Teaching and Learning Guide for: Assessing Welfare Reform, Over a Decade Later

* Abbreviations: PRWORA = : Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act • AFDC = : Aid to Families With Dependent Children • TANF = : Temporary Assistance for Needy Families • SCHIP = : State Child Health Insurance Program • SSI = : Supplemental Security Income The passage of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) in 1996 represented one of the most profound developments in American social policy since the Great Society programs of the mid- 1960s and has the potential to affect the health of millions of American children. The overall purpose of the legislation, commonly referred to as welfare reform, was to decrease reliance on welfare and increase the economic independence of poor families. Its impact has been far-reaching, affecting many determinants of child health and well-being, such as family resources, reproductive choices, maternal employment, parental supervision, childcare, and access to health insurance. The implementation of PRWORA has been associated with unprecedented declines in the number of children receiving public benefits. In the first 2 years after welfare reform, the number of children receiving welfare benefits fell by 28%.1,2 In addition, the number of children enrolled in Medicaid, the principal public health insurance program for poor children in the United States, also fell, despite provisions in the legislation to extend Medicaid coverage to all children who lose welfare benefits.3 Similarly, the number of children receiving food stamps has dropped by 20% between 1996 and 1998.4–6 Although there is consensus that both growth in the economy and welfare policies themselves have contributed to these declines, the exact proportion attributable to each factor remains unclear.7–9 This discussion considers how these major shifts in public support for poor children and their families are likely to affect patterns of child health and the provision of clinical services to children. It addresses these concerns by exploring 4 related issues: the elements of the welfare legislation most likely to affect child health, the impact of this legislation on enrollment in public programs for children, the potential health effects of welfare reform, and the …

Teaching and Learning Guide for: Resisting the Neo‐liberal Poverty Discourse: On Constructing Deadbeat Dads and Welfare Queens

Mothers Welcome Reform, Urge Compassion* The welfare system in the United States has undergone enormous restructuring. Previous research suggests that welfare recipients were highly dissatified with the welfare system. This study expands previous treatises by focusing on their views of welfare reform. Based on in-depth interviews with 47 recipients of AFDC, flow called TAVF we examine their level of support towards three specific reforms: (a) time limits on benefits; (b) work requirements; and (c) caps, which limit or deny additional benefits for children born to mothers already receiving assistance. We found that recipients were eager for welfare reform. The were most likely to embrace work requirements, and least likely to support time limits and caps. They urged compassion and flexibility to meet individual needs and were critical of adopting models based on popular stereotypes about women on welfare. The data are interpreted in light of Individualistic and Feminist Welfare State theories. Key Words: AFDC, poverty, TANF welfare, welfare reform. Welfare has been one of the most vexing social policy concerns in the United States. It's principal program, Aid to Families With Dependent Children (AFDC), now called Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) has been accused of fostering long-term dependency, break-ups, and illegitimacy (Armey, 1994; Murray, 1984, 1988). Welfare recipients are stigmatized (Goffman,1963; Jarett, 1996; Seccombe, James, & Battle Walters, 1998), and are largely viewed as being lazy and unmotivated, looking for a free ride at the expense of the American taxpayers. Many people believe that poverty is a result of their own lack of drive, thrift, or human capital (Davis & Hagen, 1996; Feagin, 1975; Hunt, 1996; Smith & Stone, 1989). This individual perspective-which suggests that poverty is the result of individual flaws or inadequacies rather than a result of idiosyncrasies within our larger social structureholds widespread appeal within the population, even among welfare recipients themselves (Seccombe, 1999). Attempts to reform welfare, AFDC in particular, have a longstanding history (Abramovitz, 1996a; Gordon, 1994; Trattner, 1989). Both Republicans and Democrats have tried to reconstruct welfare, or end it altogether. President Clinton signed sweeping welfare reform legislation, which became federal law on July 1, 1997. PL 104-103 abolished AFDC, and replaced it with a new program called Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF). Considerable latitude was turned over to individual states to implement reform within federally mandated parameters. Some of the key features include a lifetime welfare payment of no more than five years, with the majority of recipients being required to work after two years. Twenty-five percent of recipients in each state must be working by the end of 1997; by the year 2002, 50 percent must be employed. States are free to apply more stringent policies, and many have elected to do so (Gallagher, Gallagher, Perese, Schreiber, & Watson, 1998). This research provides insiders' accounts on several of the reforms implemented in our welfare system. Although recipients' dissatisfaction with the welfare system has been well documented (Berrick, 1995; Edin & Lein, 1997; Rank, 1994; Schein, 1995; Seccombe, 1999), their views on welfare reform measures are not well understood. Based on in-depth interviews with women who receive welfare, this research examines the support or opposition towards three reforms in particular: (a) time limits on welfare; (b) work requirements; and (c) family caps, which limit or deny additional benefits for children born to mothers on welfare. Conceptual Framework Feminist welfare state theorists are concerned with the ways in which the welfare system and welfare reform efforts perpetuate gender inequalities and poverty among women (Abramovitz, 1996b; Gordon, 1994; Harrington Meyer, 1996; Nelson, 1989; Orloff, 1993; Quadagno & Fobes, 1995; Miller, 1992). …

