Patsy T. Mink: “Mr. Speaker, there is so much that needs to be said about this issue, but I would like to inform the last speaker that…”

“Mr. Speaker, there is so much that needs to be said about this issue, but I would like to inform the last speaker that the unfunded mandate in this bill would cost the State of New Jersey about $233 million. That is the financial aspect of it. The human aspect is what I want to address. The people that get up and say what a wonderful thing has happened under the 1996 bill because half of the families have been removed from welfare, we cannot deny those statistics, they remain there. But what has happened to those families? No one can tell us whether indeed they are still working, whether they are out of poverty. Most of the figures we have seen is that those that still work, work for minimum wage. I dare say that people working for minimum wage are not out of poverty. In fact, we have 38 million people considered in poverty. So, with the requirements today of 30-hours mandated work activity and all of these rave reports about the success of the program acknowledging that the States have done most of this good work, why in the world would the Republicans now want to come and make the work requirement tougher? Why increase the 30 hours to 40 hours? It pays no account to the 2 million families that are on welfare today who are struggling.”