Kristin S Seefeldt
Biographic Data
| ID | 215463 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Kristin S Seefeldt |
| GIVEN NAMES | Kristin S |
| FAMILY NAME | Seefeldt |
| SIGNATURE | SEEFELDT K S |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Michigan |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-3408-0729 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 25 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 398 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 25 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2000 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 11 |
Are We the Welfare Office? Managing Administrative Burden in a Guaranteed-Income Pilot
Despite increased attention to the phenomenon of administrative burdens, we know less about efforts to minimize these burdens, particularly how those efforts affect frontline staff. This article addresses the gap by analyzing documents gathered and generated by the authors as they implemented a guaranteed-income pilot in Ann Arbor, Michigan, intentionally designed to lessen administrative burdens on applicants. The findings highlight the challeng…
Making Sense of Health-Related Labor-Market Exits and Disability
Issues around stigma and deservingness may be particularly salient for people who stop working due to health-related reasons. Although historically those experiencing disability have been viewed as “deserving” of assistance, disability has also been stigmatized. Using the American Voices Project data and narrative and discourse analysis methods, we ask how those with a health-related labor-market exit make sense of their exit. We find that respon…
Learning From Youth
Summer Youth Employment Programs (SYEPs) help connect youth to opportunities for career exploration, skill development, and mentorship. Despite heightened investment in SYEPs, research regarding positive impacts is limited. Most of the common SYEP evaluation strategies are rooted in deficit thinking and focus on outcomes such as reducing violent crime, risk behaviors, gaps in unemployment, and increasing educational attainment. Despite recent shi…
To Lend or Not to Lend to Friends and Kin
Although family and friends can drain a household’s finances by requesting personal loans, lenders have proven savvy in how they respond to such requests. Beyond identifying the importance of sincerity tests for curtailing the pressure to help others in one’s social circle, the studies of negative social capital do not address why the pressure to lend varies according to the dramaturgical performance strategies of the benefactors. In other words,…
Waiting it out
Waiting is an under-explored area of social stratification and domination. Lower-income Americans frequently endure long waits, including waits to secure social welfare benefits, and these waits may serve the purpose of instilling in clients the need for compliance. Using qualitative interview data, this paper explores how low and moderate-income women in a US state understand their waits for public benefits; how those understanding shape their r…
Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare Vol. 44 No. 2
Serving No One Well: TANF Nearly Twenty Years Later- Kristin S. Seefeldt Barriers to Food Security Experienced by Families Living in Extended Stay Motels- Stephanie Gonzalez Guittar Impact of Short Lifetime Limits on Child Neglect - Vicky N. Albert and William C. King The Policy Nexus: Panhandling, Social Capital and Policy Failure- Amanda R. Tillotson and Laura Lein The Impact of Concentrations of African Americans and Latinos/Latinas on Neighbo…
Serving No One Well
The 1996 welfare reform law transformed the nation’s cash welfare system into a time-limited, work-based program. Welfare caseloads dropped by more than half, but in more recent years and in the wake of the Great Recession, relatively little research has focused on TANF program participation, particularly from the vantage point of clients and potential clients. This paper uses qualitative data from interviews with very low-income single mothers c…
Housing Assistance and Housing Insecurity
This article examines the factors shaping longitudinal patterns of housing insecurity in the wake of the Great Recession, with a focus on whether housing assistance helped renters who received it. We use data from the first two waves (2009-10 and 2011) of the Michigan Recession and Recovery Study, a population-representative sample of working-aged adults from Southeast Michigan. We use detailed reports from renters and other non-homeowners to con…
Low-Income Families in the Context of a Vanishing Safety Net
Welfare reform and expansions to the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), both of which occurred in the late 1990s, changed the amount and the nature of assistance available to low-income families. This essay reviews four books about the experiences of low-income families in the twenty-first century: $2.00 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America by Kathryn J. Edin and H. Luke Shaefer; Ain’t No Trust: How Bosses, Boyfriends, and Bureaucrats Fail Lo…
