From welfare poor to working poor?

Social justice news
September 2001

U.S. remains global master of war
Bush stem cell decision condemned
Drought adds to woes in hard-hit Central America
From welfare poor to working poor?
Layoffs lead to more lucre for U.S. CEOs
New report says "three strikes" strikes out
Report warns of slowing progress on child hunger

Other news this month

From welfare poor to working poor?
Salt story on welfare reform reauthorization From welfare poor to working poor? Expect to hear a lot about the rousing success of welfare reform in the coming months. Already, newspapers have started running stories praising the drop in welfare caseloads and the rise in the number of two-parents families since 1996—the year President Clinton signed a sweeping reform of the nation's welfare laws.

Now, half a decade later, the Temporary Aid to Needy Families (TANF) block-grant program that replaced Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) is up for reauthorization, and proponents and critics alike are evaluating how it has worked—or not worked. The debate already has begun about possible changes or additional issues to consider before the Oct. 1, 2002 reauthorization deadline.

While applauding the decreased caseloads and number of children born outside of wedlock, the U.S. bishops' conference is raising the underlying, fundamental question about the purpose of our national welfare policy. "It is now time to make fighting poverty and improving the lives of families and children explicit goals of welfare policy," says a background report from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Domestic Social Development Office.

The USCCB wants poverty reduction to be a stated and central goal of both TANF, specifically, and welfare policy, in general. In addition, it advocates that TANF funding should be maintained at current levels—"to continue cash assistance to those still on the welfare rolls and to give TANF leavers the work supports they need to succeed at work and take care of their families."

The 1996 welfare reform changes took a radically different approach to assisting low-income Americans, eliminating the entitlement to assistance, mandating work as a condition of receiving benefits, and putting most of the control over the programs in the hands of the states. Statistics showing an average state welfare caseload drop of 53 percent over the past five years seem to indicate that reform has accomplished some of its goals. In Illinois alone, the welfare rolls have gone from 642,644 five years ago, to 259,242 today, prompting Cook County Public Guardian Patrick Murphy to tell the Chicago Sun-Times, "So far, it's working."

Not everyone agrees, however. Just because families are no longer on welfare doesn't mean they are no longer poor, say critics of the reform process. In fact, many who have moved "from welfare to work" are in low-paying jobs that still put them below the poverty line, says Sister Therese Bangert, a consultant for welfare and poverty issues for the Archdiocese of Kansas City, Kansas.

Too often for these so-called "welfare reform success stories," wages from work does not provide the same income level they had received as welfare benefits, forcing them to turn to soup kitchens and other social service facilities for help. That's what 78 percent of survey respondents told the Welfare Reform Watch Project. Its results were released by Network, the Catholic social justice lobby, in its July report, "Welfare Reform: How Do We Define Success?"

The study found that large numbers (almost half of those surveyed) continue to subsist on household incomes far below the poverty line and that Latinos disproportionately suffered from the effects of poverty and welfare reform changes. The report also concluded that steering welfare recipients into jobs and promoting marriage—the two stated goals of welfare reform—didn't necessarily move people out of poverty. "This report illustrates more powerfully than any other publication the continuing poverty and deprivation among families in the wake of welfare reform," says Sharon Daly of Catholic Charities USA.

Like the bishops, Network also calls for welfare reform to include alleviating poverty as an explicit goal and to include specific benchmarks for measuring that goal. Network also supports an increase in TANF block grants to cover funding for child care, transportation, and job training. Other issues that must be addressed, according to Network, include the currently mandated lifetime five-year limit on federally funded welfare assistance, health care, housing, and support during economic downturns.

This month, Network is launching its new "Making A Noise About the Need" campaign to educate, organize, and motivate activists to lobby for welfare policies that actually improve the lives of people who are poor. Workshops will be conducted in 17 states from now until April 2002.—Heidi Schlumpf

For more information
U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops
Network: Making a noise about the need campaign

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