Exploring Geographic Disparities in the State Social Safety Nets in the Post-Welfare Reform Era
The US social safety net has been characterized as a patchwork of categorical programs with different target populations, eligibility criteria, and social provisions. The historical decentralized feature for key programs contributes to considerable differences in state safety nets. Substantial scholarly attention has paid to the devolution revolution after the welfare reform. Additionally, emerging studies have investigated the responsiveness of state safety nets to the recent Great Recession (2007-2009). However, the existing literature has been limited by short time-periods and by small ranges of programs. This research aims to conduct a longitudinal, comparative analysis of multiple programs across fifty states in the past two decades (1994-2011). We raised and answered three research questions: (1) how did social safety nets vary across states? (2) What were the characteristics of distinct state clusters over time? (3) Did states have similar patterns of changes in characteristics of their social safety nets?
Method
The data source of our research is the State Safety Net Policy dataset (SSNP), which collects repeated measures of two policy indicators, inclusiveness and adequacy of public supports for lower-income families, across ten federal-state programs and fifty states. All measures were constructed by using data from published sources, primarily government agencies. Measures of inclusiveness estimate how well each program is accessible to the needy population. Measures of adequacy capture how much beneficiaries of each program receive on average, adjusted for both inflation and cost-of-living differences. Cluster analysis, a subject-centered multivariate analysis, was performed to group states with similarities. A total of twenty policy characteristics (inclusiveness and adequacy for ten programs) of forty-eight contiguous states from 1994 through 2011 were used to conduct a pooled cluster analysis. Hierarchical clustering approach and the Ward’s method were adopted. Clusters were laid out by using ArcGIS mapping tool to examine the geographic distribution of state clusters.
Findings
Four distinct state clusters of social safety nets over time were identified. States in the first cluster, mainly northeastern states, scored higher in inclusiveness and adequacy for highly decentralized in-cash programs. On the contrary, states in the second cluster, mainly southern states, were characterized as low generosity for UI and TANF but relatively high adequacy for food assistance. States in the third clusters, concentrated in Midwestern area, scored higher in inclusiveness for in-kind programs such as health insurance, food assistance, and early childhood education over time. States in the fourth cluster, mainly southwestern states, on average had lower levels of inclusiveness. These clusters were relatively stable in the past two decades (about three-fourths states remaining in the same cluster).
Conclusions and Implications
This study concludes that state social safety nets substantially and continuously varied by geographic areas over time. As a result of the fragmented and decentralized social provisions, working-age adults and children across states in different geographic areas have unequally accessed to a small subset of social safety net programs. Policy makers and social work practitioners should make efforts to pursue accessible, adequate, equable, and coordinated safety nets at both state and federal levels.