The Subsidized and Transitional Employment Demonstration: Cost Analysis of the STEP Forward Program

This Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation report examines San Francisco’s STEP Forward program, which targeted diverse low-income job seekers including CalWORKs (California’s Temporary Assistance for Needy Families Program) or CalFresh (California’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) recipients, or individuals who have exhausted unemployment insurance benefits. This paper describes a random assignment evaluation of 837 adults – those with access to STEP Forward services and a control group without access to STEP Forward services but to other services. First-year costs of the program for job readiness services and subsidies were evaluated.