In recognition of the greater difficulties states face in monitoring and applying program rules to working households and those with immigrant members, USDA in 1998 began to adjust states' QC liabilities to reflect the impact of high or increasing proportions of immigrant or working households in individual states' error rates. This year, these adjustments reduced potential liabilities to just over half of what they otherwise might have been. To allow their staffs to monitor closely the efforts of families being asked to move from welfare to work, many states substantially reduced the caseloads of those staff assigned to their TANF-funded programs. In some instances, this left eligibility workers responsible for food stamps with larger and less manageable caseloads. States had limited ability during calendar year 1999 to reprogram their computer systems to the degree necessary to implement new policies or improve performance in the Food Stamp Program during 1999.
States are likely to be able to realize more benefits from their automated systems in future years.
The improved economy also appears to have complicated states' efforts to improve their administration of the Food Stamp Program in another way. Some states report that the strong job market has made it more difficult to attract and retain skilled eligibility workers. The salaries many states and counties pay their eligibility workers fall well short of those offered by private employers seeking staff with similar abilities. This has meant both that some states have had to settle for less skilled employees and that the better staff members that states hire often leave relatively quickly. Turnover can increase error rates as information a household reports to one eligibility worker may not be passed on to his or her successor.