Welfare Reform: A Race to the Bottom? - Softcover

9780943875934: Welfare Reform: A Race to the Bottom?

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0943875935 ISBN 13: 9780943875934

Publisher: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 1999

This timely collection presents research contributing to the ongoing debate over welfare reform in the 1990s, especially since the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996. Some chapters argue that the law will lead states to restrict benefits out of fear of becoming "welfare magnets." Other chapters assert that no such shift is taking place. Still others point to evidence that states are experimenting and serving as "laboratories of democracy." And others suggest that none of these positions captures the complexities of welfare reform. The work behind several contributions supported arguments (on either side) in a Supreme Court case about welfare argued in January 1999.

Contributors are professionals in government and political science, sociology, social work, and public administration. They are Sanford F. Schram, Samuel H. Beer, Mark Carl Rom, Paul E. Peterson, Kenneth F. Scheve, Jr., Frances Fox Piven, Margaret Weir, Scott W. Allard, Joe Soss, Irene Lurie, Thomas Vartanian, Jim Baumohl, Richard P. Nathan, Thomas L. Gais, Karen A. Curtis, Jocelyn M. Johnston, Kara Lindaman, Richard M. Francis, Saundra K. Schneider, Barbara Gault, Heidi Hartmann, and Hsiao-Ye Yi.

Most chapters were prepared for a conference at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and published as a special edition of the journal Publius. They have been supplemented by two new chapters, a new introduction by Sanford F. Schram, and an index.

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About the Author:

Sanford F. Schram is a visiting professor in the Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research at Bryn Mawr College. Samuel H. Beer is Eaton Professor of the Science of Government, Emeritus, Harvard University.

Review:

These essays provide valuable information on the strategies used by different states to accomplish the goal of moving low income families from welfare to work. The overwhelming lesson for this reader is how quickly the structural factors that lead to pverty are overshadowed by bureaucratic concerns.

(Nancy Naples Journal of Progressive Human Services)

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