Housing Assistance and the Effects of Welfare
Reform
Evidence from Connecticut and Minnesota
The fact that many of the people living in public or other
government-subsidized housing are also welfare recipients
means that the progress that those tenants make toward self
sufficiency may be substantially influenced by the performance
of mainstream (that is, non-housing) welfare-to-work programs
and policies. Conversely, the fact that many welfare recipients
receive government housing assistance (over 30 percent nationally,
but much higher in some cities) means that the responses of
subsidized tenants may influence the overall accomplishments
of welfare reform initiatives. Only recently, however, have
studies begun to explore the relationship between housing
status and the effectiveness of welfare policies. A better
understanding of this relationship may be important to continued
efforts to increase economic self -sufficiency in both the
assisted housing and the welfare policy arenas.
This study, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Housing and
Urban Development (HUD), adds to a small but growing body
of literature on this topic. It focuses on the following key
questions:
- Are the welfare recipients who receive housing assistance
a harder-to employ group than the recipients who do not
receive housing subsidies?
- Are the welfare reform initiatives any more effective
or less effective for welfare recipients who receive housing
assistance than for those who do not?
- Does the effectiveness of the welfare reform initiatives
vary for recipients who receive different types of housing
subsidies?
- Is there a statistical relationship between receipt of
housing assistance for welfare recipients and subsequent
success in the labor market?
To answer these and other questions, the study uses data
from two random assignment welfare reform experiments for
which reasonably complete housing data are available: the
Connecticut Jobs First program (Jobs First) and the Minnesota
Family Investment Program (MFIP). These initiatives sought
to increase self-sufficiency among recipients of cash assistance
under the federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families
(TANF) program, which in 1996 replaced Aid to Families with
Dependent Children (AFDC). Although the two initiatives differ
in important ways, together they encompass a broad array of
policy-relevant innovations, including employment services,
participation mandates, financial incentives to work, and
welfare time limits. This study combines self-reported information
provided by individuals when they entered these studies with
data from HUD’s own administrative records in order
to classify the sample members according to their housing
status.
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