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University of Wisconsin–Madison
Poverty-related issues in the news, from the Institute for Research on Poverty

Day: October 3, 2012

Welfare-to-Work Program – South Carolina

DSS: SC welfare-to-work program exceeded goal, By Seanna Adcox (AP), October 2, 2012, The State: “The director of South Carolina’s social services agency said Tuesday more of its clients are getting jobs and coming off welfare rolls. But an advocate for the poor says that doesn’t mean they’re making a livable wage. Department of Social Services Director Lillian Koller said nearly 12,300 people stopped receiving welfare payments between September 2011 and June through its welfare-to-work program. That’s more than double the number during those months a year earlier and exceeds Koller’s goal by 22 percent. Koller said the more important figure is the 21,000 children whose parents are now working and can break the cycle of poverty…”

Health Care, Income and Poverty Measurement

Health care as income for the poor, By Eduardo Porter, October 2, 2012, New York Times: “As a nation, we devote almost one-sixth of our spending to health care, twice the share of 30 years ago. Medical bills for the elderly are climbing, threatening to blow up the budget in a few decades. Politicians from both parties are consumed by how to pay for it all. Yet we cannot quite agree on how valuable government health care benefits are to Americans. In July, the Congressional Budget Office — the nonpartisan arbiter of the costs and consequences of government spending — decided that we had not been valuing these benefits enough. In a report on how income and taxes are distributed across the population, it decided, for the first time, to value health benefits provided by the government at every penny they cost…”