A decade after the introduction of Welfare to Work, how have single parents fared?
In 2005, the federal government announced Welfare to Work measures that fundamentally changed the expectations placed on those who received Parenting Payment, among others. After July 1 2005, many parents with children over the age of six were required to undertake 30 hours of paid work per fortnight. Many single parents were moved from this payment to the less generous Newstart Allowance once their youngest child turned eight. Single parents already claiming Parenting Payment were exempted from this requirement to move to Newstart, but in 2013 these changes were extended to all single parents. The government’s consistent claim has been that these reforms would improve the ‘wellbeing’ of those involved. In light of this claim, Michelle Brady (@MichelleBradyUQ) and Kay Cook (@KayCookPhD) ask: “how has Welfare to Work impacted on the wellbeing of single parents and their children?”
To answer this question, we reviewed all of the published research that provided insights into the impact of ‘welfare reforms’ on parents’ wellbeing, both before and after the implementation of Welfare to Work on 1 July 2005. What we found from the 41 research articles was that the policy had produced overwhelmingly negative consequences for single parents across a range of wellbeing indicators: finances, quality of life, and physical and mental health.
Perhaps most concerning was that the financial impacts on single parents were anticipated due to modelling undertaken prior to the passing of the 2005 Welfare to Work Act, and were certainly known before the most recent 2013 changes. Also concerning is that while academic studies have pointed to negative impacts on parents, the government’s official evaluations of Welfare to Work have not sought to assess the impacts on single parents’ financial position, subjective wellbeing and health. Instead official evaluations have only reported changes to the Parenting Payment caseload.
Here, we consolidate what university researchers, the not-for-profit sector and the government’s own evaluations have described as the impact of the 2005 Welfare to Work reforms for single parents and their children, in the hope of prompting discussion about more humanistic, and evidence-based welfare policy reform. Our full review is published in the latest issue of ANZSOG’s Evidence Base journal.
Wellbeing outcome 1: Work doesn’t always pay
When the policy was announced, the government predicted that Welfare to Work would increase labour force participation, and lead to increased individual prosperity through employment. However, modelling conducted immediately prior to the introduction of Welfare to Work (based on the government’s initial budget statements about the structure of income support and NATSEM’s projections regarding income support payment rates) suggested net financial losses for single parents who were to be affected by the reforms. Effective Marginal Tax Rates increased significantly for single parents, leaving many worse off as a result of meeting their employment participation requirements.
These projected outcomes were echoed in studies conducted by ACOSS, the Brotherhood of St Laurence and others that also revealed financial losses for affected single parent families. These studies have found that, coinciding with Welfare to Work, single parent benefit recipients were financially worse off, financial hardship was exacerbated and the poverty rate of single parents – and their children – increased. However, the government’s evaluation of Welfare to Work excluded consideration of these impacts. It focused exclusively on the number of people receiving income support (and thus government expenditure).
Wellbeing outcome 2: The stress of trying to appease everybody and instead pleasing nobody
Before the introduction of the 2001-02 Australians Working Together package, independent research found that most Australians did not feel it was appropriate for single parents with pre-school aged children to be required to work, but that part-time work was reasonable once children were in school. These findings matched the expectations of recipients themselves.
Similarly, just before the 2005 Welfare to Work reforms were introduced, community support for the requirements was low, with only one in four respondents agreeing with compulsory activity requirements for single parents. At the same time, recipient single parents expressed a desire to work, citing reasons such as not wanting to be a ‘bludger’, or waste ‘tax payers’ money’. Since the implementation of the 2005 Welfare to Work requirements, no survey research has examined community and benefit recipient sentiment. However qualitative research shows that single parents feel that the community, and the government, considers them undeserving and that their only public value is as an employee.
As single parents’ engagement with the Job Network became mandatory as a result of Welfare to Work, these experiences intensified. Single parents’ interactions with the Job Network system left them feeling unsupported and harassed. Several qualitative studies reported parents feeling pushed into inappropriate jobs or before they were ready. Many felt that their individual circumstances and requirements were not taken into consideration, and were left feeling that felt that their identities ‘as both mothers and workers [were] rendered invisible’ (Grahame and Marston 2012, 82). A series of quantitative analyses found that employed single parents reported much lower job satisfaction than other women. Further, single mothers’ quality of life suffered as a result of moving from welfare into work. It was suggested that this was caused by the difficulty of being a sole parent, on a low income, and in a job with poor conditions.