The authors examined how welfare recipiency is associated with savings outcomes in individual development accounts (IDAs), a structured savings program for low-income people. They investigated whether welfare recipients can save if they are provided with incentives. Data for this study ore from the American Dream Demonstration (ADD), the first nationwide demonstration of IDAs. A Heckman two-step regression analysis suggests that, after controlling for a variety of program and participant characteristics, welfare recipiency, either before or at the time of enrollment in IDAs, is not correlated with program exits or savings outcomes. The findings suggest that welfare recipiency does not seem to affect savings performance in IDAs. Key words: individual development accounts (IDAs); savings; welfare recipients; welfare reform ********** Welfare recipients accumulate little wealth. or example, in 1994 more than 90% of welfare recipients reported less than $500 accumulated financial liquid assets Hurst & Ziliak, 2001). Welfare recipients may have little wealth because of limited ability to accumulate assets and structural barriers to wealth accumulation. One structural barrier may be their response to disincentives created by means-tested transfer programs such as Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC)/Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), Supplemental Security Income (SSI), Medicaid, and food stamps. To qualify for benefits, a household's income and assets must be sufficiently low. For example, benefits are cut off in some states if liquid assets in the form of cash and deposits in bank accounts exceed $1,000. Under these conditions, asset limits may limit savings. Also, many nonpoor households have incentives for asset accumulation in the form of home mortgage interest tax deductions, tax deferments on retirement savings, and other tax benefits (Howard, 1997; Seidman, 2001), but few low-income households benefit from these asset-building policies (Sherraden, 1991). We examined the relationship between welfare recipiency and savings outcomes in a matched savings program for low-income people--individual development accounts (IDAs). IDAs are saving programs that provide incentives and an institutional structure for savings for low-income people. Account holders receive matching funds when they purchase assets that promote long-term well-being and financial self-sufficiency such as a home, postsecondary education, or microenterprise. We investigated whether current and former welfare recipients have the ability and willingness to save and whether their savings patterns differ from people who have never received welfare. Our study draws on a general research report by Schreiner and colleagues (2001), with closer attention to welfare recipiency and savings in IDAs. This study may have policy implications for welfare reform. First, the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) of 1996 (P.L. 104-193) represents a fundamental change in the delivery of cash benefits to program participants (PRWORA, 1996). PRWORA replaced AFDC with TANF, a work-based program. Major changes under I'RWORA include time limits on receipt of cash assistance and greater control of program rules by states. The stated intent of the legislation was to end welfare dependency and promote self-sufficiency. Yet, very little programming has been developed to help welfare recipients become self-sufficient. Studies show that limited skills for self-sufficiency may prevent many welfare leavers from lifting themselves out of poverty, even if they work full-time (Edin & Lein, 1997; Loprest, 1999, 2001). Helping welfare recipients save and accumulate assets may increase their long-term well-being and self-sufficiency. In contrast to income, which refers to the flow of resources into a household, assets refer to the stock of resources in households. Assets include financial resources such as cash savings and stocks, capital such as homeownership, and business property. …

