Recent Welfare Reform Research Findings
Implications for TANF Reauthorization and State TANF Policies
End Notes
References
Greg Acs, Katherin Ross Phillips, and Sandi Nelson, “The Road Not Taken? Changes in Welfare Entry during the 1990s,” December 2003.
Gregory Acs and Pamela Loberts with Tracy Roberts, “Final Synthesis Report of Findings from ASPE “Leavers” Grants,” Urban Institute, November 2001.
Jay Bainbridge, Marcia K. Meyers, and Jane Waldfoger, “Child Care Policy Reform and the Employment of Single Mothers,” Social Science Quarterly, vol. 84, December 2003.
Richard Bavier, “Conditions Limiting Work Among TANF Entries, Stayers, and Leavers,” presentation at APPAM Conference, August 26, 2003
Heather Bednarek and Julie Hudson, “Child Disability and Mothers’ Labor Supply,” presented at American Economic Association Meeting, 2003.
Gordon Berlin, “What Works in Welfare Reform: Evidence and Lessons to Guide TANF Reauthorization,” MDRC, 2002.
Douglas J. Besharov and Peter Germanis, “Welfare Reform and Caseload Decline,” in Family and Child Well-being After Welfare Reform, 2003.
Rebecca M. Blank, “Evaluating Welfare Reform in the United States,” Journal of Economic Literature, vol. XL, December 2002.
Dan Bloom, Mary Farrell, Barbara Fink with Diana Adams-Ciardullo, “Welfare Time Limits: State Policies, Implementation, and Effects on Families,” Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation, July 2002.
David Butler, Testimony of David Butler, Vice President, Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and the Hard-to-Employ before the United States Senate Committee on Finance, April 25, 2002.
Maria Cancian, Robert H. Haveman, Daniel R. Meyer, and Barbara Wolfe, “Before and After TANF: The Economic Well-being of Women Leaving Welfare,” Social Science Review, vol. 76:4, December 2002.
Maria Cancian, Robert Haveman, Daniel R. Meyer, and Barbara Wolfe, “The Employment, Earnings, and Income of Single Mothers in Wisconsin Who Left Cash Assistance: Comparisons among Three Cohorts,” Institute for Research on Poverty, January 2003.
Maria Cancian, Robert Haveman, Thomas Kaplan, Daniel R. Meyer, and Barbara Wolfe, “Work, Earnings, and Well-being After Welfare: What do we Know?” Economic Conditions and Welfare Reform (Sheldon Danziger, ed.), 1999.
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, “ Poverty Increases and Median Income Declines for Second Consecutive Year,” September 2003.
Center on Hunger and PovertyHellerSchool for Social Policy and Management, “Food Security Institute Bulletin, November 2003,” BrandeisUniversity.
Jeff Chapman and Jared Bernstein, “Falling through the Safety Net: Low-income Single Mothers in the Jobless Recovery,” April 11, 2003.
Lindsey Chase-Landsdale, Rebecca Levine-Coley, Brenda J. Lohman, and Laura D. Pittman, “Welfare Reform: What About the Children?” 2002.
Claudia Colton, Neil Bania, Toby Martin, and Nina Lalich, “How Are They Managing? A Retrospective of CuyahogaCounty Families Leaving Welfare,” Center on Urban Poverty and Social Change, CaseWestern ReserveUniversity, June 2003.
John Cook, Deborah Frank, Carol Berkowitz, Maureen Black, Patrick Casey, Diana Cutts, Alan Meyers, Nieves Zaldivar, Anne Skalicky, Suzette Levenson, and Timothy Heeren, “Welfare Reform and the Health of Young Children: A Sentinel Survey in Six United States Cities,” Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, vol 156:7, July 2002.
Mary Corcoran, Sandra Danziger, and Richard Tolman, “Employment Duration of African-American and While Welfare Recipients and the Role of Persistent Health and Mental Health Problems,” The Michigan Program on Poverty and Social Welfare Policy, July 2003.
