The fourth goal of PRWORA emphasizes provisions to promote marriage, reduce out-of-wedlock childbearing, and encourage parental responsibility for their children. The law requires teenage welfare recipients to attend school and live with their parents or other responsible adults. PRWORA also allows states to institute a "family cap" that denies additional benefits to families in which more children were born while the families were receiving assistance. States that succeed in reducing non-marital births will receive monetary bonuses.

Much focus has been placed on the goal of marriage promotion. Since enactment of the law, there have been some problems implementing policies that directly affect marriage per se. Most state efforts to date have focused on moving previously welfare-dependent mothers into the paid labor force rather than specifically affecting marriage.

The welfare program has been criticized for having financial disincentives that discourage marriage. Although some of these disincentives have been removed since 1996 (for example, most states have removed the 100-hour rule that made low-income married couples, but not single-parent households, ineligible for welfare if one adult in the household worked more than 100 hours the previous month, even if the earnings were not enough to lift the family out of poverty), many of these disincentives remain. A low-wage mother who marries another low-wage earner typically moves into an earnings range that reduces eligibility for the EITC. 17 states have different rules under TANF for two-parent than for one-parent families, even when both have similarly low incomes.

Additional Resources on Child/Family Policy

Selected Summary Findings in Brief

Minnesota Family Investment Program (MDRC):

• Removal of financial disincentives for marriage can positively affect marriage rates and stability.
• After a seven year follow-up, MFIP decreased divorce by about 25% among two-parent recipient families.
  
• For those who were married at study entry, MFIP increased marital stability by decreasing divorce.
• Among cohabiting couples, the cumulative rate of ever marrying during the seven year follow-up period was similar for the MFIP and AFDC groups. However, cohabiting MFIP couples were 66% less likely to divorce than cohabiting couples in AFDC.

Canada's Self-Sufficiency Project (SRDC):

• SSP increased the number of single parents who subsequently married or were in common-law relationships in New Brunswick by about 20 percent, but reduced marriage and common-law relationships in British Columbia by a similar amount.

Delaware's A Better Chance Program (Abt):

• Results showed little evidence of any impacts on marriage, marriage expectations, and nonmarital cohabitation across the entire sample.
• Within subgroups, a statistically significant (p.05) positive effect on marital cohabitation was observed among women under age 25 and among those with less than 12 years of school.
• ABC had no sample-wide impact on actual fertility and a small, statistically insignificant result on stated desire to have more children.

California Work Pays Demonstration Project (UC Berkeley):

• It was found that a regime of lower benefits and higher work incentives had �sizeable and statistically significant effects on marriage behavior,� consisting of a treatment-control difference of seven percentage points in marriage rates. This effect was observed in the decision to remain married, with little effect observed on the probability that single-parent recipients marry. The effects on married recipients became larger over time, suggesting the possibility of long-run effects

Iowa Family Investment Program (Mathematica):

• The impact on marriage was negative for women who started receiving welfare after the reforms began and were not married when they applied for assistance. Those in the welfare reform program were 8 percent less likely than those in the traditional program to be married at follow-up, and they experienced more instability in their relationships. Researchers also noted negative impacts on some measures of family and child well-being, such as financial strain, doubling up of households, domestic abuse, and school engagement of children.