Pocket Facts

The simple reform Congress can make to move millions from welfare to work

Congress has a chance to help millions of Americans move from welfare to work while fixing one of the country’s most broken federal programs. Lawmakers are preparing to reauthorize the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act, which controls the vast and failed federal workforce-development system. Instead of doubling down on the longstanding approach of wasting money...

Empowerment Accounts: 21st Century Safety-Net Reform

Frankie Johnson, a college-educated single mother from Washington, D.C., moved to Atlanta to distance herself and daughter from an abusive husband. Without a job or place to live, she sought government assistance for childcare and transitional housing. While she waited for this assistance, she was offered a job paying $70,000. She turned it down. Why?...

Don’t Fence Me In: Lianne’s Story

Family, then finances—and opportunity. Those are what brought Lianne Halpern back to tiny Shamrock, a small, dusty stop on the famous Route 66 in the Texas panhandle. Like generations of Americans before, Lianne and her family had traveled west along that route in search of the golden promises of California. Lianne’s father worked in the...