Hope Corman, Nancy E. Reichman, and Kelly Noonan, “Mothers’ Labor Supply in Fragile Families: The Role of Child Health,” Center for Research on Child Wellbeing, Working Paper #03-20-FF, December 2003.
Leslie I. Crichton, “The Welfare Time Limit in Minnesota: A survey of families who lost MFIP eligibility as a result of the five-year time limit,” Program Assessment and Integrity Division, Minnesota Department of Human Services, July 2003.
Sandra K. Danziger, Elizabeth Oltmans Ananat, and Kimberly G. Browning, “Childcare Subsidies and the Transition from Welfare to Work,” forthcoming in Family Relations, vol. 52, no. 2, March 2004.
Amy Dryden Witte and Magaly Queralt, “Impacts of Eligibility Expansions and Provider Reimbursement Rate Increases on Child Care Subsidy Take-Up Rates, Welfare Use, and Work,” May 2003.
Amy Dworsky, Mark E. Courtney, and Irving Piliavin, “What Happens to Families Under W-2 in Milwaukee County, Wisconsin? Report from Wave Two of the Milwaukee TANF Applicant Survey,” September 2003.
Alison Earle and S. Jody Heymann, “What Causes Job Loss Among Former Welfare Recipients: The Role of Family Health Problems,” Journal of American Medical Women’s Association, vol. 57:1, Winter 2002.
Shawn Fremstad, “Immigrants and Welfare Reauthorization,” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, January 2002.
Shawn Fremstad, “Immigrants, Limited-English Proficient Persons, and TANF: What Do We Know?” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, March 2003.
Shawn Fremstad, “Falling TANF Caseloads Amidst Rising Poverty Should Be a Cause of Concern,” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, September 2003.
Bruce Fuller, Sharon L. Kagan, Gretchen L. Caspary, and Christiane A. Gauthier, “Welfare Reform and Child Care Options for Low-Income Families,” The Future of Children, Winter\Spring 2002.
Heidi Goldberg, “https://www.cbpp.org/sites/default/files/atoms/files/1-22-02tanf3.pdf,” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, January 2002.
Heidi Goldberg and Liz Schott, “A Compliance Oriented Approach to Sanctions in State and County TANF Programs,” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, October 2000.
Jeffrey Grogger, Lynn A. Karoly, and Jacob Alex Klerman, “Consequences of Welfare Reform: A Research Synthesis,” RAND, July 2002.
Heather Hill, Gretchen Kirby, and LaDonna Pavetti, Transitional Jobs Programs: Stepping Stones to Unsubsidized Employment, Mathematica Policy Research, Inc., April 2002.
David Jesuit and Timothy M. Smeeding, “Poverty Levels in the Developed World,” July 2002.
Rucker C. Johnson and Mary E. Cochrane, “The Road to Economic Self-Sufficiency: Job Quality and Job Transition Patterns After Welfare Reform,” April 2003.
Ariel Kalil, Kristin Seedfelt, and Hui-chen Wang, “Sanctions and Material Hardship under TANF,” Social Science Review, vol. 76:4, December 2002.
Genevieve M. Kenney , Jennifer M. Haley , Alexandra Tebay , “Children's Insurance Coverage and Service Use Improve,” Urban Institute, July 2003.
Leighton Ku, “ Report Documents Growing Disparities in Health Care Coverage Between Immigrant and Citizen Children as Congress Debates Immigrant Care Legislation ,” Center on Budget and Polity Priorities, October 2003.
Robert J. Lemke, Robert Witt, and Ann Dryden Witte, “Child Care and the Welfare to Work Transition,” March 2001.
Rebecca London, “Which TANF Applicants are Diverted and What are their Outcomes?” February 2003.
Pamela Loprest, “Fewer Welfare Leavers Employed in Weak Economy,” Urban Institute, August 2003.
Pamela Loprest, “Disconnected Welfare Leavers Face Serious Risks,” Urban Institute, August 2003.
