...ways former welfare recipients using federal entitlement programs as they navigate and negotiate the "post-AFDC" era. In this article, the authors examine patterns of participation in TANF, the Food Stamp program, and Medicaid in Wisconsin. Very distinct patterns of participation emerged among the three programs: a single short period of receipt was common for TANF cycling was typical for food stamps, and a long spell was the standard for Medicaid. The authors also explored multiple program participation over a three-year period. Analysis revealed interactions and transitions not normally considered in this line of research. One key finding was the high number of transitions on and off benefits during these three years when the three programs were considered simultaneously. Policy implications are discussed.

KEY WORDS: poverty; single mothers; social policy; TANF; welfare

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In the 1990s the main cash welfare program for single-parent families, Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), faced widespread criticism. An oft-cited concern was that the structure of welfare meant that working did not "pay." Because most AFDC recipients would have received a fairly low wage had they entered the labor market, and because they would have been ineligible for some ancillary benefits had they worked, the total package of support provided to many women on welfare was often higher than the income they might have earned in the labor market. Those receiving AFDC typically also received Medicaid, food stamps, and benefits through other programs. These incentives may have encouraged women to turn to welfare and use it long term. Working without these additional benefits might have fostered greater poverty among women and children.

There were several policy responses as AFDC increasingly came under attack in the political campaigns of the mid-1990s. Some policy changes were designed to move women off welfare altogether. The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) of 1996 (P.L. 104-193) eliminated AFDC, replacing it with Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). TANF instituted time limits for receiving federal cash assistance and required most participants to work. Other policy changes in the late 1990s were designed to increase income when women were in the labor market. For example, the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) was increased substantially, providing considerable benefits, but only to those with earnings. Funding for child care assistance was also increased. Moreover, some of the support programs were decoupled from AFDC, so that families could receive Medicaid (and later the State Children's Health Insurance Program, SCHIP) even when not receiving cash assistance. In addition, in the rollout of TANF states were allowed to design and implement new policies and programs, and they responded with a wide array of innovations. Many of these programs were designed to move families off cash assistance and into work quickly but to provide them with other supports such as child care subsidies, access to health insurance, and transportation services.

Have these policy changes affected welfare use? We know that there were dramatic declines in the AFDC/TANF caseloads throughout the 1990s, from 14.4 million individuals in March 1994 to 5.0 million in September 2002. We know relatively little, however, about the dynamics and correlates of program participation in the "new world of welfare." Perhaps more important, in light of the new interest in the interactive effects of multiple programs, we know even less about how families may use several programs simultaneously, even when they are not receiving cash. This article addresses these issues, using postreform information on TANF, food stamps, and Medicaid in Wisconsin.

POLICY CONTEXT

The TANF block grant, as noted earlier, gave states substantial flexibility to design their own TANF programs. Wisconsin's TANF program, Wisconsin Works (W-2), is similar to programs in many other states in that it emphasizes work first and tries to move those who receive cash benefits quickly into programs in which they receive only services and work supports. W-2 is structured as a program with four tiers, with the idea that individuals will work their way "up the ladder." The lowest tier is W-2 Transition. For those least ready for the workforce, this level provides $628 per month in exchange for completing a work or "work-like" assignment. The next tier is a Community Service Job. This stage generally requires greater hours of work participation and provides $673 per month in exchange for completing a work assignment in a community job. The top two tiers provide no cash payment, only work supports. An additional program, Caretaker of Newborn, provides $673 per month, but is available only for the first 12 weeks of a child's life.

Wisconsin's TANF program has perhaps the strongest emphasis on work of any state program. It is also unusual in that there is no increase in benefits for larger families and no earnings disregard in the calculation of most benefits (Kaplan, 2000).W2 includes a uniquely generous treatment of child support payments, however, and the payments generally are completely disregarded in calculating cash benefits. Another unusual feature in Wisconsin is its SCHIP program, BadgerCare, which is available to all types of low-income families and covers adults as well. The Food Stamp and Medicaid programs in Wisconsin are fairly similar to those of other states.

Because TANF programs differ across states, conclusions from a study of welfare participation in any single state cannot be generalized to other states. Nevertheless, the substantial state flexibility and significant program changes associated with TANF make it increasingly important to learn from experiences of individual states. Wisconsin's work-first approach and more stringent work requirements, moreover, are consistent with pending TANF reauthorization proposals. Understanding the implications of its approach for multiple program participation may be of growing importance nationally.

LITERATURE REVIEW

In this review, we focus on the post-TANF period when possible, and summarize key findings from AFDC-era studies when more recent results are limited. We focus primarily on individual and family characteristics and ignore macro factors, such as welfare policy changes and changes in economic conditions, that are associated with program participation. For a detailed discussion and review of these broader factors, see Meyers, Gornick, and Peck (2001),Moffitt (1992), and Wallace and Blank (1999).

Cash Benefits Receipt

Research indicates that many TANF recipients have more barriers to employment than nonrecipients: physical and mental health problems, lower levels of education, less work experience, more children, exposure to domestic violence, and limited access to transportation. Although white women comprise the majority of benefits recipients, African American women and other women of color are overrepresented among participants relative to their proportion of the U.S. population as a whole. Welfare recipients tend to be young and single with young children (see, for example, Danziger, Corcoran, Danziger, & Heflin, 2000; Moffitt, Cherlin, Burton, King, & Roff, 2002; Rangarajan & Johnson, 2002; U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2001).

In examining the dynamics of cash benefit receipt researchers have found that TANF recipients are more likely to move on and off welfare quickly and usually remain on welfare for a shorter period than recipients under the AFDC regime (Moffitt & Stevens, 2001; Smith, 2001; U.S. General Accounting Office [GAO], 2001b). For example, Rangarajan and Johnson (2002) examined patterns of TANF receipt in New Jersey over a three-year period, finding that fewer than 30% of the recipients stayed on welfare longer than two years. About half of the earliest TANF recipients stayed on the program for 12 months or less. Similar results emerged from an analysis of long-term welfare use and the approaching time limits in Washington state (Burley, 2001).

Several studies of welfare dynamics have found that a substantial proportion of TANF leavers (like AFDC leavers) return to welfare (Born, Ovwigho, & Cordero, 2002; Cancian, Haveman, Meyer, & Wolfe, 2002; Cheng, 2003; Loprest, 2002). Early findings have suggested that about 20 to 35% of TANF leavers returned to welfare within one year (Acs & Loprest, 2001). Similarly among families participating in the Urban Institute's National Survey of America's Families (NSAF), about one-fifth of the TANF leavers also returned to welfare within one year (Lowest, 2002). State studies using administrative data often find somewhat higher rates of return: For example, Born and colleagues (2002) found that 31% of leavers in Maryland returned to cash assistance within one year, most of them within the first three months. These findings generally resemble studies of AFDC, which found that about one-third of leavers returned within a year (see Meyer & Cancian, 1996, for a review). None of these studies, however, measured the rate of return for more than two years after exit. We do not yet know whether the majority of TANF leavers remain off welfare in the long term.

Research also suggests that factors associated with an increased likelihood of welfare receipt,...

NOTE: All illustrations and photos have been removed from this article.



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