USIA, U.S. Society and Values, January 1997 - Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act

WELFARE REFORM; THE PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY AND WORK OPPORTUNITY RECONCILIATION ACT OF 1996

On August 22, 1996, President Clinton signed this legislation into law. This comprehensive bipartisan welfare reform plan seeks to change dramatically America's welfare system, newly emphasizing the exchange of work for time-limited assistance. The subject of intensive debate, the law also encompasses new responsibilities on the part of states and new provision regarding the nation's children. Following, in outline form, are highlights of the welfare reform legislation, including changes from previous bills the President vetoed.

WELFARE: A TRANSITION TO WORK

Work requirements. Recipients must work after two years of assistance, with few exceptions. Twenty-five percent of all families in each state must be working or off the welfare roles in fiscal year (FY) 1997, with the number rising to 50 percent by FY 2002. Single parents must work at least 20 hours per week the first year in order to receive assistance, and at least 30 hours weekly by FY 2000. Two-parent families must work 35 hours a week by July 1, 1997.
Support for transition. The law provides $14 billion in child care funding over six years to help more mothers move into the workforce. It also guarantees that women on welfare will continue to receive health coverage for their families, including at least one year of transitional Medicaid when they leave welfare for work.
Work activities. To count toward state work requirements, recipients must participate in unsubsidized or subsidized employment, on-the-job training, work experience, community service, or 12 months of vocational training, or must provide child care services to individuals who are participating in community service. Up to six weeks of job search counts toward the work requirement. But no more than 20 percent of a state's caseload may include vocational training or being a teen-age parent in a secondary school. Single parents with a child under six years old who cannot find child care are not penalized for failing to meet work requirements. States may exempt from the work requirement single parents with children less than a year old.
Time limit. Families may not receive assistance for more than five cumulative years, or less at state option. States have the option of exempting up to 20 percent of their caseload from the time limit, and to provide non-cash assistance or vouchers using state funds.
Personal employability plans. States must make an initial assessment of recipients' skills. They also may develop personal responsibility plans for recipients detailing the education, training, and job placement services needed to move into the workforce.
State maintenance of effort requirements. States must maintain their own spending on welfare at at least 80 percent of the FY 1994 level, and 100 percent of either FY 1994 or FY 1995 spending (whichever is greater) on child care to provide additional funds for that purpose beyond the initial allotment.
Job subsidies. States may create jobs by taking money now used for welfare checks, to provide community service jobs, income subsidies or hiring incentives for potential employers.
Performance bonuses. One billion dollars will be available from 1999-2003 to reward states for moving welfare recipients into jobs.
State flexibility. States which have received approval before July 1, 1997, for welfare reform waivers may operate their cash assistance programs under those waivers.
PROMOTING RESPONSIBILITY
Comprehensive Child Support Enforcement
National new hire reporting system. The law establishes a federal case registry and directory of newly-hired employees to help track delinquent parents across state lines. It also expands and streamlines already existing procedures for direct withholding of child support from wages.
Streamlined paternity establishment. The law streamlines the legal process for establishing paternities, and requires a state form for voluntary paternity acknowledgment. It also directs states to publicize the availability of these processes and forms, and encourage their use. Individuals failing to cooperate with paternity establishment will have their monthly cash assistance reduced by at least 25 percent.
Uniform interstate child support laws. There will be uniform rules, procedures and forms for interstate cases.
Computerized statewide collections. States must establish central registries of child support orders and centralized collection and disbursement units, and must expedite state procedures for child support enforcement.
Penalties. States may implement tough child support enforcement techniques, including expanded wage garnishment, seizure of assets, and revocation of driver and professional licenses for parents owing delinquent child support.
"Families First." Under this new policy, families no longer receiving assistance will have priority in the distribution of child support arrears.
Visitation and access. Grants will assist states in establishing programs to support and facilitate noncustodial parents' visitation with and access to their children.
TEEN PARENT PROVISIONS
Live at home, stay in school. Unmarried minor parents are required to live with a responsible adult or in an adult-supervised setting, and participate in educational and training activities, in order to receive assistance.
Teen pregnancy provision. Fifty million dollars annually, beginning in 1998, will be added to already-existing appropriations for abstinence education. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) will establish and implement a strategy to prevent non-marital teen births, and to assure that at least 25 percent of communities nationwide have teen pregnancy prevention programs. In addition, the Justice Department will establish a program to study the link between statutory rape and teen pregnancy. The program also should educate law enforcement officials on the prevention and prosecution of statutory rape.
CHANGES FROM BILLS PREVIOUSLY VETOED
Guaranteed medical coverage. The new law preserves the national guarantee of health care for poor children, the disabled, pregnant women, the elderly, and people on welfare.
Increased child care funding and mandatory child care maintenance of effort. It provides substantially more child care funding, and requires states to meet child care maintenance of effort by granting funds for that purpose.
Incentives for states to move people into jobs. It includes $1 billion for bonuses to states that meet performance targets.
Preservation of nutrition program. It maintains the national nutritional safety net by eliminating a proposed cap on the federal food stamp program and a proposed creation of block grants to the states for food stamps.
Child protection and adoption. It maintains current laws on these subjects, as well as current funding for child welfare, child-abuse prevention, foster care, and adoption services.
Contingency funding. It includes a greater amount of money than had been proposed for contingency funds to protect states in times of population growth or economic downturn.
Child care health and safety standards. It continues current health and safety standards for day care, and continues current funding for many disabled children.
Optional family cap. States have the option of implementing a cap on benefits to families if they so choose. The vetoed legislation would have mandated the cap unless a state legislature explicitly voted to provide benefits.
PROPOSED FUTURE MODIFICATIONS
President Clinton has pledged to fix two provisions of the act which, he maintains, have nothing to do with welfare reform.
He believes the law cuts deeper than it should into the food stamp program, mostly for working families with high shelter costs.
The law also would deny most forms of public assistance to most legal immigrants for five years, or until they attain citizenship. The President has said that legal immigrants who fall on hard times through no fault of their own and need help should get it, as long as their sponsors take additional responsibility for them as well.

U.S. Society and Values
USIA Electronic Journals, Vol. 1, No. 20, January 1997