then welfare reform is a success  If we want to have more self-sufficiency among the poor and less reliance on the state – we have not achieved this since many women are still receiving federally subsidized health care and child care benefits