[Budget of the United States Government]
[V. Preparing For the 21st Century]
[4. Supporting Working Families]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]


 
                     4.  SUPPORTING WORKING FAMILIES

  ----------------------------------------------------------------------

 
 
 
  More and more parents of young children are in the workplace, either because they're single parent households,
or because both parents have to work to make ends meet, or because both parents choose to work and they ought to
have that choice.
 
  But there is no more important responsibility . . . than making sure every American can balance the dual
responsibilities succeeding as parents and succeeding at work. There is no more significant challenge.
 
                                      President Clinton
                                      January 1998
 

  ----------------------------------------------------------------------
  In the final year of this century, the fruits of the President's hard 
work on the economy are evident throughout the Nation, with higher 
wages, lower interest rates, and unemployment at almost record lows. For 
much of the country, this wave of prosperity has provided new 
opportunity. There have been benefits for many, for the college graduate 
starting a career, as well as the long-term welfare recipient taking a 
first job. But we still have more work to do to ensure that this 
economic boom provides equal advantages to all. And for working parents, 
many of whom have benefitted from the opportunities of this growing 
economy, there are also strains as they try to balance the twin demands 
of work and family. The President remains committed to helping working 
families, as well as those who are low-income and at-risk of falling 
into dependency, so that they too can enter the next century with 
justified optimism.
   The Administration will continue efforts to address the needs of 
these Americans--to build a foundation that encourages and supports work 
and responsibility. The President believes that a central challenge we 
face at the dawn of the 21st Century is to help the growing number of 
working parents with young children meet their responsibilities and 
succeed both at work and at home.
   The Administration has already taken significant steps in this 
direction, with a major expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit, a new 
child credit, a boost in the minimum wage, expansions of Head Start, 
after school programs and child care centers, and significantly 
increased participation in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program 
for Women, Infants and Children (WIC). In 1996, the President signed the 
historic Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act 
(PRWORA), reforming the Nation's welfare system into one that requires 
and rewards work and responsibility, provides increased flexibility to 
States to administer work-focused welfare programs, expands funds for 
child care, and strengthens child support enforcement provisions. 
Meanwhile, the economy has created almost 18 million new jobs in the 
past six years, increasing the number of working families, and providing 
new opportunities for those leaving welfare.
   By proposing and working to enact the Family and Medical Leave Act, 
the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, and the 
Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP), this Administration has 
enabled parents to respond to illness in the family without running the 
risk of job loss, to change jobs without forfeiting their health 
insurance, and to secure health insurance for their children when they 
could not otherwise afford it.
   But there are still key areas in which working families need more 
help, especially in finding safe and affordable child care. Last year, 
the President proposed a major child care initiative, with new grants 
and tax credits for working families. His agenda was clear: to ensure 
that low- and middle-

[[Page 76]]

income parents could afford to purchase child care, and to ensure that 
their children entered school ready to learn. Regrettably, despite the 
need for these measures, Congress only took action on a small part of 
this proposal. Because the President remains committed to helping 
parents meet the twin demands of work and family, he will propose a 
comparable Child Care Initiative for 2000.
   In addition, the President will propose measures to help groups of 
low-income and at-risk individuals--homeless and runaway youth, older 
foster care children, legal immigrants, families moving from welfare to 
work, and battered women and their children. The budget will assist over 
100,000 runaways and foster care youth in their efforts to become self-
sufficient, expand and strengthen the network of battered women's 
shelters, strengthen early intervention by the educational system for 
disabled children, provide employment assistance to non-custodial 
parents of children on welfare, and support an array of critical 
services to thousands of low-income families through the Social Services 
Block Grant.

Expanding Child Care

  In 1999, the Administration obtained $173 million to help States 
improve the quality of child care, $10 million for child care research, 
and an increase of $160 million for the Education Department's after-
school/summer school program. The budget proposes a full range of 
further increases and new policies to increase spending and tax 
incentives by $3.6 billion over 1999 (see Table 4-1).