When There Is No Welfare
Kristin S. Seefeldt, Heather Sandstrom, When There Is No Welfare: The Income Packaging Strategies of Mothers Without Earnings or Cash Assistance Following an Economic Downturn, RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences, Vol. 1, No. 1, Severe Deprivation in America (November 2015), pp. 139-158
From Welfare to a Work‐based Safety Net
Increasing Work Opportunities and Reducing Poverty Two Decades After Welfare Reform
Constant Consumption Smoothing, Limited Investments, and Few Repayments
American households increasingly carry debt. Taking on debt can increase consumption beyond what one’s income can support, it can smooth consumption during periods when income falls, and it can represent an investment in the future. I find that economically vulnerable households take on debt primarily for purposes of consumption smoothing and investment in the future but that, over time, having debt can result in significant financial challenges.…
Social Policy
In this review, we focus on current research on the major welfare program in the United States, food security programs, Social Security, Social Security Disability, Unemployment Insurance, child support, and tax provisions such as the Earned Income Tax Credit that provide substantial financial support for low‐income households and other potentially vulnerable populations such as the elderly and the unemployed. Since many of these are programs spe…
Housing instability and health
Housing Instability Among Current and Former Welfare Recipients
Objectives. We examined correlates of eviction and homelessness among current and former welfare recipients from 1997 to 2003 in an urban Michigan community. Methods. Longitudinal cohort data were drawn from the Women’s Employment Study, a representative panel study of mothers who were receiving cash welfare in February 1997. We used logistic regression analysis to identify risk factors for both eviction and homelessness over the survey period. R…
Failing the Transition from Welfare to Work
Objectives. Although employment among welfare mothers increased substantially following the 1996 welfare reform, some former welfare recipients failed to find stable employment. We review the extent to which low‐income mothers are without work and cash welfare for long periods of time and seek to understand the correlates of becoming chronically disconnected. Methods. We analyze data from a 1997–2003 panel study of single mothers who received cas…
Measuring State Welfare Policy Changes
Objectives. Since the implementation of the 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, many analysts have attempted to measure the effects of new state welfare policies, particularly work requirements, sanctions, and time limits, on the Act's key goals—reducing cash assistance caseloads and increasing employment among single mothers. De Jong et al. present new measures of state policy variations, but they do not attempt…
Watching the Clock Tick
The 1996 welfare reform made extended welfare stays more difficult. One of the most notable provisions was the 60-month lifetime limit on cash benefits through the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) program. This study investigated the personal characteristics associated with accumulating more months on TANF. Using four waves of data from the Women's Employment Study, we examined factors surrounding receipt at varying levels: low (less…
Barriers to Employment and the ‘Hard to Serve’
Falling welfare rolls in the US has focussed attention on those remaining on the caseload, variously termed the ‘hard to serve’ or ‘difficult to employ’. Using data from the first three years of the Women's Employment Study, a sample of TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) recipients drawn in an urban county in Michigan, this article examines the barriers that inhibit people moving off welfare. The analysis indicates that the kinds of s…
Drug testing welfare recipients—false positives, false negatives, unanticipated opportunities
Sanctions and Material Hardship under Tanf
Relatively little is known about families who have been sanctioned since the 1996 Welfare Reform Act. We use panel data from the Women's Employment Survey to examine the predictors of sanctioning and consequences for material hardship among a sample of welfare recipients under the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. Approximately 12 percent reported being sanctioned by fall 1998. Statistically significant predictors include being Afr…
Substance Use among Welfare Recipients
Substance use by welfare recipients is frequently mentioned as a barrier to well‐being and social performance. This article uses nationally representative cross‐sectional data and Michigan‐specific panel data to summarize trends in substance use among AFDC/TANF recipients. It also examines the prevalence of substance dependence within the welfare population. Although almost 20 percent of welfare recipients report recent use of some illicit drug d…