KAREN SECCOMBE Portland State University DELORES JAMES University of Florida* KIMBERELY BATTLE WALTERS Azusa Pacific University* Welfare reform is in the forefront of the political and social agenda in the United States. This research examines the ways that women on interpret use. From in-depth interviews with 47 women who received cash assistance in 1995, we examined the theories behind their accounts of the stigmatizing of recipients and why they, and other women, use the system. Although the respondents tended to blame the social structure, the system itself or fate for their own economic circumstances and use, they often invoked popular and mainstream individualist and cultural victim-blaming theories to explain other women's reliance on the system. Many women believed popular constructions of the mother as lazy and unmotivated and evaluated their own situation as distinctly different from the norm. The hegemony of the individual perspective is a strong and stubborn barrier to dealing constructively with poverty and reform. I've had people who didn't know I was receiving assistance, and everything was just fine. But when people find out you're receiving assistance, it's like, why? Why did you get lazy all of the sudden? Leah, a 24-year-old mother Key Words: inequality, policy, poverty; TANE welfare. Approximately 39 million people are poor in the U.S., according to recent data from the U.S. Bureau of the Census (1997a). Within this large segment of the population are the approximately 3.5 million families, mostly mothers and their dependent children who receive cash assistance, which until recently was called Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC). President Bill Clinton signed monumental reform legislation, which became federal law on July 1, 1997. P.L.104-193 abolished the AFDC program and replaced it with a new program called Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF). Turning many of the details of law over to the states, it sets lifetime payments at a maximum of 5 years, and the majority of adult recipients are required to work after 2 years. Twentyfive percent of recipients in each state must be working by the end of 1997. By the year 2002, 50% must be employed. Other changes under this reform include child-care assistance, at least 1 year of transitional Medicaid, the identification of the children's biological fathers, and the requirement that unmarried recipients who are minors must live at home and stay in school in order to receive benefits. AFDC and are virtually synonymous with the word in the minds of most people. In the larger sense of the word, could also encompass schools, parks, police and fire protection, as the term, welfare state, popular in most of Western Europe, implies. However, in the U.S. generally brings to mind the cash assistance programs of AFDC and TANF, and therefore, welfare, AFDC, and TANF are used interchangeably here for ease of discussion. Although was originally created to serve primarily White widows and their children, welfare's recipient base has shifted over the years to mostly divorced and never-married women with children. Many people think that cash programs provide benefits to a large number of never-married, young, African American women and their children, a stereotype that has undoubtedly contributed to the growing sentiment against (Pivan & Cloward, 1993; Quadagno, 1994). Yet, African Americans constitute only 36% of recipients (U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Ways and Means, 1996). AFDC is criticized as an extravagant and costly program that is spiraling out of control and is responsible for a sizable component of our federal deficit, but it approximates only 1% of federal spending (Congressional Digest, 1995; U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Ways and Means, 1996). …

This article examines the evolution of the programme Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) since 1996. In 1996, the transformation of Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) marked a watershed in American social policy. AFDC was the main US public assistance programme for single parents. By the mid‐1990s, it was also the most unpopular social programme in the United States, which explained why Bill Clinton promised to ‘end welfare as we know it’ during his presidential campaign in 1996. TANF ended automatic individual entitlement to public assistance, established a five‐year time limit for receiving cash assistance, and promoted a punitive approach towards welfare recipients, who were in theory increasingly required to work in exchange for benefits. This approach is known as the Work First Approach. Cash assistance was temporary, and granted as a favour to low‐income mothers, who were required to comply with various behavioural requirements. TANF was hailed as a tremendous success on both sides of the political spectrum. This bipartisan consensus explains why the new Republican administration (G. W. Bush became President in January 2001) wanted to build upon the existing programme.

