Workfare

“Simply put, welfare reform worked because we all worked together”, President Bill Clinton beamed, after signing the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996. After the passing of the PRWORA, dependence on welfare had been nearly cut in half, and unemployment rates were down. But, was workfare really all it was made out to be? Not exactly. Although the aid of workfare sounds effective in theory, it has proven to be unsuccessful and often subjects its recipients to unjust circumstance. In almost all cases, the program of workfare does not “teach” those who engage in it work skills, as it had intended. Shannon Waits, an anti-poverty worker elaborates on the life of a parent on workfare in a published article. “Welfare parents are expected to do the impossible”, she writes. “They go off to work without backup childcare for below poverty wages. Some are refugees in new foreign land.” And yet, despite the struggles many on workfare face, employees like Wait are not supposed to aid workers in developing job skills, but are rather mandated to “spy on them”.…

Is there a non-perfectionist justification for workfare? I. Introduction In 2014 The Conservative Party introduced the Help to Work scheme in the United Kingdom; long-term unemployed people were expected to work in return for their benefits. Prime Minister David Cameron made the claim that “a key part of our long-term economic plan is to move to full employment, making sure that everyone who can work is in work. (...) [W]e need to look at those who are persistently stuck on benefits.” However,…

In the early 1900s, the Federal government provided grants from the 1935 Social Security Act to state and local government to assist them and families with dependent children. The Aid to Dependent Children program also known as the mothers’ pension, mothers’ aid and mothers’ assistance program which provided economic aid to families who were poverty-stricken due to lack of a father 's support. The program was focused toward families headed by single women to be able to afford the basic family…

Australian families face solidarity and Division: Numbers of sole parent households are increasing, with predictions of a 65% increase within Australia by 2036. Although financial assistance is provided by the welfare system, families continue to experience financial hardship. Recent statistics suggests, that sole parent families are at the highest risk of experiencing disadvantage. Why are so many Australian sole parent families living so close to or below the calculated poverty line?…

Abusing the welfare system has always been an issue in the United States. There are thousands of able-bodied capable adults, without children, who are not plagued by a disability, collecting the benefits of the welfare. With how our welfare system is set up right now, recipients can collect taxpayer money with little to no work, and not contributing to their community at all. Now, kicking off every adult believed to be able bodied, is not what is going to happen. There will be better programs…

There are many assumptions about lone parent on welfare that are inaccurate. A lot of people classified people on social assistance as a lazy person, most especially women. They are characterized as lazy, or simply waiting for the next month’s benefits to turn in. This assumption is not true. According to Global News, nearly 73% of people receiving welfare assistance are members of working families, though some families still need social assistance to be financial stable (2016). Similarly to…

The needs of the poor, sick and hungry have always been an important issue throughout history, even before America. Countries all over the world have tried different programs to provide individuals with the help they needed to survive. However, the United States did not establish a program to help families in unfortunate circumstances until hardship hit the whole country. Before the government stepped in to help, contributions were merely volunteer based, mainly through churches and communities.…

Many supporters of welfare point out that the United States is lacking compared to most European nations when it comes to welfare. Most people agree that the United States is far superior to most of the European nations in terms of economy and technology: however, they also agree that it is unacceptable that the leader of the free world falls behind many countries in providing a better social welfare system. For example, Sweden has government sponsored education, healthcare, and an amount of…

Running Head: Case Study 3 Analysis of Welfare to Work Legislation 1 Case Study 3 Analysis of Welfare to Work Legislation Lonnie Wilborn PUA 440 Spring 2017 University of Las Vegas Nevada Case Study 3 Analysis of Welfare to Work Legislation 2 Define the Problem In this analysis of the Welfare to Work Legislation, the authors (Stephens & Wikstrom, 2007) describe the policies from this legislation that affects intergovernmental relations for the federal, state, and local levels. Until the 1920s…

Harvey believes that scholars that adopt a new theory quickly are vulnerable to use the work in an abusive way that will benefit their own thinking. An example of this misinterpretation can be the work of Lawrence Mead who, like Lewis, was concerned with poverty and how it affects society. In his work “The Logic of Workfare; The Underclass and work Policy” Mead examines the lower class in 1989 and focuses heavily on the number of jobs and their availability to the lower class. This writing is…