ABSTRACT
Nothing could be more straightforward than to ask whether welfare programs benefit children. Yet once this question has been posed, it becomes necessary to think about how benefits should be measured. 8 This chapter discusses some common measures of child well-being. The multiplicity of measures stems from the fact that well-being is a multi-dimensional concept and raises another difficulty: What is the most appropriate measure of the effect of a program like AFDC, for example? Or, granting that health status is the best measure of the effect of the Medicaid program, what is the best measure of a child’s health status? In the absence of hard answers to these questions, the best strategy is likely to involve examining a broad range of outcomes.
