Success By Six: TANF

Economics

Employment and Unemployment

Income Measures:
Per Capita Income
Median Income
Average Annual Pay
Wages by Occupation

Poverty and the Self-Sufficiency Standard

Percent of Children in Poverty

At-Risk and Disconnected Youth

Personal Bankruptcies

Success in Economic Well-Being and Security

TANF in Allen County, Indiana

Note: 2003 is estimate using 10 months of data; 2007 is projected using 4 months of data. Each year is a State Fiscal Year.

	Since 2003, the first year for which reliable data on the breakdown of recipients is available, enrollees have been decreasing by 7-10.5 percent each year for adults, and at almost the same rate of reduction for children, although at slightly lower rate (7-9.6%).
Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) - commonly known as "welfare reform" --replaced Aid to Families with Dependent Children. TANF is a program that provides cash assistance and supportive services to assist the family, helping them achieve economic self-sufficiency. Families with children under the age of 18 that are deprived of financial support from a parent by reason of death, absence from the home, unemployment, or physical or mental incapacity are eligible. Generally, seventy percent of the participants are children. A typical TANF family is a mother with 2 children. Since there are time limits to receiving TANF, participants are dropped when their time limits are up. Two thirds of the dropped participants are children, although their eligibility is longer.
	Individuals began to be removed from the TANF program in larger numbers beginning in 2003. At the beginning of that year, approximately 20-30 adults were removed from the program each month, either because they were employed or their time on the program expired (children are removed when they turn 18). By March 2003, over 200 adults were removed each month, and those numbers have not changed substantially since that time.

Source: STATS INDIANA using FSSA data

More data and supplemental information are available on Allen County Profile.

Definitions, Sources, and Caveats:
TANF-Temporary Assistance to Needy Families- a needs-based program administered by US Department of Health and Human Services (through FSSA in Indiana, i.e. Family and Social Services Administration) which replaced the AFDC program (Aid to Families with Dependent Children) in 1997. The main focus of the TANF Work Program is to help families to help themselves move from welfare to work by encouraging self-sufficiency through work and promoting family responsibility and accountability. This program is for families with children who need financial support because of a death of a parent; absence of a parent; or physical or mental incapacity of a parent.