- 2014-12-01 (x)
- Hospitals, Chronic Disease -- statistics & numerical data -- Ohio -- Cleveland (x)
- Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (x)
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Show moreIn August, 1996 the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act was signed into law. The Act limited Food Stamp benefits to able bodied adults without dependents (ABAWD) to three months in a 36-month period unless they work at least 20 hours per week or participate in certain volunteer work or training programs. At the request of Cuyahoga County's Department of Health and Nutrition, the Center on Urban Poverty and Social Change conducted a follow-up study of Cuyahoga County's ABAWDs following the introduction of a time limit on their benefits. This study was undertaken to estimate how many recipients actually met time limits and to determine how they coped with this change. For example, did the loss of benefits affect recipients' ability to obtain food, their living arrangements, health, and job seeking efforts? In addition, the study attempted to measure earnings and employment among ABAWD Food Stamp recipients. Both administrative data and survey data were used for this analysis.
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Show moreThis analysis of the retention of food stamps and Medicaid draws upon an ongoing, longitudinal study of families leaving cash assistance in Cuyahoga County. Each quarter, beginning in quarter 4, 1998, all families who leave cash assistance for at least 2 months are identified from agency records (this identification of quarterly exit cohorts will continue through quarter 4, 2000.) Each exit cohort is tracked for thirteen months. For this study, an exiter is defined as an assistance group whose OWF cash assistance case was open for at least 1 month and then closed for at least 2 consecutive months. The assistance group must have at least one adult over the age of 18 and all members of the assistance group must exit and not transfer to a new assistance group in the two-month period. The month of exit is the first month in which the assistance group does not receive an OWF check. Administrative records containing information on monthly welfare benefits (including case closing codes) and quarterly employment and earnings are compiled for all of the exiters for the year prior to and following the exit.
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Show moreThe Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 is the culmination of recent efforts to convert welfare from an entitlement program to a reciprocal obligation between government and recipient, in which the recipient must work in return for benefits. In addition to the federal legislation, many states are experimenting with similar and related reforms. All programs require that current welfare clients ultimately make the transition into the labor force. However, very little is known about the ability of the local labor market to fully absorb those who reach their welfare time limits. At the local level, policy makers will need to dramatically increase the scale of job search assistance, training, and possibly public employment. 1 As we move toward full implementation of welfare reform and the first welfare recipients reach their time limits, local labor markets may exhibit either short- or long-term unemployment. A spatial disconnect between inner-city welfare recipients who depend on public transportation and the increasing suburbanization of job opportunities may limit the labor market potential of some populations. Little comprehensive local labor market information is available to policy makers trying to assess local options and constraints. The Center on Urban Poverty and Social Change at Case Western Reserve University has developed extensive data relevant to these and other questions related to the implementation of welfare reform. This article describes efforts to develop a local labor market information system to assess the local labor market effects of welfare reform. The focus is on the Cleveland-Akron Consolidated Metropolitan Statistical Area (CMSA) as an example of how this information can be assembled and used for policy analysis and program planning and implementation at the local level.
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