Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF ) is a federal assistance program of the United States. It began on July 1, 1997, and succeeded the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program, providing cash assistance to indigent American families through the Administration for Children and Families, a division of the United States Department of Health and Human Services.U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. 2011. "TANF". Accessed 12/9/2011 from TANF is often regarded as just "welfare", but some argue this is a misnomer. Unlike AFDC, which provided a guaranteed cash benefit to eligible families, TANF is a block grant to states that creates no federal entitlement to welfare and is used by states to provide non-welfare services, including educational services, to employed people.
The TANF program, emphasizing the welfare-to-work principle, is a grant given to each state to run its own welfare program and designed to be temporary in nature and has several limits and requirements. The TANF grant has a five-year lifetime limit and requires that all recipients of welfare aid must find work within three years of receiving aid, including single parents who are required to work at least 30 hours per week (35 for two-parent families). Failure to comply with work requirements could result in loss of benefits. TANF funds may be used for the following reasons: to provide assistance to needy families so that children can be cared for at home; to end the dependence of needy parents on government benefits by promoting job preparation, work and marriage; to prevent and reduce the incidence of out-of-wedlock pregnancies; and to encourage the formation and maintenance of two-parent families.
Background Prior to TANF, Aid to Families with Dependent Children was a major federal assistance program that was coming under heavy criticism. Some argued that such programs were ineffective, promoted dependency on the government, and encouraged behaviors detrimental to escaping from poverty. Some people also argued that TANF is detrimental to its recipients because using these programs have a stigma attached to them, which makes the people that use them less likely to participate politically to defend this program, and thus the programs have been subsequently weakened. Beginning with President Ronald Reagan's administration and continuing through the first few years of the Clinton administration, growing dissatisfaction with AFDC, particularly the rise in welfare caseloads, led an increasing number of states to seek waivers from AFDC rules to allow states to more stringently enforce work requirements for welfare recipients. The 27 percent increase in caseloads between 1990 and 1994 accelerated the push by states to implement more radical welfare reform.
States that were granted waivers from AFDC program rules to run mandatory welfare-to-work programs were also required to rigorously evaluate the success of their programs. As a result, many types of mandatory welfare-to-work programs were evaluated in the early 1990s. While reviews of such programs found that almost all programs led to significant increases in employment and reductions in welfare rolls, there was little evidence that income among former welfare recipients had increased. In effect, increases in earnings from jobs were offset by losses in public income, leading many to conclude that these programs had no anti-poverty effects.Bloom, Dan and Charles Michalopoulos. 2001. How Welfare and Work Policies Affect Employment and Income: A Synthesis of Research. New York: Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation However, the findings that welfare-to-work programs did have some effect in reducing dependence on government increased support among policymakers for moving welfare recipients into employment. Paper prepared for Conference, "The Social Science and Policy Making". Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, March 13–14, 1998
While members of the Democratic and Republican parties agreed on the importance of transitioning families from government assistance to jobs, they disagreed on how to accomplish this goal. Democratic congresspersons thought that welfare reform should expand opportunities for welfare mothers to receive training and work experience that would help them raise their families' living standards by working more and at higher wages. Republicans emphasized work requirements and time limits, paying little attention to whether or not families' incomes increased. More specifically, Republicans wanted to impose a five-year lifetime limit on welfare benefits and provide block grants for states to fund programs for poor families. Republicans argued that welfare to work reform would be beneficial by creating role models out of mothers, promoting maternal self-esteem and sense of control, and introducing productive daily routines into family life. Furthermore, they argued that reforms would eliminate welfare dependence by sending a powerful message to teens and young women to postpone childbearing. Democratic congresspersons responded that the reform sought by Republicans would overwhelm severely stressed parents, deepen the poverty of many families, and force young children into unsafe and unstimulating child care situations. In addition, they asserted that welfare reform would reduce parents' ability to monitor the behaviors of their children, leading to problems in child and adolescent functioning.Duncan, Greg J. and P. Lindsay Chase-Lansdale. 2001. "For Better and for Worse: Welfare Reform and the Well-being of Children Families." In For Better and for Worse: Welfare Reform and the Well-being of children and Families. New York: Russell Sage Foundation
In 1992, as a presidential candidate, Bill Clinton pledged to "end welfare as we know it" by requiring families receiving welfare to work after three years. As president, Clinton was attracted to welfare expert and Harvard University Professor David Ellwood's proposal on welfare reform and thus Clinton eventually appointed Ellwood to co-chair his welfare task force. Ellwood supported converting welfare into a transitional system. He advocated providing assistance to families for a limited time, after which recipients would be required to earn wages from a regular job or a work opportunity program. Low wages would be supplemented by expanded tax credits, access to subsidized childcare and health insurance, and guaranteed child support.