Correlates of Employment Among Welfare Recipients
This study examines whether and how a wide range of potential barriers to work,including psychological characteristics and attitudes, are associated with current employment in a recent sample of welfare recipients in Michigan ( N = 672 ). Psychological factors include measures of depressive symptoms, work attitudes, and perceived risks associated with leaving welfare. Over and above demographic, economic, and contextual factors, positive psycholo…
How Welfare Reform is Affecting Women's Work
The new welfare system mandates participation in work activity. We review the evolution of the 1996 legislation and how states implement welfare reform. We examine evidence on recipients' employment, well-being, and future earnings potential to assess the role of welfare in women's work. Policies rewarding work and penalizing nonwork, such as sanctions, time limits, diversion, and earnings 'disregards,' vary across states. While caseloads fell an…
Housing instability and health
How Welfare Reform is Affecting Women's Work
The new welfare system mandates participation in work activity. We review the evolution of the 1996 legislation and how states implement welfare reform. We examine evidence on recipients' employment, well-being, and future earnings potential to assess the role of welfare in women's work. Policies rewarding work and penalizing nonwork, such as sanctions, time limits, diversion, and earnings 'disregards,' vary across states. While caseloads fell an…
Sanctions and Material Hardship under Tanf
Relatively little is known about families who have been sanctioned since the 1996 Welfare Reform Act. We use panel data from the Women's Employment Survey to examine the predictors of sanctioning and consequences for material hardship among a sample of welfare recipients under the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. Approximately 12 percent reported being sanctioned by fall 1998. Statistically significant predictors include being Afr…
Housing Instability Among Current and Former Welfare Recipients
Objectives. We examined correlates of eviction and homelessness among current and former welfare recipients from 1997 to 2003 in an urban Michigan community. Methods. Longitudinal cohort data were drawn from the Women’s Employment Study, a representative panel study of mothers who were receiving cash welfare in February 1997. We used logistic regression analysis to identify risk factors for both eviction and homelessness over the survey period. R…
Substance Use among Welfare Recipients
Substance use by welfare recipients is frequently mentioned as a barrier to well‐being and social performance. This article uses nationally representative cross‐sectional data and Michigan‐specific panel data to summarize trends in substance use among AFDC/TANF recipients. It also examines the prevalence of substance dependence within the welfare population. Although almost 20 percent of welfare recipients report recent use of some illicit drug d…
Barriers to Employment and the ‘Hard to Serve’
Falling welfare rolls in the US has focussed attention on those remaining on the caseload, variously termed the ‘hard to serve’ or ‘difficult to employ’. Using data from the first three years of the Women's Employment Study, a sample of TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) recipients drawn in an urban county in Michigan, this article examines the barriers that inhibit people moving off welfare. The analysis indicates that the kinds of s…
Failing the Transition from Welfare to Work
Objectives. Although employment among welfare mothers increased substantially following the 1996 welfare reform, some former welfare recipients failed to find stable employment. We review the extent to which low‐income mothers are without work and cash welfare for long periods of time and seek to understand the correlates of becoming chronically disconnected. Methods. We analyze data from a 1997–2003 panel study of single mothers who received cas…
When There Is No Welfare
Kristin S. Seefeldt, Heather Sandstrom, When There Is No Welfare: The Income Packaging Strategies of Mothers Without Earnings or Cash Assistance Following an Economic Downturn, RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences, Vol. 1, No. 1, Severe Deprivation in America (November 2015), pp. 139-158
Constant Consumption Smoothing, Limited Investments, and Few Repayments
American households increasingly carry debt. Taking on debt can increase consumption beyond what one’s income can support, it can smooth consumption during periods when income falls, and it can represent an investment in the future. I find that economically vulnerable households take on debt primarily for purposes of consumption smoothing and investment in the future but that, over time, having debt can result in significant financial challenges.…
Housing Assistance and Housing Insecurity