The Child Care Initiative

  More Affordable Child Care: The President proposes to make child care 
more affordable by expanding the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit for 
middle-income families with child care costs and for parents who stay 
home with their young children, providing tax credits for businesses to 
expand their child care resources, assisting parents who want to attend 
college meet their child care needs, and increasing funds with which the 
Child Care and Development Fund can help more poor and near-poor 
children.
   Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit (DCTC): The DCTC Credit helps 
around 5.5 million families cover their child care costs each year. The 
budget proposes to expand the credit so that it offers more help for 
families with incomes below $59,000. The budget also proposes further 
expansion of this tax credit to help parents stay home to raise a young 
child. These two proposals would provide tax credits worth $6.3 billion 
over five years.
  Tax credits for private employers: To make child care services more 
widely available, the budget proposes $500 million in tax credits over 
five years for private employers that expand or operate child care 
facilities, train child care workers, contract with a child care 
facility to provide child care services to employees, or provide child 
care resource and referral services to employees.
  Child Care and Development Fund: Federal child care funding has risen 
by 80 percent under this Administration, providing child care services 
for 1.25 million children from low-income working families or whose 
parents are moving from welfare to work. The budget would increase funds 
for the Child Care and Development Fund by $1.2 billion, to a total of 
$4.5 billion in 2000, and by $7.5 billion over the next five years, 
enabling the program to provide child care subsidies for 500,000 more 
poor and near-poor children in 2000. These new funds, combined with the 
child care funds provided in welfare reform beginning in 1997, will 
enable the program to serve 2.4 million children by 2004, an increase of 
over one million since 1997.
   College campus-based child care: To help increase low-income parents' 
access to higher education, the budget includes $5 million for the new 
Child Care Access Means Parents in School program to establish and 
support child care services on college campuses. States may also use a 
share of the Child Care and Development Fund for this purpose.
   Exclusion of employer contributions for child care expenses: Under 
current law, parents can exclude up to $5,000 of employer-provided child 
care expenses from their taxable income and Social Security earnings. 
The exclusion

[[Page 77]]

  ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Table 4-1.  THE BUDGET SUPPORTS A $3.6 BILLION INCREASE IN RESOURCES FOR
                    CHILD CARE, 27 PERCENT OVER 1999
             (Budget authority, dollar amounts in millions)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                       Dollar    Percent
                                    1999      2000     Change:   Change:
                                  Estimate  Proposed   1999 to   1999 to
                                                        2000      2000
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Spending:
  Discretionary and Mandatory
   Budget Authority:
     Child Care, including $183
     million increase for
     quality activities and
     research \1\...............     3,167     3,550      +383      +12%
     Child Care Supplement......  ........     1,155    +1,155        NA
     Head Start.................     4,660     5,267      +607      +13%
     Early Learning Fund........  ........       600      +600        NA
     21st Century Community
     Learning Centers...........       200       600      +400     +200%
     Special Education..........     5,334     5,450      +116       +2%
     College Campus-Based Child
     Care.......................  ........         5        +5        NA
     Child Care Apprenticeship
     Program....................         4         5        +1      +25%
     Developmental Disabilities
     Special Projects, State
     Support Systems............         4         4  ........         *
                                 ---------------------------------------
    Total Spending..............    13,369    16,636    +3,267      +24%
 
New Tax Expenditures:
   Expansion of Child and
   Dependent Care Tax Credit,
   Including Assistance to Stay-
   At-Home Parents \2\..........  ........       338      +338        NA
  Tax Credits to Private
   Employers....................  ........        40       +40        NA
                                 ---------------------------------------
    Total Tax Expenditures......  ........       378      +378        NA
                                 ---------------------------------------
      Total.....................    13,369    17,014    +3,645     +27%
------------------------------------------------------------------------
NA = Not applicable.
 
 * Less than 0.5 percent
 
 \1\ Includes discretionary Child Care and Development Block Grant and
  mandatory Child Care Entitlement to States.
 
 \2\ Includes elimination of household maintenance test.

   will provide nearly $8 billion in benefits over five years.----------
   Helping meet the cost of raising a child: The Child Credit, which the 
President proposed and Congress enacted as part of the 1997 Taxpayer 
Relief Act, helps working parents raise their children by providing $500 
per child for all children under age 17. The credit, which will provide 
nearly $93 billion in tax benefits over the next five years, will help 
26 million families with over 40 million children.

