"The example was for Virginia. $393 is the apparently the highest possible level for a family of three in VA. "
Note that it also states that
"In order to be financially eligible for TANF, your TANF Assistance Unit (AU) must have gross countable income that does not exceed the Standard of Assistance. "
In other words, the assistance goes down with any income at all, earned or not. So, to qualify for $393, they have to have zero income, even money from relatives would count against it.
Ad that assumes they can meet all of the other criteria.
So, let's take that $393 figure, despite it being the measure of need and not the available assistance. That would mean that TANF is not a factor at all for anyone who makes, borrows or steals $4716 or more a year. Period. Full stop. Yet that article includes it in much higher income groups. The article also grabbed the wrong number, as I have pointed out. The highest amount is $389, and that is only if they fall into group 3. I am not really inclined to figure out what the differences between the three groups is, these things are usually pretty complicated and detailed. And I am not really interested in what the state of Virginia does.
But, the fact is the author missed some pretty basic information to come up with his numbers. Now, it could be that this was the only time he did that. Odds are not very good, though. The fact of the matter is that the rules to qualify for these various programs is very complex and often mutually exclusive. And it is not clear if it is possible to qualify for all of those programs and have a job. Like with TANF, they are usually pretty time intensive to get qualified and maintained, and isn't all that easy to do and work, too.
It isn't that I am just casually dismissing them. The reality is pretty complicated and I don't have the time to track down all of the twists and turns to pin down if he has a point or not. To find that one so quickly makes me not particularly optimistic that he is actually onto something... |
