What do welfare recipients need to do? The public's most common answer is "Just get a job."
But when cold, hunger and homelessness threaten your children, securing today's needs can take precedence over job search, training, or planning for the future. Every waking moment must be devoted to the struggle to survive.
The truth is that present welfare benefit levels in Missouri are too low for survival. A family of three in our state currently receives a maximum cash grant of $292 monthly, and maximum food stamps of $329. That $621 in monthly income leaves the family at barely half of the $1,138 monthly federal poverty level for such a family. Imagine trying to pay rent and utilities with $292 monthly.
The goal of such miserly benefits is supposedly to create an incentive for work. But inadequate benefits actually trap families on welfare. Welfare policies punish welfare recipients for reporting earned income, withdrawing aid before families even come up to the poverty level. Welfare recipients can begin to lose benefits after as little as $121 in earnings.
As a result, many parents receiving welfare benefits have felt pushed into working "under the table" in order to combine enough income and benefits to survive. This causes guilt and fear, since the welfare recipient can be prosecuted for lying about her or his earnings.
Despite considerable tinkering with the welfare program over the past few years, the present system continues mistakes of the old system. Currently, however, there is reason for optimism here in Missouri. The "welfare that works, work that pays" measure being considered before the General Assembly includes provisions that may offer solutions for some of the system's entrenched problems.
One provision would reward welfare recipients for work by changing earnings rules. Recipients would be able to keep $2 of each $3 earned until family earnings reach the poverty level.
More than 40 states have already acted to expand earnings rules to support work efforts. Illinois and Minnesota are among states reporting positive results from such a rules change. If such a policy were adopted in Missouri, parents on welfare here could afford to take part-time work that could lay the foundation for full-time employment.
Another provision would get rid of welfare rules that make eligibility requirements tougher for families with two parents at home than for single parents. Such rules are incongruous and unconscionable in a society that claims to support having two parents in the home. About three-quarters of the states have already made this improvement, and Missouri ought to follow their lead.
Still another provision would grant greater flexibility by separating federal block grant funds from state funds. This is important because it would allow state funds to be used to put some clients into programs designed to overcome severe barriers to employment without the stress and danger created by the ticking time clock of current welfare limits.
Under this kind of provision, those who need literacy services or help in dealing with domestic violence, for example, could obtain specialized support while preserving welfare months they might need in the event of unemployment at some time in the future. Under current regulations, indiscriminate use of time limits is fueling depression and anxiety in welfare parents struggling with mental health disorders -- perhaps ten percent of the total caseload.
Successful businesses respect the individuality of each customer and reject one-size-fits-all approaches to service. The current welfare system, however, ignores the diverse circumstances of clients while pressing them into cookie-cutter, time-limited programs. The measure being considered in Jefferson City is aimed at righting this unwise and ultimately unsound practice.
Our legislature is on the right track. Ideas like these are what we need to move Missouri toward a welfare system that is fair, adequate, and empowering. The reality is, if we want welfare that works, then we need to make work pay.
Mott Oxford is a consultant and an anti-racism/anti-poverty educator with Reform Organization of Welfare. 
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