Ribar to Help South Carolina Crunch Welfare Numbers

Contact: (336) 334-4314

Posted 11-04-08

GREENSBORO — Dr. David Ribar, an economist in UNCG’s Bryan School of Business and Economics, has been awarded a three-year, $240,000 contract to help the South Carolina Department of Social Services analyze its welfare caseload and develop automated reports for local, state and federal administrators.

This latest project is funded by the federal Administration for Children and Families (ACF) as part of a competitive multi-state initiative to pioneer new uses of electronic data.

Ribar and state officials will conduct research using the state’s electronic welfare case management systems, its earnings database for determining eligibility for jobless benefits and a federal child support enforcement database.

Ribar has worked with welfare administrators from South Carolina on several research projects since 2003, focusing on how changes in the state’s welfare and food stamp rules have affected recipients.

“Our prior research has shown that problems filling out and keeping up with paperwork are major reasons why poor families lose assistance,” Ribar said. “A goal of this new project is to eliminate some of that paperwork by automating several systems.”

“We also hope to make caseworkers’ jobs a little easier and to provide South Carolina and the ACF with new research tools to gauge the effectiveness of welfare work-readiness programs.”