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January 11, 2024

To Better Promote Work, Stop Subsidizing More Benefit Collection

Never shy about lampooning government dysfunction, Ronald Reagan famously said that if you want more of something, subsidize it. But even the Gipper couldn’t have imagined today’s growing zeal to subsidize…

July 26, 2023

How Worker Benefits Turn into Welfare

The disparity between what the federal government collects in taxes and what it spends was never greater than during the pandemic, when annual deficits peaked at $3.1 trillion in 2020. Even today,…

June 27, 2023

House Republican Plan Penalizes Marriage

If there was something liberals used to hate most about welfare reform, it was policies that promoted more work and smaller welfare caseloads. For example, during debate about 1996 reforms, Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun (D-IL) asked what would happen to families if…

June 14, 2023

Why Behavioral Requirements Are Vital to Welfare Programs

Just as the welfare-to-work policies of the Clinton administration jump-started a remarkable improvement in the lives of black women, work requirements, such as those included in the recent debt ceiling bill , have proven…

May 3, 2023

Work-for-Welfare Gains Traction Among Republicans

Last week, U.S. House Republicans included expanded work requirements for Medicaid, food stamps, and cash welfare benefits in their legislation to extend the federal debt limit. As employers continue to struggle to find workers, states,…

June 15, 2022

Second Time’s the Charm?

Early last year, Senator Mitt Romney proposed a new approach to family policy that exposed some significant rifts among right-leaning policy wonks who care about fighting poverty and supporting family formation….