This chapter discusses the current politics of welfare reform and link welfare reform to current efforts to reform health care. It focuses on state efforts in Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) spending, describes changes between 1980 and 1990 and estimating ordinary least squares models to explain variations in state efforts in the two time periods. The chapter tests three popular explanations for state efforts in AFDC spending—politics, economics, and as a reaction to runaway Medicaid spending. The results may be helpful in anticipating the effects of recent reforms that replaced AFDC, an entitlement program, with Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) in the form of block grants to states. Given the spending trends for welfare and health care differed markedly in the 1980s, one might expect their priorities on the reform agenda to differ substantially. However, they are closely linked, particularly in the area of welfare medicine, where state and county governments are especially active given their responsibilities.

This research used data concerning recipients' employment, receipt of Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), receipt of Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), and poverty status to develop a of by welfare recipients. Using U.S. Department of Labor survey data, a sample of AFDC/TANF recipients was analyzed through event history analysis. The results show that welfare reforms launched in 1996 moved dependent recipients out of welfare but had no effect on recipients' chances of leaving welfare. New two-year limits on unbroken program participation (and a five-year lifetime limit) pushed many unprepared recipients into poverty, or not. Economic conditions became worse for people than for those on welfare. The study also found that some former welfare recipients did go to work and eventually leave welfare and poverty. Occupational skills, work experience, child support, marriage, and experience in dependency or supplementation were among the factors promoting such a change. Key words: autonomy; dependency; self-reliance; supplementation; welfare recipients ********** Since the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (P.L. 104-193) was passed in 1996, reformed welfare programs have been experimenting with new policies. Passage of this cornerstone legislation replaced decades-old Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) with Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). The TANF program emphasizes the welfare-to-work principle. To help welfare recipients leave welfare and join the workforce, state TANF programs generally provide employment support services (for example, child care, limited medical coverage) and enforce aid restrictions (for example, time-limited benefits, work quotas, and sanctions). Welfare recipients who are able-bodied adults are required to be employed within two years of enrolling in a TANF program. Those who do not find employment lose all benefits. Furthermore, TANF benefits are limited to five years over a recipient's lifetime. The new approach is controversial. Not only has the sufficiency of the child care and medical benefits been called into question, the new time restrictions have been said to force many unprepared recipients to leave welfare. After leaving welfare, many people are likely to continue living in poverty, despite being employed (McCrate & Smith, 1998; Riemer, 1997). Therefore, it is important to understand the effect of welfare reform on recipients' employment and welfare use, as well as on their financial status after leaving welfare. FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE AND TYPOLOGY OF ADAPTATIONS Financial independence means succeeding economically to the point of supplying one's own needs for shelter, food, clothing, and other necessities. Financial independence is achieved typically through employment; it is impeded by welfare use. Financial independence constitutes a continuum. Some people are employed for higher wages than others, for a variety of reasons. Many who are employed live well above the poverty line, but many live below that line, despite having regular employment. Some of these working poor individuals need public assistance (or other aid) to pay ordinary living costs. Whereas some are employed and still must participate in welfare, others rely entirely on public aid. This article presents a typology of adaptations that helps explain the differential behavior of welfare recipients. This study used concepts such as welfare use, employment, and poverty status to define four types of adaptation exhibited by welfare recipients--dependency, supplementation, self-reliance, and autonomy (see Figure 1). Dependency on welfare is defined as reliance on AFDC or TANF to meet all financial needs. Utterly dependent welfare recipients are unemployed, generate no earnings, and live in poverty. …