  New Emphasis on Early Learning: The budget provides new funds to 
improve the safety and well-being of young children, including the new 
Early Learning Fund that grew out of the White House Conference on Early 
Childhood Development and Learning and continued expansion of the highly 
successful Head Start program.
   Early Learning Fund: The Early Learning Fund responds to the 
scientific research presented at the White House Conference on Early 
Child Development and Learning in April 1997, indicating that a child's 
experiences in the first three years of life profoundly affect his or 
her brain development. The budget proposes $3 billion over five years 
for the Fund, which would provide grants to communities for activities 
that improve early childhood education and the quality

[[Page 78]]

and safety of child care for children under five years old. For example, 
the money can fund innovative efforts to meet the developmental needs of 
children, with a focus on language development, emergent literacy, and 
other child development activities aimed at improving readiness for 
school. Resources could also fund parent education in child development, 
home visits, and efforts to help child care centers become accredited 
and reduce child-to-staff ratios in child care.
  Head Start: Head Start, one of the President's highest priorities, is 
America's premier early childhood development program. It supports 
working families by helping parents get involved in their children's 
educational lives and providing services to the entire family. Since 
1993, the President has worked with Congress to increase annual Head 
Start funding by 68 percent. In 1999, Head Start will serve 835,000 low-
income children, including up to 38,000 children under age three in the 
Early Head Start component that the President launched in 1995. The 
budget proposes to expand Head Start funding by $607 million in 2000 and 
add 35,000 Head Start pre-school slots and 7,000 Early Head Start slots. 
The Administration intends to increase participation by underrepresented 
groups in specifically targeted areas with recent influxes of immigrants 
and limited English proficient children, including seasonal farmworkers. 
The proposed increase invests in program quality improvement measures 
and makes further progress toward the President's goal of enrolling a 
million children in Head Start by 2002, including doubling the number of 
infants and toddlers in Early Head Start.

  School-Age Care and Improved Educational Achievement: The President 
proposed, and Congress agreed in 1999, to expand 21st Century Community 
Learning Centers to enable 1,700 schools to open their doors before and 
after the traditional school day and in the summer. Instead of returning 
to empty houses, or playing on unsafe streets, a quarter of a million 
children will participate in safe, drug-free programs that combine 
learning, enrichment, and recreational activities. The budget proposes 
to triple funding for this program to $600 million, reaching nearly 
7,500 schools, as part of a comprehensive approach to help fix failing 
schools and help end social promotion the way successful schools do it--
without harming the children. Under the President's proposal, school 
districts with comprehensive policies in place to end social promotion 
will receive priority in the grant-making process. After-school and 
summer school programs are a critical tool in ending social promotion 
because they give students who are not on track an opportunity to get 
extra help so they can meet promotion standards.
  Safety and Quality in Child Care: The President and Congress worked 
together to pass legislation to improve the safety of children by making 
it easier for States to conduct background checks on child care workers 
and to provide new funds for child care quality activities in 2000.
   National crime prevention and privacy compact: Congress recently 
passed legislation, based on a proposal from the White House Conference 
on Child Care, to help build a new electronic information sharing 
partnership among Federal and State law enforcement. This legislation 
makes background checks on child care providers (and other non-criminal 
justice checks) more efficient and accurate by eliminating some of the 
barriers that have made it difficult for States to share information 
about the criminal backgrounds of job seekers.
   Increasing investments in child care quality: In response to the 
President's request, Congress provided an increase for 2000 of $173 
million for child care quality activities, in addition to the nearly 
$132 million that will already be available for these activities in 
2000. States invest these dollars in improving child care quality 
through activities such as resource and referral for parents, 
scholarships and training for child care providers, monitoring and 
inspection of providers, networks for family day care providers, and 
linkages with Head Start, to name a few.

  Services for Families of Children with Disabilities: Children with 
disabilities and their families face a broad range of obstacles to 
achieving educational success. Ensuring that the educational needs of 
the youngest children with disabilities are fully met is critical to the 
Administration. (For a discussion of the Administration's work 
incentives initia

[[Page 79]]

tive for disabled individuals, see Chapter 3, ``Investing in Education 
and Training.'')
   Special Education: The budget proposes $5.4 billion for special 
education, including an increase over last year's budget of $116 million 
targeted toward improving educational results for children with 
disabilities through early intervention. These new funds provide a $50 
million initiative to help schools implement research-based practices to 
serve children with disabilities in the primary grades. The budget also 
provides increases of $28 million for Preschool Grants and $20 million 
to the Infants and Families program.
   Families of Children with Disabilities: The budget continues a $4 
million program proposed last year by the President and funded by 
Congress to help the families of children with disabilities. This 
program provides grants to States to expand and modify their State-wide 
support systems to help these families address such problems as 
inadequate child care options, missed job training and job 
opportunities, the loss of medical assistance, and teen pregnancy.

