How Bill Clinton slashed social welfare

Bill Clinton and his right wing Democratic allies launched a major attack on social welfare in the mid-1990s. Here are some of the results:  

Center on Budget & Policy Priorities  As conservative policymakers advocate for changes in the nation's safety net in the coming years, they may tout the "success" of the 1996 welfare reform. The reality, however, is that welfare reform is not the success that some proclaim. The Temporary Assistance for Needy Families Program, which was the cornerstone of the 1996 reforms, provides a temporary safety net to few families who are poor and may have no other means to meet their family's basic needs. This is a weaker safety net: welfare reform has put poor families -- and especially their children -- at risk of much greater hardship with the potential for long-term negative consequences, and TANF does little to connect families to work.

In 2013, for every 100 families in poverty, only 26 received cash benefits from TANF. This is down from the 68 families for every 100 in poverty that received cash assistance when TANF was first enacted in 1996. This ratio, which we call the TANF-to-poverty ratio, has declined nearly every year since 1996 and reached its low point of 25 in 2012.