ABSTRACT
Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) has been abolished. The new welfare program created by the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA)—now called Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF)—has stiff work requirements and enforces these requirements with time limits. Not surprisingly, the current welfare reform is being hailed as “new,” a fundamental change. Welfare is no longer an entitlement. Instead of a lifetime on welfare, recipients will have to work, and welfare will be available only for relatively short periods of time. In some respects, this is a sharp departure: never before have there been legislatively determined time limits. But in a fundamental sense-the emphasis on work rather than welfare-the current reform is as old as welfare history. The great dividing line in U.S. welfare policy is between the “deserving poor” and “undeserving poor.” The former are excused from the paid labor force; the latter are not. From the days of the colonies until postWorld War II, most single, poor mothers were not on welfare; thus they were considered part of the paid labor force. It is only since the late 1950s and early 1960s that significant numbers have received welfare, and, as will be discussed shortly, when they finally did receive welfare, they were still subject to work requirements.