  Research on Childhood Development and Child Care: Research on child 
care, and dissemination of its findings, is critical to support State 
and local policy makers in their decision-making about child care and to 
help parents learn how to evaluate and where to find quality child care. 
At the President's request, Congress has already provided $10 million 
for a new Research and Evaluation Fund in 2000, which will provide 
consumer education, parent hotlines, and research activities to expand 
our knowledge of good policies and practices, including the types of 
child care settings, parent activities, and provider training that most 
benefit the early development of children.

Promoting Self-Sufficiency

  Supporting Children Leaving Foster Care: An estimated 20,000 children 
leave foster care each year having reached the age of 18 without being 
adopted or finding another permanent relationship. These youth are 
troubled. Studies that examined former foster youth two to four years 
after leaving care found that only half had completed high school, less 
than half were employed and only about 40 percent had held a job for one 
year or more. One-fourth had been homeless at least one night, 60 
percent of the females had given birth, and fewer than one-in-five were 
completely self-supporting.
  The budget provides a four-part program to support children leaving 
the foster care system:
  Independent living. This program provides services to assist 
          current and former foster children ages 16 to 21 who are 
          making the transition to independence by earning a high school 
          degree or participating in vocational or other training. The 
          budget provides $105 million, a 50-percent increase over the 
          1999 level, which has been unchanged since 1992.
  Comprehensive residential transition assistance. The budget 
          provides a new capped mandatory program of competitive grants 
          for States to support living expenses of youth in these 
          programs who otherwise lose such support at age 18 or under 
          other circumstances. The new program is funded in 2000 at $5 
          million, increasing to $20 million by 2003.
  Transitional living grants. This program provides shelter and 
          services to homeless youth ages 16 to 21. The budget increases 
          funding to $20 million, an increase of $5 million over 1999.
  Medicaid coverage. Medicaid coverage for children receiving 
          foster care assistance generally ends at age 18. The lack of 
          health insurance limits their ability to make a successful 
          transition out of foster care. The budget gives States the 
          option of covering these children up to age 21.

  Curtailing Violence Against Women: Since 1993, funding for services to 
victims of domestic and sexual violence has grown by nearly $400 million 
and the passage of the Violence Against Women Act of 1995 expanded the 
Government's role in supporting services and providing scientific 
knowledge to prevent and treat violence against women. The budget 
proposes an increase of $26 million to further strengthen and increase 
the availability of battered women's shelters and counseling services, 
increase culturally appropriate services in under-served populations, 
and expand resources for research and prevention activities

[[Page 80]]

aimed at changing the social norms that allow this violence to occur. 
These new funds will allow programs addressing violence against women to 
serve an additional 40,000 women, children, and perpetrators.

Restoring Equity in Benefits for Legal Immigrants

  The President believes that legal immigrants should have the same 
opportunity, and bear the same responsibility, as other members of 
society. Upon signing the 1996 welfare law, he pledged to work toward 
reversing the harsh, unnecessary cuts in benefits to legal immigrants 
that were unrelated to the goal of moving people from welfare to work. 
As part of the 1997 Balanced Budget Act (BBA), the President worked with 
Congress to restore Medicaid and Supplemental Security Income (SSI) to 
hundreds of thousands of disabled and elderly legal immigrants. The next 
year, the Noncitizens' Benefit Clarification and Other Technical 
Amendments Act restored eligibility to additional legal immigrants. In 
response to the Administration's request, last year's Agricultural 
Research Bill restored food stamp benefits to 225,000 elderly, disabled, 
and other needy immigrants, including 70,000 children who lawfully 
resided in the United States as of August 22, 1996.
  As a result of the 1996 law, however, many legal immigrants, including 
disabled individuals and families with children, are not eligible for 
health and disability benefits. The budget provides $1.1 billion over 
five years to let States provide health care to legal immigrant 
children, to restore SSI eligibility to legal immigrants with 
disabilities, and to restore Food Stamp eligibility to certain aged 
immigrants. The SSI and related Medicaid benefits in the budget that 
apply to immigrants who entered the country after August 1996, and 
became disabled thereafter, would only start after five years of 
residence.

