Flat Broke with Children: Women in the Age of Welfare Reform

"A nation's laws reflect a nation's values," Sharon Hays announces in caps lock in the opening salvos of her 2003 book, Flat Broke with Children: Women in the Age of Welfare Reform, This thesis becomes the central theme of her study of two welfare offices in different regions of the United States, which details the consequences and implications of welfare reform. The Personal Responsibility Act, passed in 1996 during the height of the Clinton administration, resulted in sweeping changes in the welfare system and a reduction of over fifty percent of welfare enrollment rates.

Hays, a professor in the Department of Sociology and Women's Studies at the University of Virginia, spent just over three years in "Arbordale," a mid-sized Southeastern town, and "Sunbelt City," a large West-coast metropolis, conducting field research on welfare caseworkers, clients, and their families during the three years following the initial implementation of the first welfare reform act since the system's inception in 1935. During this time, she uncovered unsettling inconsistencies in policy and intention, and many impoverished families who suffered because of them.

My interpretation of the book is that welfare reform has had few successes and is a long-term failure, or rather, a disaster waiting to happen. Although intended to expedite recipients' return to the workforce, the end result has been that the mostly female welfare clients who have been put to work have done so only to be met with jobs that do not pay a sustainable wage and do not support their simultaneous roles as mothers and heads of household. While the number of people enrolled in the welfare program has declined dramatically, this can largely be attributed to the new system of penalties and restrictions that not only make it harder to get on welfare but make it more difficult to stay on it. This means that women have turned to illegal action, abusive domestic partners, or sometimes even "disappeared" in order to support themselves and their families.

The most important thing I learned is that the general public has assumed that welfare recipients are lazy, selfish cheats who have no work ethic or values. What Hays discovers is that these women do share our values. The primary reason why they cannot support their families is that they do want to work, to be married, and to raise a happy, healthy, family, but are burdened by a lack of education, a shortage of supportive, economically healthy partners, and overpriced and unreliable childcare. They are caught in a vicious cycle of poverty that hinders their progress towards achieving their family-centric goals, ones that we all share. They are all cognizant that they are perceived as drains on society, and they, like us, have externalized a fictional Other -the very few people who actually do cheat and milk the system- who can take the blame for the bad rap that welfare recipients receive. Two of the women she questioned even said they do not believe in abortion when asked if they had considered it before having children they could not support. Yet, it is all to convenient to dismiss welfare mothers and their poverty by saying it is their fault and their morals that have caused them hardship.

Essentially, the Act has epitomized the maxim that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Welfare reform has resulted in a few positive changes, such as an increase in funding to support offices and improve infrastructure; subsidized childcare; and funded some efficient education programs for job seekers. Yet, even these improvements highlight the contradictions between the principles and the consequences of reform: under-funded, under-regulated childcare; penalties for non-married women; and endangering the lives of the recipients and their families. What welfare reform boils down to is an imposition of middle-class realities on a poverty-stricken population that cannot sustain them. It has stripped this extremely needy population of their choices, and has declared our collective disregard for nurturing and caring for others. Work, according to welfare reform, has nothing to do with housekeeping and raising a family. Work is a paying job, no matter how low the wages, how horrid the conditions, or how high the price your family pays. Work, according to welfare reform, is the duty and obligation of each individual, and if you are unemployed and collecting benefits you had best make back into the workforce and make it quick.

A sociological study, Flat Broke is actually an easy and quick read. Unfortunately, some chapters seem repetitive and a bit redundant, although they do achieve the end result of driving the point home that welfare reform is having and will have long-lasting and far-reaching adverse effects on contemporary society. Although she mentions early on that over 90% of welfare recipients are mothers, it is not clear what percentage are men or childless women. Lastly, though the consequences of the feminization of poverty are nothing to dismiss, Hays sometimes betrays her professional, objective viewpoint by revealing her personal bias against welfare reform. I agree with her on her points and think they are very well-put, but it is unfortunate that she undermines her credentials by sneaking her views into the text.

Despite these shortcomings, Sharon Hays has written a compelling argument against the Personal Responsibility Act of 1996. It is evident enough six years later, during this tumultuous period of conflict, hope, and the prospect of change amid social, economic, and political upheaval, that the impact of welfare reform has been devastating to the increasing number of women and children living in desperate poverty. My greatest hope is that you will read it and also be inspired to act on their behalf.