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Although a vast amount of literature on the characteristics of public assistance recipients exists, little is known about the characteristics of the clientele of nonprofits that provide material assistance. This [...]

A study was conducted to investigate the effect of job access on employment outcomes for welfare recipients in Cleveland, Ohio. A longitudinal dataset combining administrative and survey data with multiple measures of access to jobs is used. Findings indicate that labor market outcomes are related to the residential locations of welfare leavers prior to employment.

The study presents a hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) example investigating intergenerational dependence on welfare and its relation to child academic achievement. Results show that HLM is a robust and flexible tool that can effectively test various types of research hypothesis, particularly those concerning multilevel influences and macro-to-micro relations.

Several Oregon counties received a noticeable influx of elderly migrants from other states during the 1980s. Oregon policy regarding taxes, land use, and long-term care is examined for possible influence on migration. Models of elderly migration are examined for insight into how public policy influences migration, and previous research regarding the effects of elderly migration on public policy is reviewed. Data regarding disability and financial vulnerability among elderly by migration status are analyzed for possible influence upon public policy. Change in the population aged 65 and older mirrored state and national patterns for 1980 to 1990 and 1990 to 1999. Interstate elderly arriving in attractive counties reported a low prevalence of disability and financial vulnerability, indicating a low risk of demanding public assistance. Interstate elderly arriving in population centers reported a relatively high prevalence of disability but a low prevalence of financial vulnerability. This may suggest that Oregon's long-term care policy influenced elderly migration. [Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail address: Website: KEYWORDS. Aged, migration, disability, poverty, public revenues, public assistance, capacity, competency

This study analyzed interdependent behaviors among states in setting welfare benefits, behaviors often referred to as strategic interactions. Strategic interactions among states are believed to have led some state governments [...]

Researchers infrequently have focused on assessing the degree to which the changes in welfare policy legislated during the 1990s have affected immigrants' receipt of welfare. Using data from the March Current Population Survey, we analyze the contribution of local labor market conditions to the explanation of relative declines in immigrants receipt of welfare from 1994 to 2000. The results or a series of models that included labor market-area and state fixed effects indicate that employment and unemployment rates across metropolitan statistical areas and states account for at least one-third of the observed relative decrease among immigrants. The policy implications of the findings are discussed.

The federally-imposed lifetime limit on cash assistance receipt compels program administrators to examine returns to welfare after an exit. We explore recidivism among a random sample of 2,665 Maryland families who left welfare between October 1996 and December 1997. Using administrative data, we compare the demographic characteristics, welfare histories, and work histories of recidivists and non-recidivists. Results indicate that most families do not return to welfare within a year. However, almost one-third do return, often within the first 30 days. This rarely investigated 'administrative churning' phenomenon is important because of the federal time limit, the valuable agency resources which are consumed in handling churning cases and the possible negative consequences of churning on family well-being. KEYWORDS. Welfare, recidivism, human services, policy

This article examines the fundamental elements that define the field of human services. Human services can be classified as social services created to contribute to societal well-being that incorporate key elements such as interactions between recipients and providers, therapeutic methods, mediating organizations, fundamental human needs, and the social environment.

Research on welfare levels from 1940-1995 have shown declines in assistance beginning in 1975, especially for higher-paying states. This lessened commitment to maintaining families above the poverty line places those receiving Temporary Assistance to Needy Families in significant difficulty.

An examination of a 1994 household survey of foreign-born Mexicans in Los Angeles County, California and the Current Population Surveys of March 1994 and 1995 revealed several surprising facts about welfare use by illegal immigrants. It was found that unauthorized Mexican immigrants in that area use welfare at a similar or lesser rate than other ethno-racial groups. In addition, Mexican welfare recipients do not use as much in terms of value as individuals from other groups who also access welfare. These findings negate prevailing public beliefs about welfare use by illegal immigrants.

Bourdieu conceptualises most aspects of social life in terms of fields, which constitute sites of struggle over a central stake. The resources which are used in these struggles, and whose appropriation is at stake, are defined as types of capital: economic, cultural, social and symbolic. Each field involves a set of players, of agents who are engaged in practices and strategies on the basis of an habitus. It is contended in this article that such an approach can be usefully mobilised to develop a sociological analysis of welfare. The model has to be slightly altered to make it more adequate for the study of the welfare field. First, what Bourdieu calls political capital is given a more prominent place. Secondly, the focus is more definitely set on the rates at which types of capital are converted in the welfare field. It is argued that such a model satisfies the central requirements of a sociology of welfare, in that it places welfare activities within the wider social context while grasping their internal dynamic. It provides an effective framework for addressing the main questions which are raised by a sociology of welfare.

This research examines the quantitative impacts of welfare program characteristics and individual characteristics on both the labor force and welfare participation decisions of low-income females with children. The participation decisions are estimated jointly as a bivariate probit model using data derived from the U.S. Census Bureau's Current Population Survey for the years 1979 to 1990, inclusive. These data allow the estimation of the precise behavioral impacts of welfare. The main empirical findings are that effective welfare guarantee levels and the effective welfare tax rate on unearned income both significantly affect the probability of labor force and welfare program participation, but that such impacts are very small in magnitude. Implications for policy are discussed.

This article is concerned in part to inform the quest for an understanding of the perceptions which Muslim minorities have of Western welfare state provision, but its wider purpose is to explore the essence and the potential of the Islamic welfare state. Heuristic models constructed by social policy academics have provided insights into the influences of religion upon different kinds of welfare state, but no model exists by which specifically to understand Islamic welfare traditions. The article explains the Islamic tradition of Zakat; its significance as one of the central pillars of Muslim faith, and the principles through which it addresses the relief of poverty and the redistribution of wealth. Islamic conceptions of state and community are then explored and the ways in which Muslim faith and culture are adapting at both the global and community level. The article concludes with some speculative remarks about the scope for rapprochement between Western debates about the moral basis for welfare and Muslim perspectives on social justice.

