The 1996 federal welfare reform law issued a clear
marching order to Americans on public assistance:
Get a job.
But for many of those now facing the new work requirements,
getting to a job can be an even bigger problem
than finding one. In state after state, governments,
businesses, and social service groups are discovering
that transportation is one of the biggest obstacles preventing
welfare clients from becoming workers.
Although it wasn't so obvious when we imposed
them, work requirements entail the time and financial
costs of a daily commute. Many policymakers are focusing
on public transit as the solution to the getting-from-welfare-
to-work problem. They seem to think the
challenge is to make public transit "good enough" to
handle the reverse commutes of urban low-income
workers to the job-rich suburbs.
But for many working families struggling to make
ends meet, public transit simply isn't good enough
not because buses have plastic seats, but because it can
take multiple transfers and two hours or more to get to
and from work by bus.
Public transit is geared mainly to accommodate 9-to-5
workers who need to get from one high-density locale to
another during the normal work week. In contrast, the
entry-level jobs most welfare recipients are qualified for
are often located in warehouses, plants, strip malls, and
office parks that sit astride suburban roads rather than
city streets. These new hires also often work "on call" or
on rotating shifts, or are assigned to work at night or on
weekends when public transit is infrequent or simply
not available.
Moreover, work isn't the only place welfare clients
need to get to on any given weekday. They also may
have to travel to and from child care facilities, schools,
job training or basic literacy classes, the doctor's office,
the supermarket, and so on. The best evidence shows
that public transit, even in metropolitan areas with the
biggest and best systems, is woefully inadequate to meet
these needs of many welfare households.
In most cases, the shortest distance between a poor
person and a job is along a line driven in a car. In many
cases, a car is also the most cost-effective way to use the
limited public funds available to support the commutes
of working families.
More and more states and localities are turning to the
car as a means of helping low-income working families
get to their jobs. There's nothing really so breathtaking
about this. Automobiles, after all, are the mainstay of
American commuting.
In a recent survey of the 10 states with the largest welfare
caseloads, we found a number of programs that
help working-poor families buy cars to get to work.
Pennsylvania and Michigan, for instance, provide families eligible for welfare, now known as Temporary
Assistance to Needy Families, with grants for car purchases.
Michigan provides up to $1,200 for a down payment
on a car and Pennsylvania up to $750. This
summer, the Florida legislature passed a law permitting
local welfare agencies to provide clients with up to
$8,500 to obtain a car that will be used to get to work,
school, or job training.
The most interesting efforts to expand working-poor
families' opportunities for car ownership, however, are
emerging at the local level.
Dallas: Wheels to Work
In Dallas, for example, we found a novel initiative called
Work for Wheels created by Glenn Weinger and the staff
of Lockheed Martin IMS, which manages the Dallas
County welfare program under a government contract.
Work for Wheels is a van-pool service similar to many
that have sprung up nationwide to help people leaving
welfare get to their new jobs. This program, though, has a
twist one that helped it earn a competitive state grant
financed through Texas' federal welfare block grant. Riders'
fares, which cost only a few dollars for each leg of the
trip but do add up over time, are held in a special account.
If a worker stays employed for three months, she
gets the accumulated money for a down payment on a
car. Lockheed staff members work with local car dealers
to arrange loans for Work for Wheels riders.
Southern Illinois: Cars to Careers
In five counties in southern Illinois, Michele Newton
manages a program called Cars to Careers. Working
with a consortium of three area car dealerships, she has
helped 20 welfare clients obtain used cars and prepare
themselves for the responsibilities of car ownership.
She says she now has the means to put 50 more in
the driver's seat.
To be eligible to buy a car donated by one of the dealerships,
a client must have a job, a driver's license, the
means to afford operating costs, and her caseworker's
endorsement. The local welfare agency holds a lien on
the car for a year, during which time the buyer must
make monthly payments of between $20 and $40, stay
employed and insured, and attend budgeting and car
maintenance classes. If the buyer meets all the requirements
after the yearlong "shakedown cruise," she ob-tains
the title to the car. According to Newton, the
program gives clients an extra incentive to remain employed
during the crucial first year in their transition
from welfare to work.
Western New York: EARNA CAR
Irene Rubner is the welfare-to-work project director for
Chautauqua County, N.Y., a small county with only 476
welfare cases. It is the practice of welfare case mangers
in her county and others to advise clients who have no
way to get to work to move. Less than enamored with
the "move" solution, Rubner developed the EARNA
CAR program, which helps the working poor buy cars
that have been donated by individuals or retired from
the county's auto pool.