In 1994, Clinton introduced a welfare reform proposal that would provide job training coupled with time limits and subsidized jobs for those having difficulty finding work, but it was defeated. Later that year, when Republicans attained a Congressional majority in November 1994, the focus shifted toward the Republican proposal to end entitlements to assistance, repeal AFDC and instead provide states with blocks grants.Greenberg, Mark et al. 2000. Welfare Reauthorization: An Early Guide to the Issues. Center for Law and Social Policy The debates in Congress about welfare reform centered around five themes: Reforming Welfare to Promote Work and Time Limits: The welfare reform discussions were dominated by the perception that the then-existing cash assistance program, AFDC, did not do enough to encourage and require employment, and instead incentivized non-work. Supporters of welfare reform also argued that AFDC fostered divorce and out-of-wedlock birth, and created a culture of dependency on government assistance. Both President Clinton and Congressional Republicans emphasized the need to transform the cash assistance system into a work-focused, time-limited program. Reducing Projected Spending: Republicans argued that projected federal spending for low-income families was too high and needed to be reduced to lower overall federal spending.
Promoting Parental Responsibility: There was broad agreement among politicians that both parents should support their children. For custodial parents, this meant an emphasis on work and cooperation with child support enforcement. For non-custodial parents, it meant a set of initiatives to strengthen the effectiveness of the child support enforcement. Addressing Out-of-Wedlock Birth: Republicans argued that out of wedlock birth was presenting an increasingly serious social problem and that the federal government should work to reduce out-of-wedlock births. Promoting Devolution: A common theme in the debates was that the federal government had failed and that states were more successful in providing for the needy, and thus reform needed to provide more power and authority to states to shape such policy.
Clinton twice vetoed the welfare reform bill put forward by House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole. Then just before the Democratic Convention he signed a third version after the Senate voted 74–24 and the House voted 256–170 in favor of welfare reform legislation, formally known as the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA). Clinton signed the bill into law on August 22, 1996. PRWORA replaced AFDC with TANF and dramatically changed the way the federal government and states determine eligibility and provide aid for needy families.
Before 1997, the federal government designed the overall program requirements and guidelines, while states administered the program and determined eligibility for benefits. Since 1997, states have been given block grants and both design and administer their own programs. Access to welfare and amount of assistance varied quite a bit by state and locality under AFDC, both because of the differences in state standards of need and considerable subjectivity in caseworker evaluation of qualifying "suitable homes". However, welfare recipients under TANF are actually in completely different programs depending on their state of residence, with different social services available to them and different requirements for maintaining aid.Kaufman, Darren S. "Aid to Families with Dependent Children (ADFC)", in Encyclopedia of Health Care Management, ed. Michael J. Stahl. SAGE Publications, 2003, p. 17
Funding and eligibility
PRWORA replaced AFDC with TANF and ended entitlement to cash assistance for low-income families, meaning that some families may be denied aid even if they are eligible. Under TANF, states have broad discretion to determine who is eligible for benefits and services. In general, states must use funds to serve families with children, with the only exceptions related to efforts to reduce non-marital childbearing and promote marriage. States cannot use TANF funds to assist most legal immigrants until they have been in the country for at least five years. TANF sets forth the following work requirements in order to qualify for benefits:
Recipients (with few exceptions) must work as soon as they are job ready or no later than three years after coming on assistance. Single parents are required to participate in work activities for at least 30 hours per week. Two-parent families must participate in work activities 35 hours a week. Failure to participate in work requirements can result in a reduction or termination of benefits to the family. States, in fiscal year 2004, have to ensure that 50 percent of all families and 90 percent of two-parent families are participating in work activities. If a state meets these goals without restricting eligibility, it can receive a caseload reduction credit. This credit reduces the minimum participation rates the state must achieve to continue receiving federal funding.
While states are given more flexibility in the design and implementation of public assistance, they must do so within various provisions of the law:U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. About TANF.U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Accessed 11/2/2011 from