Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gbm5v Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T21:35:07.020Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Marriage, Motherhood and Welfare Reform

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 April 2005

Jill Duerr Berrick
Jill Duerr Berrick
Affiliation:
School of Social Welfare, University of California at Berkeley E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In 1996, the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) was passed in the US, ushering in a series of reforms to the cash assistance programme previously available to poor families. ‘Welfare reform’ included a number of efforts to encourage work among unemployed single parents. More important, the law extended the government's interest in regulating social behaviours such as marriage and reproduction. This paper reviews states' efforts at developing programmes that encourage marriage and discourage child-bearing, then offers a review of the empirical evidence on the effectiveness of these approaches to date. Implications for the future of welfare reform are provided.

Type
Articles
Information
Social Policy and Society , Volume 4 , Issue 2 , April 2005 , pp. 133 - 145
Copyright
© Cambridge University Press 2005

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)