When welfare reform first inserted work requirements into our welfare system in 1996, some on the Left predicted doom for America’s most vulnerable families. New York Democratic Sen. Patrick Moynihan predicted that we would “find children sleeping on grates, picked up in the morning frozen.” New Jersey Democratic Sen. Frank Lautenberg said that we would see “children begging for money, children begging for food, 8- and 9-year-old prostitutes.” And Massachussets Democratic Sen. Ted Kennedy called the bill “legislative child abuse.”

Fortunately, none of those hysterical prognostications came true. Between 1996 and 2000, single-mother welfare caseloads fell by 53%, their employment rate increased by 10 percentage points, and their poverty rate fell by 10%. And the consumption-based poverty rate among single-parent families has continued to fall since then — from 23% in 1995, to 15% in 2000, to 9% in 2010.