Sanctions and Time Limits in Californias Welfare Program

California’s welfare program—the California Work Opportunity and Responsibility to Kids (CalWORKs) program—provides cash assistance to needy families while helping them gain self-sufficiency. Toward this end, most adults receiving CalWORKs are required to work; they may also (with some restrictions) combine work with education or training. This study finds that the state’s caseload would be substantially lower, and its work participation rate significantly higher, if the state adopted stricter sanction policies for adults who fail to meet work requirements. Poverty among children in single-mother families in California would not be greatly affected if the state adopted a gradual or immediate grant-elimination sanction policy. However, the authors note that using their analysis it is not possible to predict what might happen to child poverty under grant-elimination policies during a prolonged recession.