Strengthening Work Requirements? Forecasting Impacts of Reforming Cash Assistance

Work requirements are perhaps the most controversial aspect of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program, America’s sole federal cash assistance program for low-income families with children. In 2025, for the first time in nearly 20 years, the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023 (FRA) will implement policy changes intended to strengthen states’ work requirements. However, researcher’ and policymakers’ understanding of how FRA will impact states’ compliance with federal requirements is hampered by a lack of research and publicly available data. We tie information from reports submitted to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that are collected to administrative caseload and expenditure data to document several strategies that states currently use to comply with federal work requirements. We estimate that FRA will increase the stringency of work requirements in 23 states and that 5 states will begin to fall short of requirements. We note that several compliance strategies available to those states do not encourage work. We discuss changes in states’ work requirements that would promote better long-term economic and labor market outcomes for TANF recipients.