Chris Dodd: “The whole goal, of course, of the underlying bill before us is to move families from welfare to work. That has been the…”

“The whole goal, of course, of the underlying bill before us is to move families from welfare to work. That has been the goal of those who initiated this proposal some time ago. Of course, many of us ask the question how in good conscience we could do that, turn our backs on those who are doing what we asked them to do, and that is to leave the dependency of welfare and to enter the workforce. Yet without the adoption of the Snowe-Dodd amendment, it is quite clear some 450,000 to 500,000 children who are presently receiving childcare assistance would have to be dropped from receiving childcare assistance. I don't think any of us want to be a party to that at all. Let me further point this out to my colleagues as a backdrop of why the Snowe-Dodd amendment is so critically important. Between 1994 up to 2001, we have seen employment by families headed by single mothers soar from 61 percent to now about 75 percent of single parents with children who are in the workforce. Among low-income mothers with children under the age 6, who have the greatest childcare costs and needs, employment has risen from 44 percent in 1996 to about 60 percent in the year 2000. Let me further point out there are 7 million children every day who go home from school alone, without any kind of afterschool or childcare assistance.”