Soon after the 1996 Congressional passage of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (commonly known as "welfare reform," and hereafter referred to as PRWORA), thousands of researchers began to document the effects of this dramatic change in social welfare policy. Millions of grant dollars and hundreds of thousands of research hours later, there is a voluminous body of research on welfare restructuring. But at this writing I am stunned by the enormous gulf between the knowledge that has been generated and the narrow policy debate and legislative action that has taken place to date. Put simply: policies promoted by the Bush administration—already passed in the House, and pending in the Senate—would have grim consequences for millions of poor families in this country. These policies would undermine the efforts of poor families, state legislators, welfare administrators and workers, and community-based organizations to fulfill what is, arguably, the most important objective of social welfare policy: reducing poverty and enhancing economic security for vulnerable families. Moreover, the proposed changes in welfare policy fly in the face of what researchers have learned since welfare-to-work policies were implemented in the 1990s. [End Page 745] I am one of those researchers. Over the past four years, with my colleague Joan Acker, a sociologist, I have led a research team that explored the effects of welfare restructuring on both clients and welfare workers in Oregon. We disseminated our research findings to policy makers and the public at both the state and national levels through policy reports and briefs, invited testimony before state legislative committees, opinion pieces in newspapers, lectures and conferences. Additionally, I helped form an ad hoc group of anthropologists within the American Anthropological Association who worked together over several years to ensure that there were scientific and policy sessions on welfare at the annual meetings. We also produced a policy statement that was approved by the AAA Executive Committee and disseminated to policy makers and the media. In this piece I reflect on what I have experienced and seen, especially in recent months, in the national debate on welfare policy. I find it disturbing, if not surprising, how little research—especially anthropological research—appears to have influenced either the issues discussed or the legislative outcomes, at least to this point, in Congress. While I am sure that researchers could do more to communicate effectively with policy makers, the media and the public, this is not my main point here. I want to suggest that anthropologists have much to contribute to the much-needed task of challenging mainstream popular and academic assumptions and frameworks about poverty and the poor. The 1996 legislation profoundly altered welfare policy in replacing the long-standing Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) with Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). AFDC, an entitlement program, provided a minimal subsistence income to families who met program eligibility criteria. TANF provides time-limited cash assistance (federal five-year life-time limits, with even shorter time limits in many states) but the primary objective of the program is to move recipients into paid employment. PRWORA also changed the nature of federal funding and regulation of welfare programs such that states now receive block grants (rather than matching payments) and have an unprecedented degree of discretion about welfare program design. Additionally, the 1996 legislation led to significant cuts in Food Stamps and the SSI (disability) and excluded most legal immigrants from eligibility for public assistance. Welfare became welfare-to-work, and each of the fifty states developed its own version of welfare-to-work within the broad parameters of the federal legislation. Under PRWORA, families who applied for cash assistance have to comply with stringent work requirements. States can use block grant funds to offer previously unavailable assistance with some of the costs of searching for work or being employed (childcare, transportation, etc.) or to expand Medicaid. Because [End Page 746] of the single-minded emphasis on...

The Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, enacted under the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, is a reality for many working families. As public policies are enacted, unintended consequences for infants/children must be minimized. Child advocates in Wisconsin, leading this nation in reforming Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), are concerned about supporting eligible infants/children as safety-net programs are unlinked. This study reviews the enrollment status of 4 linked programs over time in Wisconsin, from January 1995 to August 1998. Eligible infants/children in programs, such as Medicaid/AFDC, Medicaid/Healthy Start, and Food Stamps, were analyzed and compared with enrollment in Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants/children (WIC), a nonlinked program. A cross-sectional analysis of monthly enrollment for infants/children was subdivided into 3 periods: prewelfare reform or AFDC (January 1, 1995 to December 31, 1995), the welfare reform pilot or Pay For Performance (January 1, 1996 to August 31, 1997), and welfare reform better known as Wisconsin Works (W-2), (September 1, 1998 to August 31, 1998), periods 1, 2, and 3, respectively. Infants/children in Wisconsin from birth to 18 years of age enrolled in W-2 and/or other safety-net programs were monitored: AFDC or W-2, WIC, Food Stamps, Medicaid/AFDC, and Medicaid/Healthy Start. The average number of infants/children removed from AFDC and Medicaid/AFDC during periods l and 2 were -1210 increasing to -3128 per month, respectively, almost tripling the rates of decline during the pilot period (see ). By the end of this study, >100 000 (111 198) infants/children were removed from AFDC/W-2 enrollment and 51 559 fewer infants/children benefited from Medicaid. This rate of decline slowed during period 3, averaging -687 per month, while W-2 enrollment continued to decline significantly at a rate of -2692 per month. In contrast, Medicaid/Healthy Start enrollment, targeted to infants/children <6 years of age, increased significantly over all periods by +332, +1327, and +266, respectively. Food Stamps enrollment also declined throughout all 3 consecutive periods, -603, -2462, and -1450, respectively. However, enrollment in the WIC program did not decline significantly to the same degree as other certification-linked programs with AFDC or W-2, as indicated by the consecutive slopes of -60, -111, and -183, respectively. Wisconsin infants/children were rapidly removed from welfare rolls in unprecedented numbers during the periods January 1995 and August 1998. Comparisons of periods before W-2 implementation and 1 year after implementation support the fact that certification-linked programs, such as Medicaid and Food Stamps, were sufficiently aligned to AFDC/W-2 to significantly impact infants/children enrollment. Historically, WIC certification in Wisconsin has not been linked to AFDC, and infants/children traditionally eligible for Medicaid and Food Stamps are also eligible for WIC. Yet, contrary to the AFDC-linked safety-net programs, declines in WIC enrollment were not statistically significant during all study periods. Statewide and local interventions within Wisconsin, such as outreach activities, targeted to Medicaid/Healthy Start and more recently Title XXI (State Children Health Insurance Program), slowed the reductions of Medicaid enrollment for Wisconsin infants/children. These findings support that altering safety-net programs can result in unintended consequences if not carefully transitioned as demonstrated in Wisconsin welfare reform.

