of their children they are considered “good mothers”. Also, when they do decide to work outside the home they are judged as “selfish” and “bad mothers”. However, the expectation of poor women is the exact opposite. Poor women are often criticized for staying home to take care of their children and are expected to leave the home and work for wage in order to receive the “good mother” approval from society. One reform argument is centered on the “burden” for taxpayers to support people who are not trying to help themselves. Gilens reported, “The economic self-interest explanation of welfare reform is widely assumed to be true, and debates over public policy often remain on the assumption that the middle class resent paying for programs that benefit only the poor“ (Gilens, p. 2, 1996). Reform efforts often focus on general stereotypes of welfare recipients not wanting to work and preferring to take advantage of taxpayer money. Conservatives and liberals refer to “welfare spending” as excessive and unnecessary. However, prior to the popularity of welfare reform, the U.S. Bureau of Census reported actual money spent on AFDC was only 7% of the $613 billion spend on social welfare which included health care, veterans’ programs, education, housing, and pubic aid (tables 579, 583, 1993). With government statistics contradicting claims of excessive spending, there is legitimate suspicion regarding the real motivation for welfare reform programs.Undeniably, current reform bills seem to target the narrow population of poor minority women. Ninety five percent of TANF recipients are single women with children (Sherman et al., 1998). So there is no question who is affected most by these reform bills. Also, there have been several studies that suggest welfare-reform laws are especially discriminating against lower income women of color (Gilens 1996). A...
