What happened at the front lines of US welfare reform? Exploring the experiences of front-line implementers
| Date | 01 March 2018 |
| Published date | 01 March 2018 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0020852315596215 |
| Author | Hyunjoo Chang |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Review of
Administrative
Article
Sciences
International Review of
Administrative Sciences
2018, Vol. 84(1) 82–100
What happened at the front lines
! The Author(s) 2016
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DOI: 10.1177/0020852315596215
the experiences of front-line
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implementers
Hyunjoo Chang
Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, Republic of Korea
Abstract
This article aims to explore the story of the front-line implementation of US welfare
reform through analyzing the experiences of front-line workers with a grounded theory
approach. There were deep concerns about the working poor and unelaborated pro-
grams for economic independence, which were attributable to the legislation’s thrust to
work-first and a skill mismatch, without taking the quality of jobs into account. Welfare
roll reduction resulted in taking a generous approach to welfare clients on the front
lines. Although discretion resulted in the operation of more local initiatives on the front
lines, it was not a substantial response to the demands of the real lives of clients. This
article argues that the quality and sustainability of work is critical, prior to an emphasis
on work-first. Front-line implementation must shift to increasing employers’ willingness
to create incentives for skill-building and to giving clients some motivation to work.
Points for practitioners
A gap between policymaking and nonlinear policy implementation on the front lines is
inevitable as local demands vary. Particularly, perspectives of front-line implementers
are useful in reflecting various local demands and adjusting the different interests of
clients in the process of refining welfare reform in lieu of federal policymakers. Although
the discretion of front-line implementers is critical, less attention has been paid to how
they put welfare reform into practice and what they learned. Qualitative exploration of
such issues thus provides field-based evidence to improve its implementation to help
the clients, which has rarely been examined in the literature.
Keywords
front-line implementation, grounded theory, welfare reform
Corresponding author:
Hyunjoo Chang, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies–Public Administration, 107 Imun-ro, Dongdaemun-gu,
Seoul 130-791, Republic of Korea.
Email: hjchang@hufs.ac.kr
Chang
83
Introduction
The US welfare reform of 1996, which recasts an entitlement program, ‘Aid to
Families with Dependent Children’ (AFDC) as a block grant system, ‘Temporary
Assistance for Needy Families’ (TANF), added a new directive to reduce depend-
ence on public assistance (Gottschalk, 2005; Mead, 2007). The directive included a
time limit on the receipt of benefits and work requirements to promote employment
and changes in personal behavior to discourage welfare dependency (Riccucci
et al., 2004). Welfare reform also pursued improved economic self-sufficiency for
welfare recipients and enhanced parental responsibility to strengthen families
through work (Jennings and Ewalt, 2004). Thus, it changed the focus of welfare
from an entitlement program to a work-first approach that underlined the import-
ance of economic self-sufficiency.
Since its first reauthorization in 2002, however, the policy priority in many states
has moved from placing TANF clients into work to helping them retain jobs. Also,
the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 established an emergency
contingency fund for state TANF programs and expanded states’ flexibility in the
use of TANF funds carried over from one fiscal year to the next (US Department
of Health and Human Services, 2009).1 This effort was intended to give more
financial resources to states to support families during an economic downturn
period. These legislative efforts have caused front-line implementers to invest
more time and resources in job preparation, training, and education programs
designed to help the clients get more advanced job skills and increase intellectual
capabilities for job retention (Riccucci, 2005).
However, despite a plethora of research on its implementation, few studies have
taken up the questions of how welfare reform has affected the front lines of service
delivery and what front-line implementers have experienced from local practices.
Moreover, there has been little reliable information on what has happened to
people on welfare and people who left welfare to better help them make a transition
to work and support their families.