The potential of non-governmental agencies as providers of welfare services is increasingly recognised but little attention has been given to the welfare-providing role of religious congregations. This article draws on four case studies to describe and analyse the range of congregational welfare activities. Six types of welfare work are distinguished: welfare projects, indirect welfare work, informal care, informal care in an organised framework, mutual aid and social integration. Distinctive features of congregational welfare work are identified. The article concludes by discussing the implications of the findings and considering whether there is scope for expanding the contribution of congregations to the mixed economy of welfare.

This research documents trends from 1970 through 1990 in the utilization and ameliorative effects of public assistance among poor children in nonmetropolitan (nonmetro) and metropolitan (metro) America. Results indicate that the families of nonmetro poor children rely more heavily on parental earnings and less so on public assistance when compared to their metro counterparts; that there was a sharp rise over the period in reliance on public assistance, especially among nonmetro children, and a corresponding decline in reliance on earnings; that the ability of public assistance to ameliorate child poverty is modest; and that while the ameliorative effects are always greater in metro than nonmetro areas, this disparity declined over the 1980s owing partially to improvement in nonmetro areas.

Even though individuals generally become homeless after living in an impoverished but domiciled 'vulnerable' state, few quantitative investigations consider determinants of the decline from vulnerability. This leaves in question the rather common claim that personal deficits are direct determinants of the lack of a domicile. Using data on a sample from Chicago, the study tests whether homeless and vulnerable domiciled individuals are differentiated by three sets of deficits: alienation, disabilities, and occupational deficiencies. It also assesses whether the loss of a domicile reflects a lack of access to support offered by social institutions. Variables representing lack of access are found to be the best predictors, but certain deficits have limited importance in specific subsamples. The generally limited role of deficits, in turn, seems to occur because the most problem ridden adults are protected from homelessness and from vulnerability. Differentials across gender as well as previous homeless history are also noted and explained.

In this article we argue that current reform proposals coming from Robert Pinker and others are challenging the universalist premises of generic social work. Pinker et al. argue that social work should, for the sake of efficiency and performance, be a connected set of specialist activities. This 'determinate dispersal' which we recognise as falling within the remit of postmodern strategies, we contrast with the far more libertarian ideas of the noted post-modern theorist J.F. Lyotard. Thus we site the political and cultural meanings of Pinker's ideas between generic social work which upholds ideas of universal ethical values and universal provision, and those of Lyotard whose anti-foundationalism proposes a radically heterogeneous society with no central value-structure. We express our concern that the 'new specialist' remit may allow too much power to the social worker. Thus we have considerable sympathy for Lyotard's call for a radical anonistics - a field wherein the inequalities of power between say, a worker and her client, to some extent can be redressed.

This paper employs original survey data on female single parents in Boston to examine the determinants of welfare participation. Particular attention is paid to the hypothesis--growing out of the literature on the urban underclass--that there are important neighborhood effects. The results provide support for the existence of neighborhood effects. These effects remain after controls for the personal characteristics of the respondents and for the possible endogenaity of neighborhood choice. The study also provides support for an explanation in which neighborhood effects are a result of the level of resources, particularly resources related to the percent of family heads who work. There is less support for the influence of stigma attached to welfare.

The 'New Consensus' on welfare expresses the idea that the major problem in social welfare is dependency, not poverty. Much of the evidence for this perspective has come from trend line data indicating that over time poverty did not evaporate in the face of increases in social welfare spending. Using various measures of the 'dependent' poor, the empirical analysis presented suggests that reducing welfare expenditures relative to need does not produce less poverty and dependency.

A recent study looks at the economic well-being of women and children following an exit from AFDC The goal of many previous national welfare reform efforts has been to help [...]

A study was conducted to investigate the impact of neighborhood characteristics on the use of nutrition, health, and welfare programs. Hierarchical linear models are used in the study. Findings indicate that individual and perceived neighborhood disorder factors are related to social service use.

A study was conducted to present an argument for revisiting social work's relationship to public assistance in the wake of 10 years of welfare reform. Interventions that could impose service to the poor, both on and off cash relief, are suggested. The role of social work in promoting changes in welfare policy, program, and practice contexts is also tackled.

A grant from the University of North Carolina at Pembroke Committee on Faculty Development and special funds from the Office of the Chancellor funded this research. The findings were presented [...]

Harvard economist C. Fritz Foley analyzes the patterns in crime in 12 large U.S. cities where more than 10 percent of the population receives food stamps. In doing so, Foley [...]

Surveys were carried out in five Nordic countries in 1995-1996, with between 1,500 and 2,000 registered unemployed young people surveyed in each country. Receipt of unemployment benefits was linked to lower re-employment rates, controlling for other factors such as length of unemployment, but other factors were also linked to lower re-employment levels, such as financial problems. It was surprising that financial problems were linked to lower re-emploment levels, since this could be seen as an incentive to find work, and further research is needed in this area.

The extent to which levels of welfare receipt for immigrants and natives are sensitive to the use of household-, family- or individual units of analysis or presentation was studied using data from the 1990 and 1991 panels of the Survey of Income and Program Participation. Results showed that nativity differences are statistically significant only at the level of larger units. It was also shown that if immigrants and natives had identical living arrangements, immigrants' household-level receipt of Supplemental Security Income would exceed natives' receipt even more than it actually does.