  Health Care: As described in Chapter 5, the budget would let States 
provide health coverage to legal immigrant children and pregnant women 
under Medicaid and, in the case of children, CHIP. Currently, States can 
provide health coverage to legal immigrants who entered the country 
before the welfare law was enacted. But, immigrants who entered after 
the law was enacted cannot get benefits for five years. Under these 
proposals, States could provide health coverage to those children and 
pregnant women through Medicaid or through CHIP.
  Supplemental Security Income (SSI): The budget would provide 
approximately $925 million over five years to restore SSI and related 
Medicaid to legal immigrants who entered the country after August 22, 
1996, lived in the United States for more than five years and became 
disabled after entry. Currently, only legal immigrants who entered the 
country before August 22, 1996 can be found eligible for SSI disability 
benefits.
  Food Stamps: The budget provides $60 million over five years to ensure 
that legal immigrants in the United States as of August 22, 1996, are 
eligible for food stamp benefits once they reach age 65.

Continuing Support for Working Families

  The Child Care Initiative, the restoration of benefits to legal 
immigrants, and expanded efforts to assist low-income families, at-risk 
youth and victims of domestic or sexual violence in attaining self-
sufficiency, all build on a strong base of support for at-risk and 
working families, a priority area in which the President's work with 
Congress has achieved significant results in the past five years. That 
support includes a broad array of tax incentives to encourage and 
support work as well as legislation to, among other things, enable 
workers to care for a newborn and fulfill other family responsibilities; 
raise the minimum wage; reduce welfare caseloads by nearly four million, 
enable workers to retain their health insurance; and provide health 
insurance to up to five million uninsured children. (For the broader 
discussion of the health care expansions, see Chapter 5, ``Strengthening 
Health Care.'')

  Support Through the Tax System: Over the last five years, the 
Administration has worked with Congress to expand the number and size of 
tax incentives to encourage work and support working families (see Table 
4-2).
  Tax incentives for work: The budget proposes to extend, through June 
30, 2000, the Welfare-to-Work Tax Credit, which the President

[[Page 81]]

and Congress created as part of the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997. It 
focuses on those who most need help--long-term welfare recipients--by 
letting employers claim a tax credit on the first $10,000 a year of 
wages that they pay, for up to two years, for workers they hire who were 
long-term welfare recipients. The credit is 35 percent on the first 
year's wages, rising to 50 percent on the second year's wages. In 
addition, the budget would extend through June 30, 2000, the Work 
Opportunity Tax Credit, which provides a credit of 40 percent on the 
first $6,000 of wages paid to members of eight more target groups.
  Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC): The Federal Government is committed 
to helping those who work to meet the cost of raising their children. 
The EITC helps to meet this goal by supplementing the earnings of 
working families. In his 1993 economic program, the President proposed 
and Congress enacted legislation to substantially expand the credit, 
helping 15 million low-income working families. The Administration 
remains committed to ensuring that this program is managed fairly and 
accurately. The Administration is currently implementing a series of 
EITC error-reduction initiatives, including the provisions enacted in 
the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997. The EITC will provide $167 billion of 
tax benefits over the next five years to low-income working families.

  Helping Families Move from Welfare to Work: The President has led 
successful efforts to remove obstacles that have hindered families 
trying to make a successful transition from welfare to self-sufficiency.
  Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF): The President signed 
the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act 
(PRWORA) in 1996, and States have refocused their welfare systems to 
support work. Welfare caseloads have fallen by over four million since 
President Clinton signed the welfare reform law, and by well over 40 
percent since he took office. Recent data from the Census Bureau's 
Current Population Survey show large increases in the rate of employment 
both for individuals on welfare and those leaving welfare. The 
Administration is proposing to replace the current TANF contingency fund 
with one that could more effectively respond to State needs in the event 
of an economic downturn.
  ----------------------------------------------------------------------

