Trends
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TANF Benefits Fell Further in 2011 and Are Worth Much Less Than in 1996 in Most States
November 21, 2011
Cash assistance benefits for the nation's poorest families with children fell again in purchasing power in 2011 and are now at least 20 percent below their 1996 levels in 34 states, after adjusting for inflation. While most states froze benefit levels in 2011, six states and the District of Columbia cut them, reducing … -
Poverty and Financial Distress Would Have Been Substantially Worse in 2010 Without Government Action, New Census Data Show
November 7, 2011
Six temporary federal initiatives enacted in 2009 and 2010 to bolster the economy by lifting consumers’ incomes and purchases kept nearly 7 million Americans out of poverty in 2010, under an alternative measure of poverty that takes into account the impact of government benefit programs and taxes. These initiatives — three … -
TANF’s Inadequate Response to Recession Highlights Weakness of Block-Grant Structure
July 14, 2011
Leading conservatives in Congress – including House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan – as well as some conservative activists and commentators [1] have recently cited welfare reform and the TANF block-grant structure as a model for reshaping the federal-state funding relationship in other programs for low-income … -
TANF Responded Unevenly to Increase in Need During Downturn
(with state-by-state fact sheets)
January 25, 2011
Nationally, the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program, which provides basic assistance to low-income families with little or no income, has only been modestly responsive to the economic downturn. Using data collected directly from the states, [1] we estimate that between December 2007 and December 2009, TANF caseloads increased by just 13 percent, while …




