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What is the current status of welfare reform?
Welfare reform was signed into law in 1996 with the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA), which replaced the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program with the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) program. The new law transferred oversight of the design and implementation of welfare programs to the states, using federal block grant funds. The law was set to expire in 2002, but has since been extended through June 30, 2004, due to Congress's inability to reauthorize the measures.
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What are the major welfare programs administered by the states?
Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, child care, food stamps, the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), and Medicare.
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What sort of incentives are there to help welfare recipients to become idependent?
There are limits — usually up to 5 years for adults — on the length of time that individuals can recieve federal welfare benefits. There are also work requirements that vary among states, ranging from immediate work mandates to a 24 month window. While there is considerable flexibility, states must penalize recipients who do not, without "good cause," meet work requirements or other program rules (Coalition on Human Needs ).
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How can we measure the performance of welfare reform?
Since the welfare reform was enacted in 1996 the number of families receiving federal welfare benefits has fallen from 4.4 million in August 1996 to just over 2 million in June 2003, a 50 percent decline. While some point to caseload declines as evidence that welfare reform has been a success, critics caution that the caseload decline has been much greater than the decline in the poverty rate. According to the Coalition on Human Needs, "persistent poverty indicates that TANF has generally not been effective in promoting economic security and substantially improving child and family well-being."
Recent analysis by the National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support (NCJIS) of 18 state-level "leaver" studies found that former recipients have trouble finding employment, lack needed child care, transportation, nutrition, and health care assistance, and are concentrated in the low wage labor market (Coalition on Human Needs).
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http://zfacts.com/p/636.html | 01/18/12 07:28 GMT
Modified: Mon, 17 Apr 2006 05:43:57 GMT
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