View Research by Author - Keith Watson

Citation URL: http://www.urban.org/KeithWatson

This brief focuses on how current state welfare programs, food stamps, the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), and tax payments affect a low-income mother's financial incentives to work. The central finding is that work pays.

This analysis finds that working 20 hours per week at minimum wage increases income by an average of 50 percent over cash assistance in the 12 states studied. Public Policy contributes much to making work pay. The interaction of programs such as the Earned Income Tax Credit, and state decisions on cash benefits, earnings disregards, Food Stamps, access to child care, and health insurance create powerful economic incentives to work.

The state-by-state descriptions of cash assistance programs show that states have used the flexibility TANF granted to take very different approaches to major decisions surrounding welfare reform in areas such as program eligibility and benefits, time limits, and work requirements. Easy-to-read charts simplify making cross-state comparisons on many features of state welfare reform plans. These include asset limits, income eligibility limits, diversion assistance payments, eligibility of two-parent families, time limits, exemptions to time limits, extensions of time limits, work sanctions, work exemptions, work requirement time limits, benefit amounts, earnings disregards, family caps, and child-support pass-throughs. Especially hospitals, to continue to provide care to the uninsured. Nine findings relating to changes to Medicaid, HIPAA, employer-sponsored coverage, and long-term care dominate the study's portrait of state health policy.

This report describes some of the state legislation proposed or enacted in 1995 and 1996 designed to shift program funding or administrative responsibilities from states to localities. The paper also examines the extent to which such devolution took place in the areas of social services, public assistance, and workforce development.

This report presents estimates of how the major income security changed proposed by H.R. 3734 would affect family incomes. Such welfare reform legislation is designed to decrease dependency on government assistance and to shift more responsibility for social programs to states. The analysis, based upon the Urban Institute's TRIM2 microsimulation model, compares how families would fare under the new rules compared to current program rules, making reasonable assumptions about how program changes will affect behavior.

This study estimates the size and characteristics of the potential homeowner market and examines the relative default risks associated with expanded homeownership among lower-income, "underserved" households.

This paper examines how a budget reconciliation bill under the Balanced Budget Act of 1995 would affect social welfare programs, taxes, and family income by using the Urban Institute's TRIM2 microsimulation model. Topics covered include (1) how current government programs assist families; (2) how the reconciliation bill would affect families; (3) the aggregate effects of changes in government spending and taxes; (4) effects on total family income; and (5) effects on poverty. The study does not consider the bill's proposed changes in government health programs nor does it include the effects of reductions in capital gains taxes.

To examine the relationship between enrollment in Medicaid and employment, this report uses longitudinal data from the 1990 Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP). These data allowed examination of individuals' concurrent work and Medicaid status over the course year. The analysis focused on the extent to which individuals enrolled in Medicaid moved into work, the relationship between this transition (or lack thereof) and Medicaid enrollees' characteristics, and the characteristics of work for those who made the transition. Also studied were the characteristics that distinguish individuals with long-term dependence on public health insurance from those with only short-term needs.

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