Customer Reviews

Flat Broke with Children: Women in the Age of Welfare Reform

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I picked up this book to do a research paper on the topic of welfare reform. This book has been both enlightening and frightening in its information and the arguments put forth by the author. The research is amazingly thorough and well documented throughout the text. Hays points out many contradictions concerning the goals set forth by the Personal Responsibility Act.

The bottom line is that we are living in a society that is still grossly unequal in terms of sex, race, and class. I especially appreciated the realism that the ideals and provisions of welfare reform fall far below any sort of real hope of mobility in terms of the demands of an evolving global market place.

This book is not just about welfare reform; it is indicative of a society that we are becoming - one that undermines the care of our nation's children and welfare for struggling families and most especially the plight of single mothers.

The old cliche' of welfare and women who sit home eating well and driving nice cars is just that-Ms. Hays reflects the stories of the real women and children affected by our belief in the Horatio Algier syndrome. Too many variables exist to allow the cliche' of welfare and families to continue. The stories in this book are real people, real families who are experiencing the backlash of our punitive welfare reforms. This is not a book per say, but real people, people we care about, who are speaking to us. We need to listen.

Hays does a remarkable job of revealing the cultural logic behind welfare reform. In the process, we do not "just" learn about welfare recipients and their values, we learn something about our own values. It becomes very clear in reading this book that we must resolve the tensions that all families (and especially women) feel when it comes to which comes first: work or family. Only then can we figure out what is fair and good to ask of welfare mothers.
I strongly recommend this book to anyone who seeks a better understanding of the paradoxes and contraditions in our laws regulating the family.

Hays does a remarkable job of revealing the cultural logic behind welfare reform. In the process, we do not "just" learn about welfare recipients and their values, we learn something about our own values. It becomes very clear in reading this book that we must resolve the tensions that all families (and especially women) feel when it comes to which comes first: work or family. Only then can we figure out what is fair and good to ask of welfare mothers.
I strongly recommend this book to anyone who seeks a better understanding of the paradoxes and contraditions in our laws regulating the family.

This book will prove enlightening to anyone who is concerned with the consequences of "welfare reform." Flat Broke, while "putting a face on" reform, provides the analytical tools with which to understand the crux of the welfare dilemma. The dilemma is not unique to those women who must turn to public assistance, it is one faced by all those that live within American culture. Work and family. We all know the struggle - at least in some form.

Hays does an excellent job illustrating how welfare recipients DO pursue mainstream ideals, DO foster mainstream American ideals. . . but are systematically denied the ability to live up to our cultural ideal of middle class. As always, those at the bottom bear the brunt of our cultural contradictions more than any other social group.

I read this book for a college course essay assignment, and could not be more happy that I chose this to write my project essay on. The author of the book captured different sides of the welfare argument - show casing how different sides (the workers, the people receiving welfare, successes and failures) viewed welfare reform, how it impacted different types of welfare recipients, and more. Her information was backed up with lots of research, interviews, and information that many people are not aware of that government and other organizations are using to document the success or failures of welfare.

I believe that everyone should read this book, epecially if you think that welfare recipients are free loaders who don't want to work. Some of the women portrayed in the book were tragic victims of a system that couldn't or wouldn't help them. Others had just had some bad luck, and still others were ones that could almost fit the stereotype. You learn much about the real women and families that face this harsh reality every day of their lives - one that seems distant from our middle class existence.

This is a very well written study of the realities of welfare in the United States that thoughtfully considers the values behind our policies and approaches to the poor, specifically welfare mothers, whose first-hand accounts, along with those of welfare case workers, feature prominently in her study without making it anecdotal like Nickel and Dimed.

Hays convincingly shows that welfare reform of 1996 was wrongheaded and generally ineffective because it was aimed "correcting" the poor in various capacities without adequately engaging the underlying causes of their poverty, namely a shortage of stable jobs accessible to the poor that pay well enough to help pull them out of poverty.

The government is perpetuating the problem! It's imperative to look at the root of the problems. It's important to look at the fact that having children that you know you can't afford to support is wrong. The women AS WELL AS THE MEN who choose to have "unprotected" sex and get pregnant are being irresponsible. It's time to look at that fact. I feel sorry for people who are in these situations mentioned in the book. But too many of them are doing irresponsible things and we productive taxpayers who also may be struggling to survive without the government's help are having to also support the irresponsible people who are having kids they know they can't afford just because they want to have sex. That's wrong! One does not have to have sex! And if you don't have any money and can't support yourself, you know you can't afford to support children. So don't have sex. Men and women. I know that there are exceptions to this, but it's too true in most cases.

Book arrived in a timely fashion, just as described. Very happy with the condition of the book and how smoothly the transaction went.

This book is extremely informative in the area of welfare reform. I learned a great deal about the current state of the welfare system in the United States. Hays backs up her information with citations and examples, and the book contains many helpful personal anecdotes from welfare recipients themselves. I can't help but notice, however, that the author seems to look unfavorably upon welfare reform.

Although I have since returned this book to the library and cannot directly quote from it, I can point out several instances where Hays implies that welfare reform and restrictions are unnecessary and harmful to welfare recipients. She laments the situation of the single mothers who must pay to have their children cared for by professionals instead of looked after by friends or family members. Hays also seems to dislike the practice of requiring welfare recipients (who are not presently caring for an infant under 18 months of age) to work in order to receive welfare benefits. One is required to start actively searching for a job in order to be on welfare. If a job is not found within a month or two, one is given work for the municipal government or the welfare office. Hays seemed most annoyed that, if one must work for the welfare office, one is not paid a salary in addition to one's welfare benefits. I, however, consider the welfare benefits to be payment in exchange for working at the welfare office. The point of welfare reform was, among other things, to prevent people from getting something for nothing.