Full Citation

Title: ‘Work-fare’ and Child Care: A Synthetic Instrumental Variables Analysis of Child Care Subsidies, Welfare Program Participation, and Labor Market Outcomes of Low-Income Parents

Citation Type: Dissertation/Thesis

Publication Year: 2022

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Abstract: Inability to access quality and affordable child care represents a barrier to employment for many parents, but for low-income parents of young children, it can also be a barrier to compliance with the work requirements affiliated with most forms of public assistance in the United States. Though prior research remains unclear on whether welfare work requirements effectively increase economic self-sufficiency or functionally disqualify especially vulnerable individuals, subsidies for child care have been widely viewed as a way to enable parents to engage in employment and qualifying “Welfare-to-work” program activities. In this paper, I investigate the impacts of these subsidies on parental labor supply decisions and welfare program participation. I also attempt to examine the ways in which accessible childcare alters the screening effects of welfare work requirements, and whether the presence of accessible childcare reduces the disincentives to work inherent to receipt of welfare benefits. Using the Supplemental Nutrition Access Program as my program of interest, I leverage the 2014 reauthorization of the Child Care Development Block Grant and accompanying nationwide changes to eligibility requirements and recertification periods. Via a simulated instrumental variables method, I estimate near-zero effects of altering subsidy program generosity on employment or income and small but significant positive effects upon SNAP uptake among families predicted to be SNAP-eligible by household income amount.

Url: https://economics.virginia.edu/sites/economics.virginia.edu/files/Madison Perry.pdf

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Authors: Perry, Madison

Institution: University of Virginia

Department: Economics

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Publisher Location: Charlottesville, VA

Pages: 43

Data Collections: IPUMS USA

Topics: Poverty and Welfare, Work, Family, and Time

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