A Question about Two-Parent Cash Assistance

The Behavioral Interventions to Advance Self-Sufficiency-Next Generation (BIAS-NG) project aims to make human services programs work better for the people receiving services by reshaping program processes using lessons from behavioral science. This Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation newsletter provides insights from New York and Washington, focusing on improving employment and training services for Temporary Assistance to Needy Families clients.

The Tennessee Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Opportunity Act funds seven grantees to provide services to families with low income, each aimed at improving education, health, and economic outcomes for adults and children. This Urban Institute resource is a baseline scan which describes the demographic and economic context within which the seven pilot programs are operating as of the start of the programs’ implementation. The context described includes demographic information, income measures and poverty rates, employment and education data, safety net program caseloads, and health information. This baseline scan provides information on the circumstances of Tennessee families to support the evaluation of the TANF Opportunity Act pilot programs. The data presented in this baseline report will also serve as a starting point for a data dashboard tracking changes during the pilots.

This American Public Human Services Association and Chapin Hall “Evidence to Impact” tool provides examples of state policy options aligned with peer-reviewed research, organized by the policy levers at agencies’ disposal, including macroeconomic supports (Earned Income Tax Credit, Child Tax Credit, minimum wage, paid family leave, employment and job creation), concrete supports (child care, housing, health care, flexible funds, direct cash transfers), and public assistance programs (Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children). Used in concert with meaningful policy and practice improvement efforts, this policy tool allows jurisdictions to assess their current policy landscape and consider future opportunities to expand access to economic and concrete supports as a primary prevention strategy.

Economic and concrete supports are “protective factors”—factors that prevent families from becoming involved in the child welfare system. The evidence indicates that increasing access to these supports may be an effective strategy to prevent child maltreatment, keep families together, and address racial inequities. For families who receive Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF), experiencing material hardship (difficulty meeting basic needs) is associated with increased risk for both neglect and physical abuse investigations. This Chapin Hall policy brief highlights how increasing access to TANF decreases the risk of child welfare involvement.

This Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation toolbox highlights selected resources and tools that are particularly relevant for current and future Tribal TANF-Child Welfare Coordination (TTCW) grantees, and that may also be relevant for other human services programs. Resources included address the following topic areas: developing and using logic models for systems change; planning for data collection and collecting data; collecting and using stories in program research and dissemination; collaborative approaches to screening and assessment; data sharing and protecting sensitive information; performance measurement; data-driven decision making and continuous quality improvement; measuring collaboration; measuring program outcomes; dissemination; and sustainability.

Jurisdictions are increasingly using funding in innovative ways to meet the economic and concrete needs of families as a child welfare prevention strategy. Concrete supports are provided further upstream to families at risk for child welfare involvement. While there is variation in when and how these flexible dollars are used by child welfare agencies to strengthen families, this Chapin Hall policy brief highlights efforts in Kentucky, Indiana, and Wisconsin to integrate and expand flexible funds as a core component of their prevention continuum.

This Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation (OPRE) report examines the link between measures of self-regulation skills and longer-term outcomes among adults with low incomes. OPRE drew on the conceptualization of self-regulation skills from the Goal-Oriented Adult Learning in Self-Sufficiency (GOALS) project and used data from the Evaluation of Employment Coaching for TANF and Related Populations. Using both sets of data, OPRE examined the predictive power of self-regulation measures by examining their link to future outcomes such as earnings and employment one year later.

Case management is a service delivery approach in which staff meet with clients to provide direct, personalized one-on-one support to improve a comprehensive set of outcomes related to employment, education, housing, health, and public benefit receipt. This Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation resource describes the effectiveness of programs that were identified by the Pathways Clearinghouse as using case management as their primary service. It summarizes what we know about these programs and their impacts so Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) and other program administrators, policymakers, researchers, and the public can apply the evidence to their context and the questions that matter to them.