As welfare reform involves moving the TANF clients into stable local jobs, the
experiences and perspectives of front-line implementers are suitable for hearing a
real story about local practices from both programmatic and administrative stand-
points (Maynard-Moody and Musheno, 2000; Riccucci, 2005). In particular, a
careful examination of their views shows the importance of administrative discre-
tion in the achievement of policy goals (Meyers et al., 1998; Riccucci, 2005;
Riccucci et al., 2004; Sandfort, 2000). It would be useful to develop more elaborate
programs or to improve the implementation of local programs, in particular, job
training and employment programs for those on the welfare rolls or leaving
welfare.
This article explores the questions of how welfare reform has proceeded on the
front lines of service delivery and what the challenges are. To explore such ques-
tions, this article begins with a brief discussion about welfare reform and front-line
implementation, which partially includes the issue of the TANF clients’ employ-
ment on the front lines.2 It then reviews the grounded theory approach, a
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International Review of Administrative Sciences 84(1)
qualitative research framework, to draw conclusions via inductive reasoning with
the experiences of front-line implementers. The state of Pennsylvania was selected
because it has offered diverse policy contexts and experiences with the front-line
implementation of welfare-to-work programs under a state-administered system
since 1987, in which less devolution occurred. Based on its proximity to state
agencies and the administrative load of past welfare recipients, ‘A’ county was
selected to examine, in detail, how the TANF programs have been implemented
on the front lines. While this selection does not claim to represent all states, as an
explorative study, it offers a wide range of perspectives from the front lines.3 To
gain qualitative data, using theoretical sampling, this study interviewed front-line
workers who have worked for the TANF clients’ transition to the workforce.4
Welfare reform implementation: the front lines
Unlike entitlement programs, the 1996 welfare reform was seen as an unprece-
dented comprehensive policy reform that emphasized the values of work in ways
that changed the behavior of individuals and their motivation to work. A program-
matic change through TANF includes five-year time-limited benefits and work
requirements imposed for receiving benefits for the first 24 months in which
TANF clients must participate in work or work-related activities, such as skill-
building activities (Mead, 2007). Welfare reform legislation thus prohibits states
from using their block grants to provide benefits for adults who do not work after
receiving benefits for the first 24 months or who have reached their lifetime limit
(Jennings and Ewalt, 2004).
In fact, welfare reform has become a complex and varying experiment by state
and local administrations to translate TANF’s goals into operation. Before TANF,
federal AFDC regulations required state welfare agencies to have as their highest
priority minimizing eligibility errors and issuing benefits on a timely basis. Welfare
reform, however, has given substantial leeway to states to make their own spending
decisions to help welfare recipients leave welfare (Meyer et al., 2007). With the
flexibility, states can provide assistance to needy families, ensuring that their
families are cared for, and reduce the dependence of needy parents on benefits
by promoting a transition to employment and job-readiness (Riccucci et al.,
2004). This administrative change is considered to be a shift in the dominant pol-
itical mood in US society to reduce welfare rolls. In fact, welfare reform, remark-
ably, has increased the willingness of state and federal governments to decrease
welfare rolls by levying work requirements (Bartik, 1998). This is why Mead (2007)
asserted that welfare reform was a success for the federal government, but the
political mood and states’ choices made the effects of welfare reform on future
labor markets harder to predict because it resulted in an increased labor supply.
Likewise, welfare reform has taken up not only the question of whether it simply
reduced welfare rolls, but also the question of whether it inspired low-income adults
to seek greater financial security through ongoing investment in the development of
new work skills on the front lines. Much research has examined the effects of the
Chang
85
front-line practices on the clients, in particular, paying more attention to changes in
the labor market-related characteristics of the clients, such as jobs or wage levels.
Prior studies have taken account of a ‘displacement effect’, in which the large inflow
of new entrants into the low-wage labor market could also reduce their wage levels in
the long run (Bartik, 1998; Matsudaira and Blank, 2014). Thus, TANF clients
entering the workforce are likely to compete for low-skill jobs with other job-seekers
who have similar...
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