Its findings highlight the failures of the old system and identify critical issues that public policy must address in the context of a new welfare system which emphasizes work as the path out of poverty. Most striking, perhaps, is the stark contrast it paints between economic conditions in New York City and the rest of the nation. Uncertainty abounds over the long term impact of the new law, especially its five-year time limits on federally funded cash assistance. But at the national level, at least for now, the situation is nearly ideal. The current economic expansion is in its seventh year with no signs of a recession on the horizon.
Unemployment is close to a quarter-century low.
Poverty rates have dropped and welfare rolls have been trimmed, even before the new law has taken effect. If there was ever a time when this change in the welfare system could work, this is surely it. Poverty in New York City finds that many of the city's residents have little to show for all this good news. The national expansion has neither lowered New York City's poverty rate nor lifted its families' incomes. The city has yet to recover all the 436,000 jobs it lost in the last recession and its 10 percent unemployment rate is twice the national average.