This article examines the factors shaping longitudinal patterns of housing insecurity in the wake of the Great Recession, with a focus on whether housing assistance helped renters who received it. We use data from the first two waves (2009-10 and 2011) of the Michigan Recession and Recovery Study, a population-representative sample of working-aged adults from Southeast Michigan. We use detailed reports from renters and other non-homeowners to con…
Correlates of Employment Among Welfare Recipients
This study examines whether and how a wide range of potential barriers to work,including psychological characteristics and attitudes, are associated with current employment in a recent sample of welfare recipients in Michigan ( N = 672 ). Psychological factors include measures of depressive symptoms, work attitudes, and perceived risks associated with leaving welfare. Over and above demographic, economic, and contextual factors, positive psycholo…
Watching the Clock Tick
The 1996 welfare reform made extended welfare stays more difficult. One of the most notable provisions was the 60-month lifetime limit on cash benefits through the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) program. This study investigated the personal characteristics associated with accumulating more months on TANF. Using four waves of data from the Women's Employment Study, we examined factors surrounding receipt at varying levels: low (less…
From Welfare to a Work‐based Safety Net
Social Policy
In this review, we focus on current research on the major welfare program in the United States, food security programs, Social Security, Social Security Disability, Unemployment Insurance, child support, and tax provisions such as the Earned Income Tax Credit that provide substantial financial support for low‐income households and other potentially vulnerable populations such as the elderly and the unemployed. Since many of these are programs spe…
Making Sense of Health-Related Labor-Market Exits and Disability
Issues around stigma and deservingness may be particularly salient for people who stop working due to health-related reasons. Although historically those experiencing disability have been viewed as “deserving” of assistance, disability has also been stigmatized. Using the American Voices Project data and narrative and discourse analysis methods, we ask how those with a health-related labor-market exit make sense of their exit. We find that respon…
Increasing Work Opportunities and Reducing Poverty Two Decades After Welfare Reform
Learning From Youth
Summer Youth Employment Programs (SYEPs) help connect youth to opportunities for career exploration, skill development, and mentorship. Despite heightened investment in SYEPs, research regarding positive impacts is limited. Most of the common SYEP evaluation strategies are rooted in deficit thinking and focus on outcomes such as reducing violent crime, risk behaviors, gaps in unemployment, and increasing educational attainment. Despite recent shi…
Serving No One Well
The 1996 welfare reform law transformed the nation’s cash welfare system into a time-limited, work-based program. Welfare caseloads dropped by more than half, but in more recent years and in the wake of the Great Recession, relatively little research has focused on TANF program participation, particularly from the vantage point of clients and potential clients. This paper uses qualitative data from interviews with very low-income single mothers c…
Low-Income Families in the Context of a Vanishing Safety Net
Welfare reform and expansions to the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), both of which occurred in the late 1990s, changed the amount and the nature of assistance available to low-income families. This essay reviews four books about the experiences of low-income families in the twenty-first century: $2.00 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America by Kathryn J. Edin and H. Luke Shaefer; Ain’t No Trust: How Bosses, Boyfriends, and Bureaucrats Fail Lo…
Measuring State Welfare Policy Changes
Objectives. Since the implementation of the 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, many analysts have attempted to measure the effects of new state welfare policies, particularly work requirements, sanctions, and time limits, on the Act's key goals—reducing cash assistance caseloads and increasing employment among single mothers. De Jong et al. present new measures of state policy variations, but they do not attempt…
How Welfare Reform is Affecting Women's Work
The new welfare system mandates participation in work activity. We review the evolution of the 1996 legislation and how states implement welfare reform. We examine evidence on recipients' employment, well-being, and future earnings potential to assess the role of welfare in women's work. Policies rewarding work and penalizing nonwork, such as sanctions, time limits, diversion, and earnings 'disregards,' vary across states. While caseloads fell an…
Correlates of Employment Among Welfare Recipients