 Table 4-2.  THE BUDGET INCLUDES $286 BILLION OVER FIVE YEARS IN SUPPORT FOR FAMILIES WITH CHILDREN THROUGH THE
                                                 TAX SYSTEM \1\
                                            (In millions of dollars)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                       Estimate
                                          1998  ------------------------------------------------------   Total
                                         Actual    1999     2000     2001     2002     2003     2004   1999-2004
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tax Expenditures
Existing Law:
  Earned Income Tax Credit 2, 3.......   28,928   30,734   31,222   32,172   33,258   34,374   35,576    166,602
   Child Tax Credit \2\...............    3,525   19,155   19,253   18,926   18,643   18,198   17,580     92,600
   Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit    2,485    2,455    2,425    2,395    2,365    2,340    2,310     11,835
   Exclusion of Employer Contributions
   for Child Care Expenses............    1,325    1,385    1,445    1,510    1,575    1,645    1,715      7,890
 
Proposed Legislation:
   Expand Child and Dependent Care Tax
   Credit, Including Assistance to
   Stay-At-Home Parents \4\...........  .......  .......      338    1,585    1,425    1,471    1,503      6,322
  Tax Credits for Private Employers...  .......  .......       40       84      114      131      140        509
  Simplify Foster Care Definition
   under EITC.........................  .......  .......       -2      -42      -44      -46      -47       -181
                                       -------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Total.............................   36,263   53,729   54,721   56,630   57,336   58,113   57,777    285,577
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Does not include interaction effects between provisions.
 
\2\ Includes tax expenditures and effect on outlays.
 
\3\ Excludes credit for workers who do not live with children.
 
\3\ Includes elimination of household maintenance test.

  ----------------------------------------------------------------------

[[Page 82]]


  Welfare-to-Work (WtW) Grants: Because of the President's leadership, 
the 1997 Balanced Budget Act included $3 billion requested by the 
President for a new Welfare-to-Work grants program. WtW provides grants 
to States and local communities to help long-term, hard-to-employ 
welfare recipients, and certain non-custodial parents, secure lasting, 
unsubsidized employment. Funds are used for job creation, job placement, 
job retention, and other post-employment support services. The budget 
proposes $1 billion more for this program in 2000.
  Welfare-to-Work Transportation: One of the biggest barriers facing 
people who move from welfare to work--in cities and in rural areas--is 
finding transportation to get to jobs, training programs and child care 
centers. The President's leadership on this issue helped secure funding 
through 2003 to assist States and localities in developing flexible 
transportation alternatives, such as van services, for welfare 
recipients and other low income workers. The budget proposes $150 
million for this program in 2000.
  Welfare-to-Work Housing Vouchers: In his 1999 budget, the President 
proposed $283 million for 50,000 new housing vouchers for welfare 
recipients who need housing assistance to get or keep a job, and 
Congress approved full funding for this new initiative. Families will 
use these housing vouchers to move closer to a new job, to reduce a long 
commute, or to secure more stable housing to eliminate emergencies that 
keep them from getting to work every day on time. The budget proposes 
$144 million for an additional 25,000 vouchers, bringing the total 
number of welfare-to-work vouchers to 75,000 in 2000.
  Individual Development Accounts: Since 1992, President Clinton has 
supported the creation of Individual Development Accounts (IDAs) to 
empower individuals to save for a first home, post-secondary education, 
or to start a new business. The President signed into law last year 
legislation providing $10 million to get the program off the ground. The 
budget provides $20 million for IDAs.
  Social Services Block Grant: The President's Budget proposes to fund 
the Social Services Block Grant (SSBG) at its fully authorized level of 
$2,380 million, increasing funding levels by $471 million over last 
year. SSBG provides funding to States to support a wide range of 
programs including child protection and child welfare, child care, and 
services focused on the needs of the elderly and the disabled. The 
inherent flexibility of this grant permits States to target funds to 
meet the specific needs in their communities. The Administration will 
work with the States to improve reporting and accountability for 
services provided with these funds.

