MDRC How-To Guide: Making Work Pay
April 2003 MDRC How-To Guide: Making Work Pay In the 1990s, welfare reform rose to the top of the policy agenda. The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 created a federal block grant to fund state welfare programs, established stricter work requirements, and placed a 60-month lifetime limit on the use of federal funds for cash benefits to welfare recipients. Although welfare rolls nationwide decreased sharply after 1996, many families who moved from welfare to work left for low wage jobs and remained in poverty. In other words, states succeeded at increasing employment among welfare . . .
