Welfare Reform and Recession

Welfare overhaul’s impact on America’s poorest, April 12, 2012, National Public Radio: “The welfare program that operated in the United States between the Franklin Roosevelt administration and the Clinton administration offered poor families assistance with few requirements or time frames. States could enroll as many people as they wanted in the program, and the federal government would match their funds. That changed in 1996, when President Clinton signed legislation overhauling the nation’s welfare system. The new law – referred to as the push ‘to end welfare as we know it’ – took away federal matching funds from states, giving them little incentive to bring new people onto the cash welfare rolls. That’s affected growing numbers of poor people across America. Sixteen states have decreased the number of people receiving welfare benefits since the recession hit. And most states are using their allotment of federal welfare dollars to make up for budget deficits in other areas…”