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Welfare Reform in Virginia: An Overview of Progress
How did welfare families in Virginia fare after the implementation of reforms designed to promote employment and responsible parenting? How did the welfare office staff adapt to these changes?
In 1997, Mathematica began an evaluation of welfare reform in Virginia, conducted jointly with Virginia Tech. Researchers studied the Virginia Independence Program (VIP) and the Virginia Initiative for Employment Not Welfare (VIEW) to measure the effect of the state's welfare reform policies.
The most recent report is the fourth in a series on what happens to families that reach TANF time limits in Virginia. It highlights the status of 1998, 1999, and 2000 families 18 months after their TANF cases closed.
Findings include:
- Nearly all time-limit parents worked, and most worked for more than half of the follow-up period. Despite low wages, their average hours, hourly wages, and total earnings increased over time.
- Incomes increased 12 percent between case closure and the 18-month interviews. Twenty percent reported an income above the poverty line.
- Families decreased their use of noncash assistance—such as food stamps, Medicaid, and child care subsidies. As of November 2002, 15 percent had returned to TANF.
- Eighty-three percent had health insurance coverage for their children, but just 45 percent had coverage for themselves.
- Time-limit families were long-term welfare recipients, most of whom had been receiving public assistance for more than five years when they exhausted their benefits. They were similar to other VIEW families in their areas, except that time-limit parents were somewhat older and had larger families than comparable VIEW participants.
The first, second, and third reports on time-limit families are also available. Previous reports highlight findings on the impacts of VIEW, early impacts of VIP and VIEW, and how leavers who did not reach time limits fared. To order a copy of the reports, please contact Jackie Allen.
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