Welfare to work: analysis and recommendations.

Policymakers have long hoped to find ways to buffer children from the ravages of poverty without excusing parents from the responsibility of providing for their offspring. For 60 years, the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program guaranteed cash assistance for poor single-parent families, allowing the mothers to remain home with their children. In 1993, federal and state governments spent $22.3 billion on AFDC benefits to about 5 million families, reaching 9.5 million children. In recent years, however, frustration with the welfare program has escalated, and the faces of the children who depend on welfare have faded into the background.