This article examines the extent of interactions or spillovers between the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) and Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) programs for children. In the early 1990s, the Social Security Administration substantially relaxed child eligibility criteria for SSI benefits. Since the changes, the number of U.S. children receiving cash and medical benefits through SSI tripled to nearly 1 million. The article describes a family's decision to participate in SSI and/or AFDC, and uses state-level data for three years before, and three years after, the Zebley decision to estimate the effect of state program generosity on child program participation. The expansions in child SSI eligibility increased child SSI participation and contributed to increased total program participation by children in the early 1990s. Child SSI participation increased more in states with lower AFDC payments and higher state SSI supplementation payments. These results suggest that families use SSI and AFDC as substitutes. At least 32 percent of the Zebley increase in SSI is likely attributable to the SSI–AFDC benefit gap for the median AFDC benefit state. © 2000 by the Association for Public Policy and Management.

This article examines the extent of interactions or spillovers between the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) and Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) programs for children. In the early 1990s, the Social Security Administration substantially relaxed child eligibility criteria for SSI benefits. Since the changes, the number of U.S. children receiving cash and medical benefits through SSI tripled to nearly 1 million. The article describes a family's decision to participate in SSI and/or AFDC, and uses state-level data for three years before, and three years after, the Zebley decision to estimate the effect of state program generosity on child program participation. The expansions in child SSI eligibility increased child SSI participation and contributed to increased total program participation by children in the early 1990s. Child SSI participation increased more in states with lower AFDC payments and higher state SSI supplementation payments. These results suggest that families use SSI and AFDC as substitutes. At least 32 percent of the Zebley increase in SSI is likely attributable to the SSI–AFDC benefit gap for the median AFDC benefit state. © 2000 by the Association for Public Policy and Management.

