Reforming Welfare--Take Two (Page 3)

A Ladder of Opportunity

It doesn't have to be this way. Welfare can be transformed from a punitive system cycling people in and out of the low-wage labor market into a ladder of opportunity for all low-income families--low-wage workers, unemployed parents, two-parent families and immigrants. If low-income people had access to the supports they need, most could lift and keep themselves out of poverty and take better care of their families.

Some states have adopted innovative policies that suggest a new vision for TANF nationally. Many of these changes have come about at least partly as a result of impressive organizing. Typically, low-income people develop an agenda and then work closely with others to advance it, including organized labor, faith-based groups and public-interest lawyers. Tactics have ranged from applying direct pressure at welfare centers, to exposing what is happening to families, to direct action and mobilization of large numbers of people. State legislatures have in the past been a tough sell for progressive antipoverty policies, but greater sophistication among grassroots groups and stronger alliances with other sectors have opened up more possibilities. Recent successes fall into three main areas:

§ Opening up access. In a few states you can receive TANF services if you are poor whether you get cash assistance or not. Some provide support to both single and two-parent families. Others have used state funds to replace benefits that immigrants lost under the 1996 law. Still others apply no time limits to people unable to find a job or otherwise not in a position to work.

§ Increasing family incomes and providing opportunity. The Minnesota Family Investment Program, among others, has shown that supplementing low wages pays off in family and child well-being. The Parents as Scholars program in Maine and equivalent efforts in Maryland and elsewhere have invested in the long-term prospects of low-income parents by allowing education and training to "count" as a work activity. Pennsylvania provides wage-paying jobs and training opportunities to unemployed parents. Some states and cities have adopted higher minimum wages and enacted living-wage ordinances. "Self-sufficiency standards" that measure the real cost of living for families of various sizes in different parts of states are now routinely used by some policy-makers.

§ Supporting family and child well-being. Montana's at-home infant care program allows low-income parents to care for their own young children. A number of states have torn down barriers to enrollment in food stamps. Some states and cities have provided health insurance to both parents and children at levels well above the poverty line, expanded childcare availability and quality, and extended family leave and unemployment insurance coverage to low-wage workers. Michigan has no time limit for families that comply with program requirements, thereby rewarding families trying to get out of poverty.

We have learned from these experiences, but only the federal government can build on these examples with leverage and send positive signals about the goals of TANF to welfare offices across the country. With a souring economy and state retrenchment likely, the need for such signals is more urgent than ever.

To begin with, the federal government could draw attention to important precedents in health insurance and childcare policies embraced by some states. These changes accommodate the reality of low-income people's lives by making benefits more seamless, less tied to their immediate circumstances. Because of the nature of the low-wage job market and the fragility of childcare and transportation arrangements, low-income people move in and out of jobs with frequent bouts of unemployment. To take this into account, some states are basing health coverage solely on income--for example, giving coverage to all children or parents below some multiple of the poverty line. Similar (although less sweeping) changes have been made in childcare programs. Overall, this means these benefits are more widely accessible to low-income people, instead of being designated for either "welfare families" or "working families"--a distinction that makes little sense given the constantly shifting status of low-income families.

TANF programs have not yet followed suit. In most states, a family must still have virtually no income or resources to qualify for cash assistance or TANF-funded education and training. Families that have been receiving TANF payments do sometimes qualify for cash supplements and services once they find employment (although in nearly all states time clocks continue to tick). But working families that never received TANF are excluded from those benefits and services. Thus, while parents receiving welfare are given support when they work, those who have remained off the rolls are not accorded the same treatment.

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