To qualify, prospective buyers must have a driver's license,
a job, and a demonstrably strong commitment to
work. They also must attend a basic car maintenance
course at a community college, where they work on cars
donated to the program.
The cars range in cost from $300 to $500. A local bank
processes the participants' car loans, which must be paid
off in one year. The county also covers the buyers' car insurance
costs for one year.
According to Rubner, a car is often the key to upward
mobility for a person who has left welfare for work. She
tells the story of a program graduate who was able to get
a higher paying job once she had the car to get there.
She also assured us she would run out of donated cars
long before every prospective buyer got one.
To be sure, there will be protests about efforts to expand
programs like the ones we've described. Some will raise
concerns about the impact of additional cars on the environment.
We've already heard more than one local plan-ner
and state official cite air quality, traffic congestion,
and urban sprawl as reasons to limit low-income families'
access to automobiles.
Granted, these are genuine concerns indeed,
they've all received plenty of attention in this magazine.
But is it fair to deny people trying to get off public assistance
the opportunity to work if it means getting there
by car?
Yes, poor people tend to drive older cars that emit
more pollutants than newer models. The solution is not
to ban low-income workers from the highways, but to
help them either to maintain their cars or buy ones that
pollute less. Yes, adding more drivers to the roadways
will increase traffic marginally. The answer is not to tell
welfare clients "tough luck" if they're offered jobs not
served by bus or rail, but congestion pricing and other
policies that dampen highway use by everyone.
Policymakers and others who believe public transit is
the solution to our problems with air quality, traffic, and
poorly planned development should increase its use by
all workers, rather than simply maintain low-income
workers as a captive market. When middle- and upper-class
workers start using public transit at even one-half
the rate of low-income workers, then it'll be time to start
imposing environmental tests on drivers.
Others will complain that car-purchase-assistance
programs are a giveaway to people on welfare. Such
critics ignore the fact that transportation, by car or other
means, is a necessity in a world where everyone must
work. Poor people who need a car to get to work
shouldn't have to sign up for welfare to get one. States
should set an income threshold for transportation assistance
as they already do for health and child care
and make it available to all those who are determined
to be in need, not just those on welfare.
Nearly all states have adopted policies that recognize
that many low-income families can't get by without a reliable
car. Before the federal welfare reform law took effect
in 1996, Washington barred families receiving welfare
cash assistance from owning cars worth more than
$1,500. Forty-eight states, acting under the flexibility
granted them under the new law, have raised that limit
by varying degrees. Of that group, 24 now permit families
receiving assistance to own one car of any value.
These changes reflect more than just a greater degree
of generosity on the part of the states. They indicate that
state policymakers have come to understand that owning
a car is no insurance against needing welfare down
the road, and that it is shortsighted to require people to
deplete assets to qualify for help. The policy changes
also evince an understanding that many welfare clients
can't get or keep a job without a car.
If nearly half the states now allow welfare-assisted
families to possess a car of any value, how much of a policy
leap is it for states to begin helping other families acquire
a car to get to and from work? Too few states allow
welfare funds to be used for car purchases, though some
contribute significantly for car repair. State policymakers
should make wider use of their welfare funds to subsidize
car purchases, but limit such aid to those who are in
a position to contribute to the cost of buying and maintaining
a car. This "co-pay" approach would help ensure
that aid goes only to those who, by virtue of employment
and modest savings, are prepared to manage an
asset like an automobile. To emphasize a point made
previously, this subsidy should be available to all working-poor families below a certain income threshold, not
just those leaving welfare for work.
The 1995 welfare reform law gives states flexibility to
apply lessons learned from local programs like the ones
we highlighted to the broad working-poor population.
Last May, the U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services issued its final regulations governing the use of
federal and state welfare funds. They clearly give states
permission to use their federal welfare block grants to
provide all working-poor families with transportation
assistance without that aid counting against the five-year
time limit for receipt of welfare.
States also can use the reserves in their welfare funds
built up by dramatic caseload declines to ensure that
low-income workers can benefit from car ownership.
They can make it possible for them to get and keep a job
of their choice regardless of that job's location. They can
help them take their children to school or to child care
without having to endure an hours-long commute.
As public transit's limited ability to connect the poor
to jobs becomes more apparent, state officials will begin
turning to more realistic alternatives. The local car-ownership
initiatives we found during our survey give state
decisionmakers a blueprint to use their federal welfare
block grants to help all working-poor families buy cars.
If we're serious about "making work pay," we will begin
to help put more low-income working families behind
the wheel on the road to work.
