What other programs have been targeted for work requirements?

In addition to efforts that would harshen SNAP’s time limits, there are various proposals to attach work requirements to Medicaid. Earlier this year, senior officials from the Trump Administration, including former Secretary of Health and Human Services Tom Price and Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Seema Verma invited states to apply for waivers that would allow them to experiment with work requirements at the state-level. Separate legislation has been introduced in the Senate to require work requirements nationally, and the House of Representative’s proposed 2018 budget seeks work requirements for Medicaid recipients as well. The proposals vary, but the basic concept is the same—to require able-bodied adult Medicaid recipients (typically ages 19 to 64) to engage in work-related activities for a set number of hours a week as a condition of receipt, with few exceptions.

Other programs targeted for work requirements include various rental assistance programs—namely Section 8 Tenant-Based Rental Assistance, Section 8 Project-Based Rental Assistance, and the Public Housing program. In 2016, as part of the agenda that Speaker of the House Paul Ryan’s outlined to overhaul public assistance programs, he proposed that rental assistance programs align with TANF benefits—and that residents thus be subject to the same work requirements. In President Trump’s proposed budget for 2018, he indicated that his administration would look to add work requirements to rental assistance programs in the coming years.