Wellbeing outcome 3: Being an impoverished single parent is bad for your health
An Australians Working Together evaluation study found that few parents attributed direct health impacts to these modest, and often voluntary activity requirements. The evaluation of the 2005 Welfare to Work measures did not assess health outcomes. While the lack of health impacts found in the AWT evaluation may excuse the 2005 government from examining such impacts, a body of research accumulating over the same period linked the receipt of income support with single parents’ higher rates of physical and mental disability. Studies published in 2003 and 2006, and later work conducted between 2011 and 2013, paint a damning picture of the mental health impacts of poverty, stress and benefit receipt. The latest findings indicated that a transition to Parenting Payment Single was associated with a decline in mental health. The researchers concluded that a significant proportion of the mental health risks borne by Newstart Allowance and Parenting Paying recipients was directly attributable to the parents’ experience of financial hardship. In light of the financial and subjective impacts described above, these results are not surprising.
What has been the overall impact?
While earlier research on the impact of AWT reforms on single parents’ financial and subjective wellbeing found mixed results, no studies conducted after the 2005 implementation of Welfare to Work have found positive effects. Taken together, academic research on the impact of Welfare to Work reforms on the wellbeing of single parents and their children presents an overwhelmingly negative picture.
The most recent evidence reveals the emotional strain parents experience when engaging with the current income support and employment service system. Researchers have argued that this is due to the poor quality of jobs that program participants hold. These jobs make balancing working and caring responsibilities difficult in the context of inadequate resources. However, as the research on the financial impacts of Welfare to Work have found, the financial costs and benefits of work serve to exacerbate rather than alleviate these concerns. The poor financial returns as a result of work, combined with the stress of balancing work and family responsibility, provide a context that may explain the disturbing and disproportionate mental health consequences borne by this population.
When viewed through the prism of ‘evidence based policy’, Welfare to Work reforms that undermine the wellbeing of participants cannot be seen as a success. The failure to include measures of these outcomes in official evaluations does a disservice to future policy reform. What is currently still unknown is the impact of the Welfare to Work reforms on children and family relationships, including how childcare could support single parents to combine work and family. Evidence on these issues is urgently required.
Acknowledgements
This blog summarises the results of a systematic review funded published in the online journal Evidence Base, published by the Australia and New Zealand School of Government (ANZSOG). The systematic review was completed with funding from ANZSOG. The review also benefited from research assistance from Hiroyuki Ota from the Australia Internships Program, and the research assistance of Emily Stevens, which was funded through the ANZSOG grant.
The reference for the full report is as follows:
Brady M & Cook K (2015). The impact of welfare to work on parents and their children. Evidence Base, issue 3, ISSN 1838-9422. [Available online: https://journal.anzsog.edu.au/publications/24/EvidenceBase2015Issue3Version1.pdf]
The opinions expressed here, and in the Evidence Base review, are those of the authors and do not represent the views of ANZSOG or the individual study authors whose work we consolidate.
Posted by @MsSophieRae
To answer this question, we reviewed all of the published research that provided insights into the impact of ‘welfare reforms’ on parents’ wellbeing, both before and after the implementation of Welfare to Work on 1 July 2005. What we found from the 41 research articles was that the policy had produced overwhelmingly negative consequences for single parents across a range of wellbeing indicators: finances, quality of life, and physical and mental health.
Perhaps most concerning was that the financial impacts on single parents were anticipated due to modelling undertaken prior to the passing of the 2005 Welfare to Work Act, and were certainly known before the most recent 2013 changes. Also concerning is that while academic studies have pointed to negative impacts on parents, the government’s official evaluations of Welfare to Work have not sought to assess the impacts on single parents’ financial position, subjective wellbeing and health. Instead official evaluations have only reported changes to the Parenting Payment caseload.
Here, we consolidate what university researchers, the not-for-profit sector and the government’s own evaluations have described as the impact of the 2005 Welfare to Work reforms for single parents and their children, in the hope of prompting discussion about more humanistic, and evidence-based welfare policy reform. Our full review is published in the latest issue of ANZSOG’s Evidence Base journal.
Wellbeing outcome 1: Work doesn’t always pay
When the policy was announced, the government predicted that Welfare to Work would increase labour force participation, and lead to increased individual prosperity through employment. However, modelling conducted immediately prior to the introduction of Welfare to Work (based on the government’s initial budget statements about the structure of income support and NATSEM’s projections regarding income support payment rates) suggested net financial losses for single parents who were to be affected by the reforms. Effective Marginal Tax Rates increased significantly for single parents, leaving many worse off as a result of meeting their employment participation requirements.
These projected outcomes were echoed in studies conducted by ACOSS, the Brotherhood of St Laurence and others that also revealed financial losses for affected single parent families. These studies have found that, coinciding with Welfare to Work, single parent benefit recipients were financially worse off, financial hardship was exacerbated and the poverty rate of single parents – and their children – increased. However, the government’s evaluation of Welfare to Work excluded consideration of these impacts. It focused exclusively on the number of people receiving income support (and thus government expenditure).
