Most Important Welfare Programs example essay topic

The questions about effectiveness of a welfare programs have been of a great importance throughout the world for the last twenty years. In the United States, the problems of welfare become vital after the Great Depression. Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal proposed the creation of welfare system. It was the first time in the U.S. history when government started to use public and federal funds in order to finance people. One of the most important welfare programs is Aid to Families with Dependent Children. It the most expensive program, but it is the most needed too.

This program was proposed in 1935. However, for the last 65 years the whole welfare system had suffered significant changes. One of the most important changes was the Family Support Act of 1988, which required welfare recipients to attend job-training programs. Another welfare programs that exist today are Medicaid, Food Stamps, and Supplemental Security Income. A lot of federal money is used to finance all these expensive programs. Such a program as Medicaid is very important especially to the low-income families with many children.

Statistics shows that in 1994 approximately 35 million people had received financial assistance, which resulted into 140 billion dollars spent from the federal budget. For instance, Food Stamps can be used to purchase food items just as money. In the same year, the value of the Food Stamps given to the low-income families totaled 24 billion dollars. The Congressional Digest gives an example of how food stamps are distributed, "A four-person household with countable income below the federal poverty guidelines and specified assets of less than $20,000 qualifies for up to about $380 worth of food stamps monthly. Everyone would like to have a good welfare system, but when it comes to paying the taxes, the support for it drops. In order to have an extensive welfare system, it would be needed to raise taxes to levels with which many would not feel comfortable.

Another problem with welfare is that it brings with it more bureaucracy. The money that should be used to help people is actually used for running the program. In August of 1996, president Clinton signed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act. According to the Washington Post, since that time, there are seven million fewer people on welfare. The welfare roles have been cut in half. So far, the major changes from welfare reform have been the changes in participation experienced by education and employment preparation agencies.

Some agencies have experienced declines, while others have seen gains. In some places, like Philadelphia, welfare agencies quickly changed the focus of their welfare-to-work program, causing education and training agencies to respond to this shift. The agencies responses to meet the needs of welfare reform were to compress the curriculum and make services shorter, which may not be the best ways to serve all welfare recipients. In addition, many observers have commented that as the most employable recipients leave welfare for jobs, the largest group remaining on welfare are people who are the most difficult to employ. It is unclear whether agencies will be prepared to deal with this hard to serve group.

In the early implementation phase, welfare reform did not transform social service agencies. Nonetheless, some agencies did begin to experience changes that they attributed to new welfare policies. Basic education and literacy programs in Philadelphia suffered drops in participation when clients in that city responded to the welfare departments new job search mandate. In response, some of these agencies reported changing their curriculum in order to retain students.

Education agencies in the other cities reported either increased participation or no effect from reform, which points to the importance of local policies. New contracts from welfare departments contributed to increased participation in job training and employment preparation programs. A minority of agencies responded to the new needs and demands caused by welfare reform by taking on recipients in community service slots and attempting to advocate for their clients through communication with the welfare department. In the early stage of welfare reform, basic need agencies appeared to be less affected than education and employment preparation agencies. However, a few agencies in Cleveland experienced increased demand that they attributed to a rise in sanctioning by the welfare department; they provide a cautionary exception to this trend. This result seems promising, but should it be used to evaluate welfare reforms success?

This question divides the issue among party lines. Generally, republicans view this outcome as a reliable way to measure reforms success. In contrast, democrats probe deeper into welfare, considering additional data. This includes knowing that one third of children in America are living in poverty. This value has varied little since 1996. The question then rises, what can be wrong with the reform that is not getting people from poverty?

To answer this question, a few facts must be considered. Including, how reform has changed welfare and the characteristics of a welfare recipient. As a result, of the seven million people that stopped receiving welfare benefits since 1996, three-fourths of them have jobs. These jobs provide no health benefits and offer an average wage of $6.50 per hour.

Consequently, in order to pay their bills and avoid eating smaller meals, they must supplement their income with food stamps and Medicaid. Not only are they still living in poverty, we are still buying their groceries, thus revealing the failure of welfare.