Work Commitment and Constraint Among Mothers on Workfare

Bibliographic Data

ID2366414
AuthorsStacey J Oliker (corresponding author)
Year1995
Volume24
Issue2
Pages165-194
Publication date1995-07-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Contemporary Ethnography (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0891-2416 • E-ISSN: 1552-5414
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/089124195024002002
OpenAlexW2080388900
LanguageEN
Citations received21
References cited26

This article reports the findings of a study of single mothers who are mandated to participate in workfare programs. It examines how low-income single mothers become involved in paid work and how the structures of their personal lives and their strategies of parenthood in low-income urban environments shape their economic action. Interviews with workfare participants show how single mothers view their economic field of action and how they interpret economic opportunities and make decisions about work in the context of their obligations and commitments to their children and their close kin. This study extends sociological perspectives on the relationship between work and family life to the study of women on welfare and addresses the shortcomings of poverty policy studies that ignore the family and neighborhood contexts of welfare mothers' economic activity

Action (physics · Constraint (computer-aided design · Context (archaeology · Developmental psychology · Economic growth · Economics · Geography · Poverty · Single mothers · Sociology · Welfare · Welfare reform · Work (physics · Workfare · Employment and Welfare Studies · Gender, Labor, and Family Dynamics · Psychology · Social Psychology · Work-Family Balance Challenges