Recent welfare reform proposals (in particular, Personal Responsibility Act of 1995) are grounded in a neoconservative critique of welfare (Gilder, 1995; Murray, 1984/1994). These legislative proposals are centered around recipients of Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) rather than focused on economic structural reform. The Personal Responsibility Act of 1995 (H.R. 4) and Republican Party's Contract with America (Gingrich et al., 1994) assume that defects in AFDC mothers, not welfare state or structure of U.S. economy, are to blame for expansion of AFDC rolls and growing number of people living below poverty line: Isn't it time for government to encourage work rather than rewarding dependency? The Great Society has had unintended consequence of snaring millions of Americans into welfare trap. Government programs designed to give a helping hand to neediest of Americans have instead bred illegitimacy, crime, illiteracy, and more poverty. Our Contract with America will change this destructive social behavior by requiring welfare recipients to take personal responsibility for decisions they make. (p. 65) This article argues that labels associated with AFDC recipiency and rooted in these neoconservative ideas continue to serve as a political tool for current welfare reform movement to promote a regressive welfare reform system. This article deconstructs those labels, particularly those used in Personal Responsibility Act of 1995. In this article, deconstruction refers to process of analyzing stigma into its component concepts, exposing these concepts as mere prejudice, and leaving a path open to reinterpret (that is, to construct) a new paradigm. This deconstruction has practical implications for social work because it widens parameters of welfare reform debate and suggests alternative interpretations of needs of AFDC mothers. Deconstructing Stigma The stigma paradigm hinges on use of concepts of dependence, addiction, and illegitimacy and promiscuity to describe single mothers and children whose fathers are absent. The terms' impact on development of welfare programs is not new; however, stigma has become more difficult to expose in an era in which women are alleged to have made significant gains in economic and social equality. Deconstructing Dependence The concept of dependence has been used by advocates of restrictive welfare policies to refer to moral and psychological deficiencies. Dependence is a sufficient condition for being considered mentally unfit. Independence is a necessary condition for being considered mentally fit. Murray (1984/1994) even referred to those who are self-sufficient as the good people. The genealogy of dependence-independence dichotomy was traced by Fraser and Gordon (1994), who found that concept of dependence changed from a social and economic category in preindustrial society to a moral and psychological category in postindustrial society. During this shift single-earner family was phased out; women were expected to become wage earners: The combined results of these developments is to increase stigma of dependency. With all legal and political dependency now illegitimate, and with wives' economic dependency now contested, there is no longer any self-evidently good adult dependency in post-industrial society. Rather, all dependency is suspect, and independence is enjoined upon everyone. Independence, however, remains identified with wage labor. (p. 324) Dependence did not always carry a stigma. Aid to Dependent Children (ADC), established in 1935, and an earlier version of AFDC program discouraged participation of women in labor force by reducing working recipient's grant by 100 percent of earnings. Proper motherhood and control of women's sexuality - not self-sufficiency - were goals. …

Welfare reform is once again on the U.S. agenda. Calls to end welfare as we know echo from the White House and many statehouses as well. Like earlier attempts, new efforts are aimed at moving single mothers to self-sufficiency through job training, incentives for employment, and temporary help with medical coverage and child care for welfare recipients entering the work force. Increasingly, however, the calls for change include punitive measures: compelling mothers who cannot find work to participate in workfare programs, curtailing benefits to families when recipient mothers have additional children, and setting time limits for the receipt of public assistance. As before, current reform measures are based on the following interpretation of welfare dependency: Recipients do not work because they have insufficient preparation or skills for work, lack adequate social skills, have inappropriate attitudes to acquire a job, or are simply too used to receiving public assistance and prefer receiving it to working. The most recent federal attempt at moving recipients into the work force, the Family Support Act of 1988, was ironically formulated on the eve of a massive economic recession. The act, which governs the states' implementation of the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program, placed the burden for recipients' unemployment on personal deficiencies rather than on structural ones. Through provisions for mandatory education and training, the legislation aimed to reduce the welfare rolls and poverty by putting welfare mothers to work (Hagen, 1992; Hagen & Lurie, 1992; Nichols-Casebolt & McClure, 1989). The Clinton administration's attention to welfare reform takes place even as it acknowledges chronic unemployment flowing from profound structural changes in the economy. Yet, as evidenced in the president's 1994 State of the Union address, the connection between economic dislocation and welfare dependency--in contrast to dependency on unemployment insurance--is absent. In public rhetoric, at least, the problem is seen to be the chronic dependency and deficiency of the welfare recipient. When the focus of reform is, instead, on the question of eliminating poverty rather than reforming welfare recipients, another issue arises: whether the problems of the very poor are better addressed by targeting social expenditures on the most needy versus instituting universal programs as more appropriate and more politically viable (Skocpol, 1990). The American approach to single motherhood, work, and welfare stands in stark contrast to that of most other industrialized countries. A growing body of literature points to the economic vulnerability of single-parent families because of the limited income a single earner can produce, the low wages that many working women earn, and the adequacy or inadequacy of income transfer programs. In making comparisons the literature also finds that American single-parent families have remarkably higher and more persistent poverty rates than do those in other industrialized countries, largely because the benefit structure for single mothers in the United States is very low (Goldberg & Kremen, 1990; McFate, 1991; Smeeding, Torrey, & Rein, 1988; Zopf, 1989). This article examines the situation of single mothers and their families in Sweden, the country acknowledged to be the most advanced welfare state. Through this examination, the author hopes to contribute to the American discussion of how best to meet the needs of such families and to illuminate the complexities of welfare reform. Sweden's Approach to Social Welfare Among the industrialized countries, Sweden consistently stands out as the country where poverty appears to have been most successfully reduced (Duncan et al., 1991; Goldberg & Kremen, 1990; Kahn & Kamerman, 1983; Kamerman & Kahn, 1988; McFate, 1991; Sidel, 1986; Smeeding et al., 1988). Sweden has often been examined by comparative social policy analysts as the society where commitments to the general welfare of the population have been kept. …

