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Subgroups
Potential participants were recruited for an orientation session, during which they learned about the New Hope Project and the random assignment study. From August 1994 to December 1995, after completing a questionnaire on their background characteristics, 1,362 New Hope applicants were randomly assigned to New Hope (678) or a comparison group (679), with 5 participants dropped from the study because of missing background data. All randomly assigned individuals were eligible to participate in the two-year follow-up survey.
Participants enrolled in the project from August 1994 to December 1995. They received services for three years. The study reports outcomes two years after random assignment.
The study was funded by the Ford Foundation, the Ambrose Monell Foundation, the Alcoa Foundation, and the James Irvine Foundation.
Participants eligible for New Hope lived in one of the neighborhoods served [Editor: Please note that I rephrased this from "targeted neighborhoods"], had earnings less than 150 percent of the federal poverty level, were age 18 or older, and were willing and able to work full time. The eligibility criteria did not include employment status, family composition, or welfare status. The study sample was 71 percent female, and 60 percent had never married. The sample was 51 percent African American and 26 percent Hispanic. The average age was 31 years. Fifty-seven percent held a high school diploma or GED, and 71 percent had children in the household at the start of the study. Among the participants, 38 percent were employed at the time of random assignment, with an average $5,581 in total earnings in the previous year.
New Hope Inc.
New Hope Inc. was created by a committee of service staff and community members from Milwaukee, WI, in 1988. The New Hope Project began in 1994 as a demonstration project.
Participants who worked at least 30 hours per week received monthly earnings supplements that were intended to bring total income to the poverty threshold. Earnings supplements intended to incentivize increased work hours and wages. On average, participants received $911 in earnings supplements over the two-year follow-up period. Eighty-one percent of participants received at least one supplemental payment. Participants also received low-cost health insurance (58 percent) if their employer did not provide it. In addition, parents with children younger than 13 received child care subsidies. Participants who were unable to find full-time employment were placed in full- or part-time subsidized community service jobs with local nonprofit organizations, with a requirement for consistent attendance and job performance. Each community service job lasted up to 6 months, and participants could hold community service jobs for up to 12 months. Participants also met one-on-one or in small groups with project representatives, who encouraged participants to maximize benefit receipt and provided job coaching and counseling.
Participants not assigned to the New Hope Project received a list of other community resources to help them secure employment or other social services.
None.
Participants were eligible to receive services for three years. Participants had received two years of services at the time of the study.
The program was funded by donations from foundations, state and federal agencies, and individuals, including the Helen Bader Foundation, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Mott Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, the State of Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development, and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
The study took place in two areas with low incomes in central Milwaukee, WI. The communities were ethnically diverse. During the study, Milwaukee’s unemployment rate fell from 6.5 percent to 3.6 percent, and its minimum wage increased from $4.25 to $5.15 per hour. The state also introduced Wisconsin Works, the new work-based welfare system.
Health, housing, financial assets, parenting and co-parenting, child well-being, child educational achievement
Please see note in Sample characteristics.