  Continued Nutrition Assistance for Infants and Children: The 
Administration has continued to target resources to infants and 
children. The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants 
and Children (WIC), for example, reached nearly 7.4 million persons each 
month in 1998 and the budget proposes $4.1 billion to serve 7.5 million 
people through 2000, fulfilling the President's goal of full 
participation in WIC. (See Chapter 5, Strengthening Health Care, for 
more information on WIC.)
  Increasing Parental Responsibility Through Child Support Enforcement: 
The President's campaign to ensure that parents support their children 
is working. In 1997, the number of paternities established rose to 
nearly 1.3 million, and child support collections have gone up 80 
percent since the President took office, to an estimated $14.4 billion 
in 1998. In 1998, net Federal costs for child support enforcement were 
$1.2 billion.
  The budget will build on this success by helping Federal authorities 
investigate child support cases and prosecute more parents who fail to 
meet their responsibilities. The budget provides $34 million over five 
years to fund an eightfold increase in U.S. Attorney legal support staff 
dedicated to child support, and additional funds in 2000 to support the 
Department of Health and Human Services' establishment of regional task 
forces to investigate and refer cases for prosecution. To improve the 
child support program's effectiveness and cost efficiency, the budget 
also conforms the match-rate for paternity testing with the lower 
administrative match-rate; repeals the guarantee to States of their 1995 
level of collections; and starting in 2001, requires States to review 
support orders for families receiving

[[Page 83]]

TANF every three years. Net Federal savings of these proposals total 
$409 million over five years.
  Shortly after the Administration concludes on-going consultations with 
stakeholders in April 1999, it will submit a proposal to Congress and 
work on a bipartisan basis to enact child support financing legislation 
based on the following five principles: 1) maximize collections and 
support for all families in the program, including the hardest to serve; 
2) maximize paternity establishment, financial and medical support 
establishment, collections on current support and on arrears, and cost 
efficiency; 3) give priority to increasing payments to families, while 
ensuring Federal budget cost neutrality; 4) create incentives for 
adequate State and local investment of staff and resources needed for 
improved program performance; and 5) promote national standards and ease 
of interstate case processing, while maintaining State flexibility.

  Better Benefits in the Workplace: The President has led successful 
efforts to ensure a living wage for all American workers while expanding 
their ability to care for their families and protect their health care 
benefits.
  Family and Medical Leave (FMLA): In early 1993, the President 
proposed, and Congress enacted, the Family and Medical Leave Act, which 
allows workers to take up to 12 weeks of job-protected, unpaid leave to 
care for a newborn or adopted child, attend to their own serious health 
needs, or care for a seriously ill parent, child, or spouse--making it 
less likely that employees will have to choose between work and family. 
The budget proposes expanding FMLA to reach workers in firms with over 
25 employees, expanding coverage to 10 million more workers. In 
addition, the budget proposes providing resources to the Department of 
Labor to research: (1) the impact this law has had on the American 
family; and (2) how to make leave accessible and affordable for more of 
America's working families.
  Ensuring equal pay: The budget proposes a $14 million equal pay 
initiative to focus additional resources to provide employers with the 
necessary tools to assess and improve their pay policies and to educate 
the public on the importance of this issue as well as their rights and 
responsibilities. (See Chapter 9, ``Building One America'', for 
additional information on this initiative.)
  Minimum wage: In 1996, the President successfully sought a minimum 
wage increase that gave a big financial boost to full-time, full-year 
minimum wage workers, raising the pay of each by approximately $1,800 a 
year. In February 1998, the President proposed to further raise the 
minimum wage to $6.15 an hour by the year 2000. Increasing the minimum 
wage by one dollar in two equal steps simply restores the real value of 
the minimum wage to what it was in 1981. This increase will help ensure 
that as costs continue to increase parents who work hard and play by the 
rules can bring up their children out of poverty. The President remains 
strongly committed to increasing the minimum wage and will work with 
Congress to ensure the enactment of this vital increase.
  Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act: Working with 
Congress, the President in 1996 obtained landmark legislation, known as 
HIPAA, which provides important health insurance protections for an 
estimated 25 million Americans who move from one job to another each 
year, as well as those who are self-employed or who have pre-existing 
medical conditions. HIPAA reformed the private insurance market to 
ensure that workers have portable health benefits and insurers are less 
able to deny coverage due to pre-existing conditions. Combined with the 
Taxpayer Relief Act, HIPAA also made it easier for self-employed persons 
to get health insurance.