In recent years, Congressional leaders on both sides of the aisle have expressed interest in updating the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program to better measure how well the program supports employment outcomes for program participants.
The shift from measuring process to measuring outcomes is consistent with broader Congressional efforts to align performance measures across federally funded education, workforce, and human services programs, and if adopted would offer states and other stakeholder’s significant opportunities to connect low-income individuals to the skills and credentials that are in demand in today’s labor market.
Measuring What Matters: Shifting TANF to an outcome-based model provides some key background on the rationale for aligned outcomes measures and outlines some key considerations for federal and state policymakers as they look to adopt similar measures for TANF and other public assistance programs.