Much previous research has focused on how long families receive Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) before leaving the program and whether and when they return to the program following an exit. Few quantitative studies have looked at broader indicators of the economic well-being of those who have exited AFDC. We use data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth to trace poverty status and welfare use in the 5 years following an exit from AFDC. We find substantial diversity in economic well-being. Women who were working when they exited from AFDC do better, and, to a lesser extent, so do those who were married or had a partner when they exited. Higher levels of success are achieved by women with higher earning potential, including those with higher education and those with fewer children or older children. Although some women achieve modest levels of economic success, 41% remain poor even 5 years after an exit from AFDC. Our results highlight the distinction between leaving welfare and leaving poverty and suggest that welfare reforms targeted at reducing caseloads may do relatively little to enhance broader measures of economic success. Key Words: AFDC, poverty, self-sufficiency, welfare. The goal of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 and, to a lesser extent, of previous welfare reforms has been to move women and children off the welfare rolls. Yet we know little about the lives of women and children who have left welfare. Recent research shows that many women who exit from Aid to Families with Dependent Children return-some of them quite quickly, suggesting that life after welfare is a time of economic insecurity for many women and their children (Blank & Ruggles, 1994; Brandon, 1995; Cao, 1996; Gritz & MaCurdy, 1991; Harris, 1996; Meyer, 1993; Pavetti, 1993). But the degree of economic insecurity of those who have left welfare is not yet fully understood because the focus of research generally has been limited to examining returns to welfare. Broader measures of economic well-being are critical; leaving welfare is not synonymous with leaving poverty. As we show in our analysis, the assessment of women's economic success after leaving welfare varies substantially with the measure used. There is little analysis of the extent to which families are able to move out of poverty and into a life of self-sufficiency once they leave AFDC. This article begins to fill this gap. We analyze poverty, welfare use, and alternative sources of income for young women who left AFDC in the 1980s. After reviewing related literature and discussing our data and approach, we analyze the factors associated with women's economic success following an exit from AFDC. Understanding the level of economic wellbeing after AFDC and factors associated with well-being is particularly important in the context of current policy. The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act eliminates the entitlement to cash assistance and replaces AFDC with a block grant, titled Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), to the states. Given the block-grant structure, there likely will be substantial variation in the programs that replace AFDC. Nonetheless, the legislation requires that all programs have time limits on the receipt of cash assistance and that all programs lead to substantial increases in employment. Analysis of the levels of well-being and self-sufficiency attained by women who have left AFDC in the past can provide a reference point for the design and evaluation of welfare reforms. Economic theory (as well as anecdotal evidence) suggests that women who have left AFDC in the past are likely to have better prospects of employment and marriage than many who may lose cash assistance under TANF because those with the most attractive alternatives had the greatest incentive to leave. Nonetheless, the experiences of women who have left AFDC provide some of the best information currently available on the conditions of life after welfare. …