Child care is an important work support for parents, but also a critical venue for child development. The Urban Institute authored this report, which is a result of a multi-year qualitative study of families and communities looking at how low-income parents view the child care supply, find child care options, and have barriers to accessing care. Barriers cited include nonstandard employment schedules, inflexible employers, and unreliable transportation options. Authors conclude with recommendations for how to help promote child care choices for working parents.

This study evaluates the initial implementation of the Couples Employment (CE) project in Baltimore, Maryland, a voluntary intervention to simultaneously address employment, financial literacy, and relationship issues, to capitalize on the ways that success in each might affect the other. Initial experiences highlighted the importance of defining a program model integrating family stability and economic success; identifying a strong program director; achieving an appropriate staff mix; and maintaining a focus on couples. (author abstract)

From the Congressional Research Service (CRS), this report provides names and contact information for CRS experts on policy concerns relating to economic recovery and job losses, preservation, and creation. Policy areas identified include factors shaping the slowdown; broad policy options: coordination and tradeoffs; stimulus proposals: size, composition, and timing; and mortgage market support.

On March 13-14, 2012, the Office of Family Assistance (OFA) convened the Promising Pathways Initiative Innovation Institute in Washington, DC. The Promising Pathways Initiative provides technical assistance to state and local TANF programs and nonprofit organizations to promote successful outcomes for low-income families, and seeks to address the knowledge needs of the TANF field through an evidence-informed practice approach. The Initiative is grounded in the research on evidence-based practices. The Promising Pathways Initiative supported ten selected sites from the ten OFA Regions by building capacity of the sites to identify practice and program components; develop and document evidence; and articulate the resulting “story” about the effectiveness of the program or practice. The Innovation Institute focused on capacity-building for evidence-informed practice through identifying and sharing innovative approaches to service delivery for TANF families and low-income populations. Nine of the ten Promising Pathways sites from Regions I through X participated in the Institute. The goals of the Institute were to: (1) Provide cross-site networking between Promising Pathways sites leading to increased capacity to implement evidence-informed practice; (2) Provide interaction and dialogue between Promising Pathways sites surrounding innovative approaches and supportive technical assistance resulting from participation in the Promising Pathways Initiative; and (3) Discuss and examine processes and tools that can be institutionalized in Promising Pathways sites to support sustainable evidence-informed programming for TANF and low-income populations.

This report uses meta-analysis, a set of statistically based techniques for combining  quantitative findings from different studies, to synthesize estimates of program effects from  random assignment evaluations of welfare-to-work programs and to explore the factors that best explain differences in the programs' performance. The analysis is based on data extracted from the published evaluation reports and from official sources.  All the programs included in the analysis targeted recipients of Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC; now called Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, TANF).  The objective of the analysis is to establish the principal characteristics of welfare-to-work programs that were associated with differences in success, distinguishing between variations in the services received, differences in the characteristics of those who participated in each program, and variations in the socio-economic environment in which the programs operated. (author abstract)

This resource is also publlished as a discussion paper by the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin.

This report examines the effects of welfare and work policies on earnings, welfare benefits, income, stable employment, and stable welfare exits across a range of subgroups using information from random assignment studies of 26 welfare and work policies studied by MDRC. No two of the programs are alike, but they used one of five broad approaches: (1) job-search first programs required most welfare recipients to initially look for work; (2) education-first programs initially required most welfare recipients to enroll in education and training; (3) employment-focused mixed-activity programs stressed the importance of finding work but required more job-ready welfare recipients to look for work while allowing others to enroll in education or training programs; (4) education-focused mixed-activity programs likewise used a mix of initial activities but did not stress employment; and (5) earnings supplement programs provided extra financial payments to welfare recipients who went to work. (author abstract)

<p>Authorized by the Affordable Care Act, the Health Profession Opportunity Grants (HPOG) program from the Administration for Children and Families provides education and training to TANF recipients and other low-income individuals for occupations in the health care field. The <a href="http://www.acf.hhs.gov/ofa/programs/hpog/">HPOG Web site</a> serves as a repository of important grant-related information and a forum for grantee interaction. Among other features, the Web site enables you to: locate contact information for all HPOG grantees in the <a href="http://www.acf.hhs.gov/ofa/hpog/findhpogprograms">Grantee Directory</a>; learn about what other HPOG programs are doing; and find helpful technical assistance toolkits, conference presentations, administrative forms, and other relevant documents in the <a href="http://www.acf.hhs.gov/ofa/resource-library/search?area%5b2400%5d=2400">Resources Section</a>.</p>

Using data from a Pew Research Center survey and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, this report provides information on young adults in the labor market. Only 54 percent of young adults ages 18 to 24 are currently employed, which is the lowest since the data started being collected in 1948. Additionally, those young adults working full time have had the greatest decrease in weekly earnings than any other age group over the past four years (a six percent decline). These trends have had an impact on this population’s long-term plans as many have delayed marriage and starting a family, and 24 percent say they have had to move back home with their parents after living on their own.

The Urban Institute authored this issue brief on the multisite Housing Opportunity and Services Together (HOST) demonstration. The demonstration tests strategies using housing as a way to get vulnerable families services that they need to reach self-sufficiency, such as mental health services, access to literacy and education, and a connection to the labor force. Authors provide an overview of the challenges and successes of the program’s planning stages to help provide peers with information to create similar interventions.