WASHINGTON — Ask the average American who is not on welfare to describe the average American who is, and the response is likely to be more wrong than it is right: a black unmarried teen-ager in the inner city who has lots of children and no desire to get a job.
There certainly are many on public assistance who fit this profile. But there are just as many--in fact, more--who do not.
The typical welfare recipient is white, has fewer than two children, often lives in a rural area or "mixed" income neighborhood--not a ghetto--and wants to work, welfare experts say. Moreover, there are many mothers who could qualify for help and, for various reasons--including the difficulty of dealing with the welfare system and the social stigma attached to it--are not even on the rolls.
"I think people have the capacity to hold surprisingly inconsistent views about women on welfare," said Julie Wilson, a social policy expert at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government. "Many will tell you that a welfare mother probably is not too smart and not too skilled. At the same time, they will also tell you they believe she really could get a job and is clever enough to cheat the system. I think that's the image in a lot of people's minds."
It is this disparity between the myths--which are fueled by political rhetoric--and the reality that has helped cripple efforts to reform a system that virtually all sides agree is broken. And whether the tough proposals currently being drafted actually succeed rests to a large degree on how well these new approaches accommodate the complex realities.
When most people talk about "welfare," they usually mean Aid to Families With Dependent Children, a cash assistance program for single, poor mothers. But AFDC is only one piece in a hodgepodge of public assistance programs for the needy--among them food stamps, Medicaid, housing subsidies, education grants, long-term care for the elderly and aid to those with physical disabilities. Most women on AFDC also get food stamps and Medicaid.
Broadly defined, the welfare system includes any government assistance program where eligibility is determined by financial need. These programs total about $245 billion in annual federal spending, with additional money from state and local governments. The federal government spends about $16 billion for AFDC, roughly 1% of the federal budget.
AFDC, which has become the main focus of attention, was created during the Depression to enable women not to work. The idea was to make it easier for World War I widows and others who had lost their husbands to stay at home and raise their children.
Since then, the role of women in the work force has undergone a significant transformation--as have other factors in American society--gradually pushing the system out of sync.
The percentage of women in the labor market has jumped; from 1950 to 1992, women in the work force with children younger than 6 rose from 14% to 58%.
Many middle- and working-class mothers can no longer afford to stay home, even those from two-parent households. Moreover, if a woman today can hold a job, she is expected to. This is one of several attitudes that form the underpinnings of current popular thinking about welfare recipients, experts say.
"Today, many women work because they need the money. And in many two-parent families, you need both parents to work--and the idea that they are paying money for other people to stay home with their kids is irritating to them," Wilson said.
Other changes in American society also have effected the welfare program. While the number of children in the United States was about the same in 1991 as in 1960, the percentage of children living with a single parent increased from 9% to 26%. Indeed, most children born today will spend some time in a single-parent family, according to government figures.
And the number of unmarried women having babies has risen dramatically.
"The birth rate hasn't gone up as much as the marriage rate has gone down," Wilson said. "In the old days, unwed teen-age mothers gave away their children for adoption or got married--remember shotgun weddings when you made the girl 'honest?' . . . This is no longer true, and the debate is about illegitimacy."
Thus, the welfare system finds itself under intense pressure to deal with this trend rather than to financially support it. Leading alternatives range from the punitive--withholding benefits from these young mothers--to the more positive--offering alternatives.
Young girls who don't get pregnant tend to "have some belief they are going somewhere," said one expert who requested anonymity. "They have some hope for the future, and there are some realistic expectations for them not to do this or put it off for a few years. Find a way to give them this expectation and I think it would be the most powerful way to reduce adolescent pregnancy."