Wellbeing outcome 2: The stress of trying to appease everybody and instead pleasing nobody
Before the introduction of the 2001-02 Australians Working Together package, independent research found that most Australians did not feel it was appropriate for single parents with pre-school aged children to be required to work, but that part-time work was reasonable once children were in school. These findings matched the expectations of recipients themselves.
Similarly, just before the 2005 Welfare to Work reforms were introduced, community support for the requirements was low, with only one in four respondents agreeing with compulsory activity requirements for single parents. At the same time, recipient single parents expressed a desire to work, citing reasons such as not wanting to be a ‘bludger’, or waste ‘tax payers’ money’. Since the implementation of the 2005 Welfare to Work requirements, no survey research has examined community and benefit recipient sentiment. However qualitative research shows that single parents feel that the community, and the government, considers them undeserving and that their only public value is as an employee.
As single parents’ engagement with the Job Network became mandatory as a result of Welfare to Work, these experiences intensified. Single parents’ interactions with the Job Network system left them feeling unsupported and harassed. Several qualitative studies reported parents feeling pushed into inappropriate jobs or before they were ready. Many felt that their individual circumstances and requirements were not taken into consideration, and were left feeling that felt that their identities ‘as both mothers and workers [were] rendered invisible’ (Grahame and Marston 2012, 82). A series of quantitative analyses found that employed single parents reported much lower job satisfaction than other women. Further, single mothers’ quality of life suffered as a result of moving from welfare into work. It was suggested that this was caused by the difficulty of being a sole parent, on a low income, and in a job with poor conditions.
Wellbeing outcome 3: Being an impoverished single parent is bad for your health
An Australians Working Together evaluation study found that few parents attributed direct health impacts to these modest, and often voluntary activity requirements. The evaluation of the 2005 Welfare to Work measures did not assess health outcomes. While the lack of health impacts found in the AWT evaluation may excuse the 2005 government from examining such impacts, a body of research accumulating over the same period linked the receipt of income support with single parents’ higher rates of physical and mental disability. Studies published in 2003 and 2006, and later work conducted between 2011 and 2013, paint a damning picture of the mental health impacts of poverty, stress and benefit receipt. The latest findings indicated that a transition to Parenting Payment Single was associated with a decline in mental health. The researchers concluded that a significant proportion of the mental health risks borne by Newstart Allowance and Parenting Paying recipients was directly attributable to the parents’ experience of financial hardship. In light of the financial and subjective impacts described above, these results are not surprising.
What has been the overall impact?
While earlier research on the impact of AWT reforms on single parents’ financial and subjective wellbeing found mixed results, no studies conducted after the 2005 implementation of Welfare to Work have found positive effects. Taken together, academic research on the impact of Welfare to Work reforms on the wellbeing of single parents and their children presents an overwhelmingly negative picture.
The most recent evidence reveals the emotional strain parents experience when engaging with the current income support and employment service system. Researchers have argued that this is due to the poor quality of jobs that program participants hold. These jobs make balancing working and caring responsibilities difficult in the context of inadequate resources. However, as the research on the financial impacts of Welfare to Work have found, the financial costs and benefits of work serve to exacerbate rather than alleviate these concerns. The poor financial returns as a result of work, combined with the stress of balancing work and family responsibility, provide a context that may explain the disturbing and disproportionate mental health consequences borne by this population.
When viewed through the prism of ‘evidence based policy’, Welfare to Work reforms that undermine the wellbeing of participants cannot be seen as a success. The failure to include measures of these outcomes in official evaluations does a disservice to future policy reform. What is currently still unknown is the impact of the Welfare to Work reforms on children and family relationships, including how childcare could support single parents to combine work and family. Evidence on these issues is urgently required.
Acknowledgements
This blog summarises the results of a systematic review funded published in the online journal Evidence Base, published by the Australia and New Zealand School of Government (ANZSOG). The systematic review was completed with funding from ANZSOG. The review also benefited from research assistance from Hiroyuki Ota from the Australia Internships Program, and the research assistance of Emily Stevens, which was funded through the ANZSOG grant.
The reference for the full report is as follows:
Brady M & Cook K (2015). The impact of welfare to work on parents and their children. Evidence Base, issue 3, ISSN 1838-9422. [Available online: https://journal.anzsog.edu.au/publications/24/EvidenceBase2015Issue3Version1.pdf]
The opinions expressed here, and in the Evidence Base review, are those of the authors and do not represent the views of ANZSOG or the individual study authors whose work we consolidate.
Posted by @MsSophieRae