Operating within the Rules: Welfare Recipients' Experiences with Sanctions and Case Closings

Cherlin, Andrew J.; Bogen, Karen; Quane, James M.; Burton, Linda M.

doi:10.1086/341181

Cited by 77 publications

(76 citation statements)

References 1 publication

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“…Factors such as having more children, limited work experience, limited education, lacking access to childcare or to adequate transportation, or having to care for disabled family members increase the risk of being sanctioned. These findings have been replicated by several other studies, which also found that recipients experiencing domestic abuse, with health and mental health or substance abuse problems, are far more likely to be sanctioned (Cherlin et al, 2002;Fein & Lee, 1999;Kalil, Seefeldt, & Wang, 2002).…”

Section: Worker-client Relations: the Use Of Sanctionsmentioning

confidence: 59%

“…States have some discretion in spelling out what constitutes work activities, as well as exemptions from them, and most of them delegate that discretion to the counties. Still, as I will show, no matter what the particular "work test" each state and county implement, it has clearly become a major tool, coupled with sanctions, in denying aid and reducing the welfare rolls (Cherlin, Bogen, Quane, & Burton, 2002;Rector & Youssef, 1999).…”

Section: Welfare-to-workmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Organizational Responses to Social Policy: The Case of Welfare Reform

Hasenfeld¹

2010

Administration in Social Work

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Section: Worker-client Relations: the Use Of Sanctionsmentioning

confidence: 59%

Section: Welfare-to-workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Organizational Responses to Social Policy: The Case of Welfare Reform

Hasenfeld¹

2010

Administration in Social Work

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“…Another variable is a measure of proportionality between "infraction" and "sanction". There is ample evidence that the bulk of sanctioned TANF clients in the US, some of who lose their entire entitlement, are effectively being sanctioned for missing an appointment or not properly filling out a form (Cherlin et al 2002). Clearly both concerns bear a close relation to the distinction between narrow and broad participation requirements and their strict or lax enforcement, discussed in a previous section.…”

Section: B Identification and Monitoring Of Beneficiariesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Public Administration Case against Participation Income

Wispelaere

Stirton

2007

Social Service Review

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-Anthony Atkinson's proposal for a participation income (PI) has been acclaimed by social philosophers and policy experts as a workable compromise given the problems besetting an unconditional basic income (UBI). While some see PI as the first step towards a fully unconditional scheme, others regard PI as superior to UBI on ethical grounds as well as in terms of political feasibility. Both of these views disregard the administrative complications associated with introducing a broad participation requirement into welfare entitlements. In this paper we identify three essential administrative tasks that any welfare scheme must perform -establishing criteria of entitlement, determining compliance with those criteria, and allocating benefits to qualified beneficiaries -and show that PI performs poorly in terms of all three tasks. This suggests what we call the trilemma of participation income: only at significant costs to administrators and welfare clients does the scheme retain its apparent ability to satisfy the requirements of both activation and universal approaches to welfare. Consequently, the main apparent strength of PI -its capacity to unite different factions within the basic income debate -is shown to be illusory precisely because competing factions strongly prefer different resolutions of the trilemma. This, we argue, has far-reaching implications for the political strategy of basic income advocates as well as the wider debate on universal welfare reform.

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“…The national literature, reporting on jurisdictions both with and without full-family sanctions, finds that sanctioned families tend to be more disadvantaged and vulnerable than other families on welfare (Bloom and Winstead 2002;Cherlin et al 2001Cherlin et al , 2002Moffitt and Roff 2000). Sanctioned adults may experience greater difficulty in understanding rules and sanction policy (Fein and Karweit 1997;US General Accounting Office 1998).…”

Section: Sanctionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

TANF child-only cases in California: Barriers to self-sufficiency and well-being

Speiglman¹,

Brown

Bos

et al. 2011

Journal of Children and Poverty

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Since the United States implemented Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF), or 'welfare reform,' the number of assistance cases without an adult receiving aid has risen dramatically. In states like California, these child-only cases now constitute the majority of all TANF cases. Despite this increase, existing research sheds little light on the composition of child-only caseloads and the status of the adults and children in such cases. Drawing on county administrative data and interviews with 143 parents associated with child-only cases in five California counties, this paper identifies both the demographics of the child-only caseload in these sites and the major barriers to employment that parents in sanctioned and timed-out child-only cases face. These include human capital, health, and family issues, in addition to other obstacles. The data suggest that, despite functioning as one administrative entity, CalWORKs, California's TANF program, has transformed into two separate programs: a welfare-to-work program and a subsistence-level cash assistance program for some members of child-only families. Given this transformation, the paper closes by suggesting a research agenda for future child-only scholarship and argues for policy innovations to meet the needs of the expanding child-only caseload.

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Operating within the Rules: Welfare Recipients' Experiences with Sanctions and Case Closings

Cited by 77 publications

References 1 publication

Organizational Responses to Social Policy: The Case of Welfare Reform

Organizational Responses to Social Policy: The Case of Welfare Reform

The Public Administration Case against Participation Income

TANF child-only cases in California: Barriers to self-sufficiency and well-being

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