Bill Clinton: Radio Address on the Welfare Reform Act

Explanation and Analysis of the Document

The president sets the tone of his speech in the first paragraph. He references the holiday season, noting that the time of year is about not just celebrating but also recognizing obligations and commitments. Clinton uses the holidays as a way to frame his discussion of welfare reform; he celebrates the PRWORA's passage, but he also wants the nation to acknowledge the unfinished business of ensuring its successful implementation.

After using the phrase “obligations to family and community” in the first paragraph, Clinton further describes welfare reform as a “moral obligation for our Nation.” He carefully frames the legislation in terms of how it will help the poor. He characterizes the old welfare system as one that failed Americans, blaming the welfare system itself rather than recipients of AFDC. This is an important detail; earlier presidents, such as Reagan, had often used the image of the “welfare queen,” the stereotypical long-term abuser of the welfare system, as a reason for reform. Clinton does not stress that the new law will stop people from abusing the system; instead, he argues that it will prevent the system from abusing Americans. Clinton takes this a step further in paragraph 3, stating that welfare recipients themselves called for reform.

In paragraph 4, Clinton references his 1992 campaign promise to “end welfare as we know it.” He also mentions that he gave states waivers before signing the reform bill. Beginning with the Reagan administration in the 1980s, states were encouraged to experiment with welfare reform. The Social Security Act allowed the Department of Health and Human Services to grant waivers to states that had programs which met the objectives of the AFDC. Under the Reagan administration, Health and Human Services had granted more waivers to states, but it was under the George H. W. Bush administration that waiver use truly increased. Bush, faced with a daunting reelection threat from Clinton, relaxed some of the standards required in the past, and more states began to initiate their own welfare reform programs. Clinton further expanded the waiver process during his first term. In many ways, the PRWORA merely continued an existing trend toward state experimentation with welfare reform. Clinton notes the three primary components of most of the state-initiated programs: emphasis on immediate employment, time limits on benefits, and linkage of benefits to personal behaviors such as getting married or not having additional children.

In paragraph 5, Clinton comments on the success of the bill in terms of the drop in welfare rolls. Most historians, sociologists, and political scientists note that the extraordinary job growth during the 1990s provided opportunities for former welfare recipients that were not there during the 1980s. During the 1970s and 1980s economic shifts took many jobs, primarily those in the manufacturing sector, overseas. Manufacturing jobs represented 26 percent of the total economy in 1969 but just 19 percent in 1984 and 15 percent by 1998. These jobs were replaced with lower-paying, lower-skilled service jobs. Former welfare recipients, most of whom were single women, were qualified for this kind of work. As the economy recovered from the recession of the early 1980s, the economic expansion of the 1990s created more of these jobs, which were available for former welfare recipients.

In paragraph 6, Clinton points to Wisconsin and Indiana as two states with remarkable results in welfare reform. Wisconsin had developed its own welfare reform program through the waiver process beginning in 1986. Wisconsin Works, the state aid system, tied benefits to employment; recipients who could not find private sector jobs were provided with government work. Still, there was a generous system of child and health care to the working poor in the state. It was no accident that President Clinton highlighted such a program in his speech; he had reservations about signing the PRWORA, believing that welfare reform would happen only if recipients were given the tools and support to succeed, especially health benefits and child care.

Paragraph 7 marks the end of Clinton's “celebration” portion of his speech. He ends the paragraph with the word celebrate and then moves to the other point he wishes to make: the obligation of the American people to ensure the success of the PRWORA.

Clinton notes in paragraph 8 that the PRWORA will require “even more change” than the waiver reform efforts will. The PRWORA eliminated AFDC and replaced it with block grants to states under the name TANF. The primary focus of the new law was to set up welfare as a temporary assistance program, not as a way of life. TANF gave the states substantial leeway in terms of how they chose to use federal funds. In the past, families that could meet income eligibility received federal aid. Under the new legislation, states could impose work and other requirements to determine eligibility. The PRWORA prohibited states from providing aid to families for more than five years. States also received incentives for reducing TANF caseloads; there were annual work requirements for recipients. Noncitizens were not eligible for assistance. The PRWORA also increased child support enforcement, reduced funds for food stamps and child nutrition, and enacted a number of provisions to encourage two-parent families.

Clinton emphasizes the end of federal welfare (AFDC) in paragraph 9, noting that it is up to the states to develop programs under the TANF block grants authorized by PRWORA. He also reinforces his personal concern (and one reason he previously had vetoed the legislation) that school lunch programs, child nutrition, health care, and child care programs be included in each state reform effort.

In paragraph 10, Clinton echoes Roosevelt's language, referring to the old welfare system as a “bad deal” and the legislation as the beginning of a “better deal”; this is reminiscent of Roosevelt's New Deal, which created the ADC program. Clinton notes the August 1996 congressional vote to increase the minimum wage and the expansion of the earned income tax credit. The earned income tax credit, begun in 1975, provided federal income tax relief for low-income earners. The program had expanded substantially since it began; real expenditures had grown almost six times between 1980 and 1996. Earned income tax credits encourage people to work yet still provide them with direct cash assistance in the form of tax relief; as such, they have proved to be politically popular with both Republican and Democratic legislators.

At the close of his speech, Clinton returns to his theme of the nation's moral obligation to the community, calling on the private and public sectors to create jobs for those currently receiving aid. He ends his speech with the statement that the success of welfare reform depends on “all of us,” on every American, to reinforce the message that the PRWORA is just one step in the process of change.