THE INHERENT CONTRADICTION OF WELFARE REFORM.

Recurring efforts to reform welfare over the last twenty years have met with repeated failure. But on the last day of September 1988, the U.S. Congress passed what many proponents claim is a historic change in the nation's approach to dealing with dependent families. The new welfare reform legislation is thought to represent a new consensus for dealing with poverty and dependency among the able-bodied--a consensus that had previously been lacking. This paper reviews the approaches of past reform efforts which failed to unite competing views of the problems and appropriate interventions.