January 6, 2003

Exit Surveys of "Welfare Leavers"

Are BC's poorest paying the highest price for Gordon Campbell's New Era? The Ministry of Human Resources plans to reduce its budget 30% by 2004/05. Levels of assistance have been decreased and eligbility has been made more difficult.

In early December government issued a news release headlined "More Income Assistance Clients Finding Jobs". It's difficult to find data to support that claim. Clients leave income assistance if they become ineligible by getting a job, going to school, changing family status, moving or dying. Social service researchers know that job finding has always been the primary reason people leave income assistance. Unfortunately, many people who need assistance are the last hired and first fired so they may return to assistance several times before achieving independence.

The Campbell government has contracted with the Centre for Educational Information (CEISS) to design and manage "exit surveys" for people leaving income assistance. They are to be conducted four times a year using lists of names provided to CEISS by the Ministry.

The first "exit survey" attempted to contact 5,582 former clients whose names were provided by the Ministry in April 2002; phones were not in service for 2,211. Surveys were successfully completed for 1,833; 50.2% left assistance for work (two and a half times more had phones not in service).

The second "exit survey" attempted to contact 3,110 former clients whose names were provided by the Ministry in July 2002, phones were not in service for 1,442. Surveys were successfully completed for 994; 66% were employed at the time of the survey (less than half the number whose phones were not in service).

Comparing the first and second "exit surveys", 16.5% of the sample were confirmed to have jobs in the spring survey; 21.1% of the sample had jobs in the summer survey. That could be what "more" refers to in the ministry's news release although small survey completion rates probably means there is not a significant difference.

Some of the agencies contracting with government to providie training for income assistance clients are receiving payments based on whether the clients successfully find and keep a job. Government will have to be much more successful in tracking former clients in order to pay the correct amount to the contractors.

The methodology used in the exit surveys relies entirely on phone calls in order to survey former clients. US studies also used administrative interviews at the time of leaving assistance as well as contacts in person for subsuquent surveys. BC's disappointing response rate of 32% is substantially lower than response rates in US studies of people leaving welfare.

According to an article published on the National Conference of State Legislatures website (Tweedie et al), welfare caseloads decreased by 40% between 1994 and 1999; 50-70% found jobs. A paper on welfare leavers prepared by researchers at the US Department of Health & Human Services noted that "Three of the four survey reports reviewed here achieved response rates of 72-75 percent; one study, however, had a response rate of only 51 percent." That study does not support the claim by Tweedie et al that higher rates of employment have been achieved since "welfare reform". When comparing pre and post "reform" years, it says that "the later cohort of leavers had higher employment rates in Washington, lower employment rates in Arizona, and similar employment rates in Illinois and Wisconsin." A survey conducted in 2002 by the Center for Law and Social Policy shows that welfare caseloads are again increasing throughout the US.

The question of whether changes in welfare policy result in higher rates of employment for those leaving welfare is central to the question of trust in the Campbell government. Some suspect that cuts to welfare in BC were made to pay for the tax cuts. Others suggest that the cuts reveal a government that just doesn't care. Defenders of the government point to the first goal in the Mininistry of Human Resources' service plan which states "BC Employment and Assistance clients achieve independence through sustained employment." Bad surveys won't hide the real goal if it is to cut spending with no concern for the consequences. If there is concern for people, then the Ministry of Human Resources needs to find out what happened to the people whose phones are no longer in service since they left welfare. Most importantly, where is the evidence that more people are finding jobs today than found jobs before the changes?