This study examines whether and how a wide range of potential barriers to work,including psychological characteristics and attitudes, are associated with current employment in a recent sample of welfare recipients in Michigan ( N = 672 ). Psychological factors include measures of depressive symptoms, work attitudes, and perceived risks associated with leaving welfare. Over and above demographic, economic, and contextual factors, positive psycholo…
Drug testing welfare recipients—false positives, false negatives, unanticipated opportunities
Sanctions and Material Hardship under Tanf
Relatively little is known about families who have been sanctioned since the 1996 Welfare Reform Act. We use panel data from the Women's Employment Survey to examine the predictors of sanctioning and consequences for material hardship among a sample of welfare recipients under the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. Approximately 12 percent reported being sanctioned by fall 1998. Statistically significant predictors include being Afr…
Substance Use among Welfare Recipients
Substance use by welfare recipients is frequently mentioned as a barrier to well‐being and social performance. This article uses nationally representative cross‐sectional data and Michigan‐specific panel data to summarize trends in substance use among AFDC/TANF recipients. It also examines the prevalence of substance dependence within the welfare population. Although almost 20 percent of welfare recipients report recent use of some illicit drug d…
Barriers to Employment and the ‘Hard to Serve’
Falling welfare rolls in the US has focussed attention on those remaining on the caseload, variously termed the ‘hard to serve’ or ‘difficult to employ’. Using data from the first three years of the Women's Employment Study, a sample of TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) recipients drawn in an urban county in Michigan, this article examines the barriers that inhibit people moving off welfare. The analysis indicates that the kinds of s…
Watching the Clock Tick
The 1996 welfare reform made extended welfare stays more difficult. One of the most notable provisions was the 60-month lifetime limit on cash benefits through the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) program. This study investigated the personal characteristics associated with accumulating more months on TANF. Using four waves of data from the Women's Employment Study, we examined factors surrounding receipt at varying levels: low (less…
Failing the Transition from Welfare to Work
Objectives. Although employment among welfare mothers increased substantially following the 1996 welfare reform, some former welfare recipients failed to find stable employment. We review the extent to which low‐income mothers are without work and cash welfare for long periods of time and seek to understand the correlates of becoming chronically disconnected. Methods. We analyze data from a 1997–2003 panel study of single mothers who received cas…
Measuring State Welfare Policy Changes
Objectives. Since the implementation of the 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, many analysts have attempted to measure the effects of new state welfare policies, particularly work requirements, sanctions, and time limits, on the Act's key goals—reducing cash assistance caseloads and increasing employment among single mothers. De Jong et al. present new measures of state policy variations, but they do not attempt…
Housing Instability Among Current and Former Welfare Recipients
Objectives. We examined correlates of eviction and homelessness among current and former welfare recipients from 1997 to 2003 in an urban Michigan community. Methods. Longitudinal cohort data were drawn from the Women’s Employment Study, a representative panel study of mothers who were receiving cash welfare in February 1997. We used logistic regression analysis to identify risk factors for both eviction and homelessness over the survey period. R…
Housing instability and health
Social Policy
In this review, we focus on current research on the major welfare program in the United States, food security programs, Social Security, Social Security Disability, Unemployment Insurance, child support, and tax provisions such as the Earned Income Tax Credit that provide substantial financial support for low‐income households and other potentially vulnerable populations such as the elderly and the unemployed. Since many of these are programs spe…
When There Is No Welfare
Kristin S. Seefeldt, Heather Sandstrom, When There Is No Welfare: The Income Packaging Strategies of Mothers Without Earnings or Cash Assistance Following an Economic Downturn, RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences, Vol. 1, No. 1, Severe Deprivation in America (November 2015), pp. 139-158
From Welfare to a Work‐based Safety Net
Increasing Work Opportunities and Reducing Poverty Two Decades After Welfare Reform
Constant Consumption Smoothing, Limited Investments, and Few Repayments
