At a Glance

Funder:

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Secretary, Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation

Project Time Frame:

1998-2004

National Evaluation of the Welfare-to-Work Grants Program

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program it created, made moving people from welfare to work a primary goal of federal welfare policy. The Balanced Budget Act of 1997 furthered this goal, authorizing the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) to award $3 billion in welfare-to-work grants to states and local communities to promote job opportunities and employment preparation for the hardest-to-employ recipients of TANF and for noncustodial parents of children on TANF. Grants were awarded directly by DOL on a competitive basis to local communities with innovative welfare-to-work approaches, and through states, on a formula basis, to the Private Industry Councils or equivalent bodies in all JTPA service delivery areas.

The law instructed the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) to evaluate the effectiveness of welfare-to-work (WtW) initiatives, including those undertaken by formula and competitive grantees and by American Indian and Alaska Native tribal organizations. DHHS, in conjunction with the Departments of Labor and Housing and Urban Development, designed an evaluation to address five key questions:

What are the types and packages of services provided by WtW grantees? How do they compare to services already available under TANF or JTPA funding?
What are the net impacts of various WtW program approaches on employment and on families’ well-being?
What challenges are confronted as grantees implement and operate WtW programs?
Do the benefits of WtW programs outweigh their costs?
How well do Private Industry Councils and other non-TANF organizations—the primary vehicles for funding and operating WtW programs—meet the challenge of implementing WtW programs for the hardest-to-employ?

In August 1998, DHHS awarded a contract for the evaluation to Mathematica and its subcontractors, the Urban Institute and Support Services International, Inc.

Components of the Welfare-to-Work Evaluation

The evaluation included three main components:

A Descriptive Assessment of All WtW Grantees. A mail survey of all formula and competitive grantees, in 1998 and 1999, provided an overview of program designs and activities, target populations, characteristics of participants, and, to the extent available, placement outcomes. Visits to several dozen grantees helped to develop a fuller understanding of program variations, and to select in-depth study sites.
In-Depth Process and Implementation Study. In 1999-2000, site visits were conducted in 12 grantee sites, selected because of their innovative approaches, settings, or target groups, or because they were typical of the most common WtW interventions. These visits included discussions with staff of WtW programs and related agencies, focus groups with participants, and program observation. The study identified implementation issues and challenges, and provided program details. A separate study was also conducted of program implementation by Native American and Alaska Native WtW grantees, documenting tribal welfare and employment systems, the supportive services they provide, and how tribes integrate funds from various sources to move their members from welfare to work.
Program Cost Analysis. In the in-depth study sites, the study documented total program costs and participant costs by service category and by service locations.
Outcome Study. Originally planned studies of program impacts had to be dropped from the study, because potential impact study sites were generally undersubscribed. In the strong economy and labor market that prevailed, major WtW programs had to recruit just to make use of their service capacity, and there was little prospect for identifying sites where there was enough “excess demand” for WtW services to support creation of a control group. Instead, therefore, a study was conducted of enrollee employment outcomes, using follow-up data collected through surveys and administrative data.

The final report presented descriptive findings of enrollees during the two years after they entered a welfare-to-work program. Most were TANF recipients with significant barriers to employment; although most were employed at some time during the study, many faced employment problems at the end of that period, and the jobs they held often left them in poverty. Whether a more comprehensive approach would produce better results is unclear, but the report presents design and implementation factors for programs to consider.

Publications

Family Support Topics