Gender-Specific Barriers to Self-Sufficiency Among Former Welfare Beneficiaries

Purpose: The primary goals of the 1996 welfare reform movement were to reduce welfare dependence and motivate welfare-reliant individuals toward greater economic and material self-sufficiency. In reality, these policy changes resulted in a significant proportion of welfare leavers reporting increased economic and material hardship; few were able to achieve any significant level of self-sufficiency. As a special population of welfare leavers, many former Supplemental Security Income drug addiction and alcoholism beneficiaries also reported compromised economic security following the loss of public assistance. This population, similar to welfare beneficiaries that have been forced to leave other public assistance programs (TANF), faced many barriers to successfully transitioning from welfare to work, acquiring adequate income, and achieving any appreciable level of self-sufficiency. The purpose of this study was to identify and compare gender-specific barriers to economic self-sufficiency for this population of welfare leavers.

Methods: An analysis of former SSI DA&A beneficiaries in the San Francisco Bay Area was conducted to examine the impact losing SSI benefits had on low-income men and women. A panel of 219 former SSI DA&A beneficiaries who were unable to requalify for SSI benefits following the policy change was surveyed at six time points (baseline, and 6-, 12-, 18-, 24-, and 42-month follow-up) to assess changes in multiple domains, including alcohol and drug use, physical and mental health, housing, income, employment, and social support. Generalized Estimating Equations using a logistic link and a binominal distribution were used to examine the barriers to economic self-sufficiency over time for this population. Models were then stratified by gender to estimate the effects for men and women.

Results: Results indicated that access to transportation, good health, and time were the strongest predictors of achieving self-sufficiency for both men and women that were forced to leave SSI. Work history predicted positive outcomes for men, but not for women; job training did not predict higher rates of self-sufficiency for either group. Male study participants that reported a serious mental health symptom were less likely to achieve self-sufficiency; however, this was not a significant factor for women in this population. Conversely, education was a very strong predictor of achieving self-sufficiency for women, but not for men. Female study participants who reported having experienced domestic violence were 33% less likely to achieve self-sufficiency than women who had not experienced it. Substance abuse, as well as substance abuse and mental health treatment were not significant predictors of achieving self-sufficiency among former SSI DA&A beneficiaries.

Conclusions: Welfare reform legislation was intended to promote personal responsibility and help low-income individuals achieve self-sufficiency. The findings in this study support previous research on barriers to self-sufficiency among women leaving the welfare system, as well as some insight into the issues that low-income men face transitioning off of public assistance. These findings have implications for welfare-to-work administrators and future social welfare policymaking.