Explaining Welfare Benefits in the South: A Regional Analysis
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.15763/issn.2374-7781.2007.28.0.1-18Abstract
This paper examines the choices made by states in the implementation of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996. Commonly known as TANF, the legislation gives states substantial control over the choices of benefits and sanctions they impose on program recipients. Using the models and theoretical explanations offered by Soss et al. (2001) and tested in a 49-state model, we test the degree to which these explanations hold when applied to a regional analysis of southern states. We find that the southern states are similar to the rest of the country when it comes to setting TANF benefit choices, although social control explanations are more important for southern states than for the rest of the nation.References
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