Welfare & Entitlements News

The Daily Signal covers welfare and entitlements with conservative reporting on SNAP and food stamp programs, Medicaid expansion, work requirement battles, poverty reduction strategies, fraud prevention, and the ongoing debate between compassionate reform and perpetual government dependency.
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  • news

    Trump Administration’s 2 Priorities for Welfare Reform Executive Order
    President Donald Trump is making welfare reform a major priority and will sign an executive order laying out the administration’s goals while also urging action by Congress, a White House official said Thursday. Trump’s executive order will be twofold, said Paul Winfree, director of budget policy at the White House. The order will state the…
    Fred Lucas
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  • news

    Trump: Tax Reform ‘Will Lift Our People From Welfare to Work’
    President Donald Trump promoted his tax reform plan at The Heritage Foundation’s President’s Club, and also touted American values, the Constitution, and “God-given rights.” “We will lift our people from welfare to work, from dependence to independence, and from poverty to total beautiful prosperity,” Trump told an audience of about 1,000 people Tuesday night gathered…
    Fred Lucas
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  • opinion

    Obama Gutted Work Requirements for Welfare. Why Trump Is Right to Restore Them.
    President Donald Trump on Wednesday reversed an Obama administration policy that undermined one of the most successful domestic policy reforms in the last half-century. In doing so, Trump took strong steps to preserve the original intent of the 1996 welfare reform law: to weaken the cycle of poverty by reducing dependence and promoting self-sufficiency through…
    Robert Rector | Vijay Menon
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  • news

    Failed Welfare State an Opportunity for Conservatives, ‘Hillbilly’ Writer Argues
    Liberals built a welfare state that doesn’t offer upward mobility to Americans trapped in poverty, “Hillbilly Elegy” author J.D. Vance says, and conservatives should step forward and chart “a new direction” in government policy. The best-selling writer, speaking Thursday at The Heritage Foundation for the think tank’s release of its 2017 Index of Culture and…
    Ken McIntyre
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  • opinion

    Senate Health Care Bill Could Be Greatest Entitlement Reform in a Generation
    The Senate health care bill (the Better Care Reconciliation Act of 2017) would fundamentally reform federal Medicaid payment. As Washington Post columnist George Will has written, the bill’s Medicaid provisions, as crafted by Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., “makes it this century’s most significant domestic policy reform.” Will is correct. Medicaid financing needs reform. Jointly financed…
    Robert Moffit
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  • opinion

    CBO Analysis of Trump Budget Shows Need for Entitlement Reform, Pro-Growth Tax Policies
    The Congressional Budget Office released its analysis of President Donald Trump’s budget request last week, and it wasn’t good news. The report paints a stark picture of the proposal compared to the administration’s findings, showing that the president’s budget would never reach balance. In the report, the CBO uses different criteria and assumptions than the…
    Justin Bogie
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  • opinion

    We Hear You: The Minimum Wage, Welfare, Medicaid … and Walling Off the Eiffel Tower
    Editor's note: Jarrett Stepman's commentaries for The Daily Signal ring bells with readers. See for yourself in this selection of responses.—Ken McIntyre Dear Daily Signal: Jarrett Stepman writes in opposition to Seattle's having raised the minimum wage: "Lincoln saw the ‘opportunity society’ and reaping the fruits of one’s labor as fundamental to the growth and…
    Ken McIntyre
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  • opinion

    Why the Left Is Wrong About Welfare Reform
    Welfare reform is becoming an issue again and the left isn’t happy about it. Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, recently proposed a bill, backed by the conservative House Freedom Caucus, that would increase work requirements for those on welfare, as well as create billions of dollars in savings for taxpayers. This would be the most significant…
    Jarrett Stepman
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  • opinion

    Welfare Currently Punishes Work and Marriage. This Bill Would End That.
    There is much to celebrate in America today. Americans are, on average, wealthier, healthier, and better educated than we ever have been. We’ve made huge strides in civil rights and racial equality. And we have access to technology that would have awed past generations. But fundamentally, our culture and way of life has undergone some…
    Sen. Mike Lee
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  • news

