After five years and $15 billion in new services for the poor, only a fraction of all parents on welfare would be nudged into the work force under the Clinton administration's draft strategy.
President Clinton raised expectations for sweeping reform when he promised during his campaign to "end welfare as we know it" and require all able-bodied recipients to take a job after two years on the rolls.His aides, however, have drafted a plan that initially exempts two-thirds of all parents on welfare from any time limits or work requirements, covering only those born after 1972.
And it takes years before significant numbers of welfare recipients are pushed into a private job or a subsidized work program.
At the end of the plan's first five years, just 200,000 of the estimated 1.67 million young families who will be covered by the new welfare system will either leave the rolls because of various reforms in day care, welfare and health care, or have a parent working in a subsidized job.