	Introduction

The Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) block grant provides states, territories, and Indian tribes with federal grants for benefits and services intended to ameliorate the effects, and address the root causes, of child poverty. TANF was created in the 1996 welfare reform law and is typically thought of as the federal program that helps states fund their cash assistance programs for needy families with children. Moreover, TANF is also most associated with the 1996 welfare reform policies imposing work requirements and time limits on families receiving assistance. These are families with children cared for by adults who are not themselves recipients of TANF: disabled parents receiving Supplemental Security Income (SSI); immigrant parents who are ineligible for TANF assistance but have citizen children who are eligible; and nonparent relative caregivers, such as grandparents, aunts, and uncles. This report examines the TANF cash assistance caseload, focusing on how the composition and characteristics of families receiving assistance have changed over time. It also does not describe individuals and families who receive TANF benefits and services other than cash assistance. These debates culminated in a number of changes in providing aid to low-income families with children in the mid-1990s, creating a system of expanded aid to working families (e.g., increases in the Earned Income Tax Credit and funding for child care subsidies) and the creation of TANF, which established time limits and revamped work requirements for the cash assistance programs for needy families with children. Trends in Caseload Characteristics: FY1988 to FY2013

The increases in the cash assistance caseload from 1989 to 1994, and its decline thereafter, were also associated with changes in the character of the caseload. Table 1 provides an overview of the characteristics of the family cash assistance caseload for selected years: FY1988, FY1994, FY2001, FY2006, and FY2013. In FY2013, 38.1% of TANF assistance families had no adult recipient; in contrast, in FY1988 only 9.8% of all cash assistance families had no adult recipient. In that year, just over half (51.0%) of all families had only one child. In FY2013, the share of child recipients who were Hispanic was 36.3%, compared with 29.9% who were African American, and 25.8% who were non-Hispanic white. This reflects their growth as a share of all children in the general population and of all poor children. From FY1994 to FY2001, the cash welfare caseload declined rapidly, from 5.0 million families to 2.2 million families per month, a 56% decline. It was this group that was most closely identified with welfare dependency during the welfare reform debates of the 1980s and 1990s. This section will focus on the five major categories of TANF families: (1) families with an adult recipient who is not employed; (2) families with an adult recipient, employed; (3) "child-only" families with an SSI parent; (4) "child-only" families with a nonparent, relative caretaker; and (5) "child-only families" with an ineligible immigrant parent. However, there are some differences in family size among the different categories of families. Age of Children

The majority of TANF families have young children. However, the age of the youngest child in the family also varies by family category. These families often have pre-school children. Race and Ethnicity of Child Recipients

The majority of the TANF cash assistance caseload is composed of racial and ethnic minorities. The caseload is much smaller—1.7 million families in FY2013 versus 5.0 million families in FY1994. TANF Policies for "Nontraditional" Cash Assistance Families? Many of the "child-only" TANF assistance families are affected not only by TANF policy, but other social policies as well. The May 2013 GAO report said a potential option to better understand TANF's role in helping its "child-only" families would be to require states to provide additional information to the federal government about the status and needs of "child-only" families. Congress could also establish—or require states to establish—goals and performance measures related to the well-being of children in "child-only" families.
The Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) block grant provides states, territories, and Indian tribes with federal grants for benefits and services intended to ameliorate the effects, and address the root causes, of child poverty. It was created in the 1996 welfare reform law, and is most associated with policies such as time limits and work requirements that sought to address concerns about "welfare dependency" of single mothers who received cash assistance. This report examines the characteristics of the TANF cash assistance caseload in FY2013, and compares it with selected post-welfare reform years (FY2001 and FY2006) and pre-welfare reform years (FY1988 and FY1994). The size of the caseload first increased, from 3.7 million families per month in FY1988 to 5.0 million families per month in FY1994, and then declined to 2.2 million families in FY2001 and 1.7 million families in FY2013. Over this period, some of the characteristics of the TANF cash assistance caseload have remained fairly stable, and other characteristics have changed.
Most cash assistance families are small; 51.0% of all TANF cash assistance families in FY2013 had one child. Cash assistance families also frequently have young children; 56.6% in FY2013 had a pre-school-aged child. The majority of the cash assistance caseload has also been composed of racial and ethnic minorities. By FY2013, the largest racial/ethnic group of TANF cash assistance children was Hispanic. In that year, of all TANF assistance child recipients, 36.3% were Hispanic, 29.9% were African American, and 25.8% were non-Hispanic white. The growth in Hispanic children as a percent of all TANF assistance children is due entirely to their population growth—not an increase in the rate at which Hispanic children receive TANF.
Additionally, the majority of adult recipients today, as in the past, are women—specifically, single mothers. However, the share of the caseload comprised of families with an adult recipient has declined substantially in the post-welfare reform period. In FY2013, 38.1% of all families receiving TANF cash assistance represented "child-only" families, in which benefits are paid on behalf of the child in the family but the adult caretaker is ineligible for TANF. The three main components of the "child-only" caseload are (1) families with a disabled parent receiving federal Supplemental Security Income (SSI); (2) families with an ineligible, immigrant parent but with eligible citizen children; and (3) families with children being cared for by a nonparent relative, such as a grandparent, aunt, or uncle. Each of the three categories of families differs in their characteristics from TANF cash assistance families with an adult recipient; there are also differences in characteristics among families in the three major "child-only" categories.
TANF policies generally date back to the 1996 welfare law and the welfare reform debates of the 1980s and 1990s, and do not necessarily address the current composition of the cash assistance caseload. The major performance measure used to evaluate TANF is the work participation rate, a measure not relevant to TANF "child-only" families. Many of TANF's child-only families are affected by social policies other than TANF (i.e., federal disability, immigration, and child protection policies). However, these families are also affected by TANF, and there are currently no federal rules for assessing how TANF funds are used to improve their well-being. Options that have been raised include requiring states to provide more information to the federal government and public on benefits and services afforded to "child-only" families. Congress could also either establish performance goals and measures, or, alternatively, require states to establish such goals and measures for "child-only" families.