    House Conservatives Ready to ‘Go Big’ on Tax Reform That Includes Welfare Reform
    The House Freedom Caucus wants to “go big” on a tax reform package to include welfare reforms, but likely wouldn’t include a tax on imports, or a border adjustment tax. “There is not consensus for the border adjustment tax,” Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C., said Friday during a panel of four House Freedom Caucus members at…
    Fred Lucas
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  • news

    House Conservatives Float Ideas for Tax Overhaul, Welfare Reform
    Members of the most conservative caucus in the House of Representatives are ready to share their vision for a tax overhaul, welfare reform, and other legislative priorities. Tax reform is overdue, Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C., chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, said in a statement provided to The Daily Signal. “American voters have demanded a…
    Rachel del Guidice
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  • news

    The Major Entitlement Overhaul That Could Be Part of Trump’s Budget
    President Donald Trump’s budget proposal, to be rolled out Tuesday, likely will include Medicaid reform. But with several approaches having been floated, definitive answers will have to wait until the White House releases the fiscal plan. During his Senate confirmation hearings in January, Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price said he would look at…
    Fred Lucas
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  • news

    Freedom Caucus Members Stress Importance of Entitlement Reform
    Several members of the House Freedom Caucus shared their concern for the future of entitlement reform, emphasizing disappointment that it was not a part of President Donald Trump’s newly released budget. Reps. Raúl Labrador, R-Idaho; Mark Meadows, R-N.C.; and Louie Gohmert, R-Texas; expressed support for entitlement reform at a monthly Capitol Hill gathering. Trump’s budget…
    James Rogers
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  • opinion

    Taking the First Step Toward Welfare Reform
    Since President Lyndon Johnson launched the War on Poverty in 1964, the federal government has spent over $22 trillion on means-tested welfare programs. And what do we have to show for it? When the official poverty rate was introduced in 1969, an estimated 12.8 percent of Americans were in poverty. Today, that number has risen…
    Sen. Mike Lee
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  • news

    Conservative Lawmakers Say Current Welfare System Is ‘Anti-Family’
    With a new Republican administration in tow, conservative lawmakers are renewing their call for welfare reform that incentivizes families rather than punishing them. “When we look at what we want for our society, when we look at the key ingredients that have to be contained within any thriving civilization, there are a couple of common…
    Kelsey Bolar
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  • opinion

    Cartoon: Welfare’s Ball and Chain
    Michael Ramirez
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  • opinion

    3 Reasons Congress Can Defeat Corporate Welfare This Fall
    Last December, lobbyists successfully resurrected one of their favorite corporate cash cows: the U.S. Export-Import Bank, a government agency dedicated to subsidizing wealthy and well-connected businesses at the taxpayers’ expense. But those special interests didn’t get everything they wanted. For all of this year, the Ex-Im Bank hasn’t had a full board of directors—meaning it hasn’t…
    Andy Koenig
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  • opinion

    20 Years Ago, Welfare Reform Was Signed Into Law. Here’s What We’ve Learned.
    Two decades ago, President Bill Clinton signed one of the most successful public policies into law: welfare reform. It was called the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act—and its results were dramatic. Watch to learn more.
    Genevieve Wood
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  • opinion

    Did Welfare Reform Really Throw 3.5 Million Children Into Third World Poverty? The Facts May Surprise You
    Today is the 20th anniversary of welfare reform. Two decades ago, President Bill Clinton signed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, known as welfare reform, into law. The highly popular reform cut welfare caseloads by over 50 percent, sharply boosted the employment of the least-skilled single mothers, and pushed the poverty rates of…
    Robert Rector | Jamie Bryan Hall
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  • opinion

    Marriage Reduces Child Poverty, but Our Welfare System Penalizes Marriage
    According to a recently released study from the American Enterprise Institute, 82 percent of lower-middle-class families with young children face “marriage penalties” in the welfare system. Couples who marry would lose all or some of their welfare benefits because their combined income is often greater than each of their independent incomes. The study found that…
    Paul Draper | Rachel Sheffield
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