Welfare Reform

Posted on August 9, 2012 by townsend

• Welfare spending cut in half since reform, By Tami Luhby, August 9, 2012, CNNMoney: “Today’s welfare program is nothing like what it used to be. In the 16 years since President Clinton and Congress overhauled the nation’s welfare system, the number of people receiving cash assistance has fallen by two-thirds. And public spending on the program has dropped by more than half. Conservative lawmakers and policy analysts have celebrated the reform, saying it has helped put people on the road to self-sufficiency rather than government dependence. But advocates for low-income people contend that Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), which is what welfare turned into in 1996, does not adequately support the poor, particularly in tough economic times. The cash assistance portion of TANF has fallen to $9.6 billion in 2011, down from $20.4 billion in what were mostly cash benefits in 1996, according to an analysis by CLASP, a low-income advocacy group. The average number of people receiving payments per month is 4.6 million, down from 12.6 million…”
• Obama’s welfare waiver: Gutting rules or tweaking?, By Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar (AP), August 9, 2012, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: “Welfare is causing a ruckus in the presidential campaign. But the program is a shadow of its old self from the 1970s, when Ronald Reagan used the image of ‘welfare queens’ to assail government poverty programs promoted by liberals. Nowadays government cash assistance to the poor is mainly conditioned on work. And the Obama administration waivers excoriated by Mitt Romney as gutting welfare reform are unlikely to reverse that basic policy, as even some architects of work requirements acknowledge…”
• Romney presses Obama on work in welfare law, By Trip Gabriel, August 7, 2012, New York Times: “Mitt Romney accused President Obama on Tuesday of gutting one of the signature bipartisan accomplishments of the recent political era: the overhaul of welfare policy. Mr. Romney, taking up criticism that has gripped conservatives for the last few weeks, attacked a directive by the Obama administration that Republicans say does an end run around the welfare law, signed by President Bill Clinton in 1996, that is widely credited with reducing government dependency…”