US House Ways and Means Panel
Continues Discussion on Welfare Reform
“(The) hearing was an opportunity to engage face-to-face with those who administer welfare programs and solicit input on how we can improve the programs to better care for the working poor,” Reed said. “Welfare assistance programs are not required, nor designed, to work with one another and this presents a burden on the whole system and is not fair to recipients or taxpayers. With over 80 federal programs working independently from one another, there is a clear need to communicate and coordinate among programs.”
The hearing, titled “Improving the Safety Net: Better Coordinating Today’s Maze of Programs to Ensure Families Receive Real Help,” examined how states have used flexibility in the past in testing to determine what approaches are successful in helping families out of poverty and which practices are inefficient.
“What we’re hearing is the more flexibility states have to test out policies – whether it’s workforce development, job training, or utilizing programs with timelines – the better equipped these programs are to lift individuals and families from poverty,” Reed continued. “If we can help lift people from poverty and give them the skills they need to prosper, we all benefit.”
In June, the Ways and Means Subcommittee on Human Resources kicked off a welfare reform hearing series. The first hearing focused on how the current system of welfare programs is fragmented, failing to provide effective help to those in need. In the second hearing, witnesses testified that welfare programs have not been regularly evaluated. Wednesday's hearing was third in the series.
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