Pamela Loprest, “Use of Government Benefits Increases among Families Leaving Welfare,” Urban Institute, September 2003.
Thomas MaCurdy, Grecia Marrufo, and Margaret O’Brien-Strain, “What Happens to Families When they Leave Welfare?” Public Policy Institute of California, 2003.
Karen Martinson and Julie Strawn, “Build to Last: Why Skills Matter for Long-run Success in Welfare Reform,” Center on Law and Social Policy, April 2003.
Marcia K Meyers, Theresa Heintze, and Douglas A. Wolf, “Child Care Subsidies and the Employment of Welfare Recipients,” August 1999.
Charles Michalopoulos, Kathryn Edin, Barbara Fink, Mirella Landriscina, Denise Polit, Judy Polyne, Lashawn Richburg-Hayes, David Seith, and Nandita Verma, Welfare Reform in Philadelphia: Implementation, Effects, and Experiences of Poor Families and Neighborhoods, MDRC, October 2003.
Cynthia Miller, “Leavers, Stayers, and Cyclers: Analysis of the Welfare Caseload,” Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation, November 2002.
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Robert G. Wood and Anu Rangarajan, “What’s Happening to TANF Leavers Who Are Not Employed?,” Mathematica Policy Research, Inc., October 2003.
Sheila R. Zedlewski, “Left Behind or Staying Away? Eligible Parents Who Remain Off TANF,” September 2002.
Sheila R. Zedlewski, “Work and Barriers to Work among Welfare Recipients in 2002,” Urban Institute, August 2003.
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[1] This analysis does not provide a comprehensive review of all recent welfare reform research, but instead focuses on research that breaks new ground or is particularly relevant to current federal and state debates over the future of welfare reform. For recent reports that provide broad surveys of research from the 1990s, see Blank (2002) and Grogger, Karoly, and Klerman (2002). A short paper by Weil (2002) provides an excellent summary of research, primarily conducted by the Urban Institute, on a broad array of welfare reform issues.
[2] One limitation of most studies of welfare leavers’ income is that they generally do not take child care expenses and most other work-related expenses, except for payroll taxes, into account.
[3] Other recent studies with similar findings (although they do not use post-welfare reform data exclusively) include Earle and Heymann (2002) who find that health limitations are associated with a significantly increased risk of job loss among welfare leavers even after controlling for other factors, and Smith, Hatcher, and Wertheimer (2002) who find that single parents of young children with asthma are less likely to have full-time work than other single parents of young children.
[4] For example, an otherwise excellent 300-page report by Grogger, Karoly, and Klerman (2002) that synthesizes the current state of knowledge from the large body of research literature on the impacts of welfare reform includes no discussion of the impacts of child care assistance on employment and poverty.
[5] For a review of this literature, see Meyers, Heintze, and Wolf (1999). A few studies from the early 1990s have attempted to estimate the impact of providing child care subsidies on employment. For example, a 1994 report by the U.S. General Accounting Office estimated that subsidizing all of the costs of child care for poor women would increase their employment rates by 50 percent (GAO, 1994). A more recent report finds that the expansion of child care funding from 1991 to 1996 had a substantial positive impact on the employment of single mothers with young children (Bainbridge, Meyers, and Waldfogel, 2003).
[6] “Compelling case to reauthorize welfare reform,” Bill Archer, Rep. E. Clay Shaw Jr., and Ron Haskins, Houston Chronicle, January 19, 2003.
[7] Another factor is concern that states will dilute the work-focused nature of TANF by placing too many participants in stand-alone education and training activities. As is the case with rehabilitative services, the concern is not borne out by anything states are actually doing. Only a small percentage of TANF recipients are placed in vocational education activities even though these activities currently count toward work rates for up to 12 months. In addition, nearly every state could place a significant number of recipients in such activities for longer periods of time without jeopardizing their ability to meet federal work rate requirements.