Where have I been?

Happy birthday, welfare reform!

Ten years ago today, President Clinton (remember him?) signed into effect welfare reform (aka "Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996"), ending welfare-as-entitlement and christening into life the WorkFirst programs. Now, families on public assistance have to show compliance with state and federal participation requirements before they get their TANF grant. In general, clients are limited to five years of cash assistance (hah!). I recently saw a woman come through with 108 months on TANF. That's ... nine years.

• HuffPo laments falling wages and how unattractive that makes the working world to those entering it.

  "Particularly as our economy has shifted from one of industry--and the high unionization rates that guaranteed livable wages within that sector--to one of largely non-unionized service, there is a wide range of full-time jobs that simply do not pay enough to lift a family out of poverty. In one, very real sense, welfare reform is a broken promise to those that have borne the brunt of it,because they've gone to work and yet remain poor. ... because the poor now work, the stereotype that poverty is a result of laziness wields far less credibility."

• Boston Globe tells us how welfare reform has worked, but reminds us that American economy has never been friendly to workers (health care, living wage, paid sick leave) . It blasts low-wage work again here.
• The Pueblo Chieftain disagrees. Welfare reform worked! People have better lives off welfare! Yay!
• To my right, conservatives are doing the happy dance over the success of welfare reform. In fact, Doug Breshaov would like to end other supports to poor working families too, while we're in the celebrating mood.
• (I'll cede you that some of it may have to do with a strong economy. Maybe.)
• Best analyses are Robert Samuelson's at Real Clear Politics and Parrot and Sherman's at the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities.

  " ... an honest assessment of the last ten years also shows that our safety net for the poorest families with children has weakened dramatically and left some families in very difficult circumstances. The seldom told truth about the dramatic caseload decline is that more than half of the caseload decline is attributable to the fact that TANF assistance programs now serve a far smaller share of those poor enough to qualify for the program." (P&S)

• NYT hosts this talked-about piece by Bill Clinton on why welfare reform and the bi-partisanship that formed it worked -- but they also post a feature on families that can't get off welfare. PLEASE READ IT. These are my clients. I enjoy how they mention that some of the "disconnected" who the government cuts off sometimes have "sources of unreported income -- a little money from a new companion, perhaps." First, it's often "drug dealing." Additionally, any "new companion" who supports that family has to be reported to DSHS so they adjust the grant accordingly. The "new companion" is probably also a poor mate choice.. statistically speaking. So we have a lose-lose situation anyway...

  “We see families coming in who don’t have one monolithic problem; instead it’s a lethal combination of 10 issues in their lives that come together,” said Gloria M. Guard, president of the People’s Emergency Center, where Ms. Autry and her children found shelter. “They end up with lots of kids, no family support, no education, no coping skills, so they get a job and lose it and get another job and lose it. It’s not like they are lying around not doing anything: their lives are constantly on the go as they run behind their kids. But they end up falling way behind.”

-the cat