Idaho Welfare Reform Hurts Poor, Critics Say Tufts Study States Idaho’s Program Worst In Nation

Two advocacy groups criticized Idaho lawmakers on Thursday for policy decisions that further aggravate what they claim is a welfare reform program that threatens the economic security of the poor.

The groups said the result is that Idaho’s poor are more at risk from welfare reform than any other have-nots in the nation.

“The challenge in designing welfare and poverty programs that fit the Idaho context is less one of motivating and encouraging the parents in poor families to enter the work force than one of enhancing the ability of those parents to increase their earnings from work,” according to the report of the Idaho Hunger Action Council and United Vision for Idaho.

The report cited a recent Tufts University study that rated Idaho’s welfare program the worst in the nation in terms of helping improve a beneficiary’s financial situation. To a great extent that was because of Idaho’s two-year lifetime limit on cash assistance and the extremely low assistance level, coupled with no job-training or education initiatives for welfare recipients.

But the report also underscored the fact that 75 percent of Idaho’s poor families with children get half or more of their income from work, two-thirds of those parents have at least a high school education and in over half those families both parents are in the home.

In rural Idaho, spokesmen pointed out, it can be extremely difficult for anyone - on or off welfare - to find work even in Idaho’s steadily growing economy.

What is needed, the report said, is increased job training and education, and access to subsidized child care and medical coverage. Also needed are jobs with better earning power than the traditionally low-paying service sector jobs that account for most of Idaho’s employment growth.

The report echoes statements state Health and Welfare Director Linda Caballero made last month to lawmakers disconcerted that welfare reform has not slashed millions of dollars from the state budget.