"But whatever has happened hasn't happened in massive numbers," said Harry Holzer, a professor of public policy at Georgetown University. "Part of that may be due to the fact that so far, the recession has been relatively mild."
Even the bleak job market has been easy on welfare reform. Low-paying jobs have weathered the downturn better than others.
In Chicago, with an unemployment rate of 8.1% in January compared with the national level of 5.8%, many welfare recipients are still moving into low-rung jobs as home health-care workers, day-care providers and janitors. At the bottom of the ladder there is opportunity to climb.
"I came in as a cashier in April," Burkes said. "In three months I became an assistant manager, and in three more months I became the manager."
Ten people report to her, and she has hired other former welfare recipients. "I snatched my sister off welfare and gave her a job," Burkes said with a smile. "My sister-in-law too."
Burkes' children, ages 7 to 11, also enjoy their mother's success. "They can't wait until payday; that's when they get their allowance," Burkes said.
Nationwide, never-married mothers such as Burkes -- the group that had most commonly relied on welfare -- have flocked into the workplace. Only 47% of such women were employed in 1994, according an analysis of census data by the nonpartisan Urban Institute. By 2000, 69% had jobs, a figure that dropped slightly, to 68%, in 2002.
"We haven't seen the kind of drop-off [in employment] that people were most worried about, and that seems to be reflected in the welfare rolls themselves not jumping up dramatically," said Robert Lerman, an economist at the Urban Institute and American University in Washington.
One reason: People who were long-term welfare recipients in 1996 have become connected to the workforce. Some remain with their original employers and are promoted; some lose their first jobs but find others.
Rita Flowers, who like Burkes lives on Chicago's impoverished west side, used to personify the dependency Congress sought to break when it overhauled benefits. She had received welfare for 16 years, had six children, and couldn't imagine life without public aid.
But four years ago, she started working as a child-care provider for $5.20 an hour. Now she's a head teacher at her day-care center, earning $1,054 every two weeks, about $13.20 an hour.