American households increasingly carry debt. Taking on debt can increase consumption beyond what one’s income can support, it can smooth consumption during periods when income falls, and it can represent an investment in the future. I find that economically vulnerable households take on debt primarily for purposes of consumption smoothing and investment in the future but that, over time, having debt can result in significant financial challenges.…
Low-Income Families in the Context of a Vanishing Safety Net
Welfare reform and expansions to the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), both of which occurred in the late 1990s, changed the amount and the nature of assistance available to low-income families. This essay reviews four books about the experiences of low-income families in the twenty-first century: $2.00 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America by Kathryn J. Edin and H. Luke Shaefer; Ain’t No Trust: How Bosses, Boyfriends, and Bureaucrats Fail Lo…
Waiting it out
Waiting is an under-explored area of social stratification and domination. Lower-income Americans frequently endure long waits, including waits to secure social welfare benefits, and these waits may serve the purpose of instilling in clients the need for compliance. Using qualitative interview data, this paper explores how low and moderate-income women in a US state understand their waits for public benefits; how those understanding shape their r…
Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare Vol. 44 No. 2
Serving No One Well: TANF Nearly Twenty Years Later- Kristin S. Seefeldt Barriers to Food Security Experienced by Families Living in Extended Stay Motels- Stephanie Gonzalez Guittar Impact of Short Lifetime Limits on Child Neglect - Vicky N. Albert and William C. King The Policy Nexus: Panhandling, Social Capital and Policy Failure- Amanda R. Tillotson and Laura Lein The Impact of Concentrations of African Americans and Latinos/Latinas on Neighbo…
Serving No One Well
The 1996 welfare reform law transformed the nation’s cash welfare system into a time-limited, work-based program. Welfare caseloads dropped by more than half, but in more recent years and in the wake of the Great Recession, relatively little research has focused on TANF program participation, particularly from the vantage point of clients and potential clients. This paper uses qualitative data from interviews with very low-income single mothers c…
Housing Assistance and Housing Insecurity
This article examines the factors shaping longitudinal patterns of housing insecurity in the wake of the Great Recession, with a focus on whether housing assistance helped renters who received it. We use data from the first two waves (2009-10 and 2011) of the Michigan Recession and Recovery Study, a population-representative sample of working-aged adults from Southeast Michigan. We use detailed reports from renters and other non-homeowners to con…
To Lend or Not to Lend to Friends and Kin
Although family and friends can drain a household’s finances by requesting personal loans, lenders have proven savvy in how they respond to such requests. Beyond identifying the importance of sincerity tests for curtailing the pressure to help others in one’s social circle, the studies of negative social capital do not address why the pressure to lend varies according to the dramaturgical performance strategies of the benefactors. In other words,…
Learning From Youth
Summer Youth Employment Programs (SYEPs) help connect youth to opportunities for career exploration, skill development, and mentorship. Despite heightened investment in SYEPs, research regarding positive impacts is limited. Most of the common SYEP evaluation strategies are rooted in deficit thinking and focus on outcomes such as reducing violent crime, risk behaviors, gaps in unemployment, and increasing educational attainment. Despite recent shi…
Making Sense of Health-Related Labor-Market Exits and Disability
Issues around stigma and deservingness may be particularly salient for people who stop working due to health-related reasons. Although historically those experiencing disability have been viewed as “deserving” of assistance, disability has also been stigmatized. Using the American Voices Project data and narrative and discourse analysis methods, we ask how those with a health-related labor-market exit make sense of their exit. We find that respon…
Are We the Welfare Office? Managing Administrative Burden in a Guaranteed-Income Pilot
Despite increased attention to the phenomenon of administrative burdens, we know less about efforts to minimize these burdens, particularly how those efforts affect frontline staff. This article addresses the gap by analyzing documents gathered and generated by the authors as they implemented a guaranteed-income pilot in Ann Arbor, Michigan, intentionally designed to lessen administrative burdens on applicants. The findings highlight the challeng…
Political science (20 works) · Economics (19 works) · Welfare (19 works) · Psychology (14 works) · Sociology (14 works) · Gender, Labor, and Family Dynamics (12 works) · Welfare reform (12 works) · Demographic economics (11 works) · Law (11 works) · Employment and Welfare Studies (10 works)