Displaced Homemakers: Programs andPolicy

October 1985

NTIS order #PB86-120276

Recommended Citation:Displaced Homemakers: Programs and Policy–An Interim Report (Washington, DC:U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment, OTA-ITE-292, October 1985).

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 85-600606

For sale by the Superintendent of DocumentsU.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC 20402

Foreword

The problems of displaced adults have received increasing attention in the 1980s,as the social, technological, and economic changes have changed the worklivesof millions of Americans. As Congress debates programs to provide training, re-employment assistance, and financial support to displaced people, it is useful toexamine the problems and performance of existing Federal support for displacedadults.

In October 1983 OTA was asked to assess the reasons and future prospectsfor adult displacement, the performance of existing programs to serve displacedadults, and identify options to improve service and avoid displacement. As partof that study, the Senate Committee on Labor and Human Resources requestedthat OTA focus on problems of and programs for displaced homemakers as wellas displaced workers. This interim report on displaced homemakers will be partof the overall assessment Technology and Structural Unemployment: Reemploy-ing Displaced Adults.

Displaced homemakers are a large, often overlooked group of people, mostlywomen, who have lost their primary source of income. Many of these people havenot worked in the commercial sense for many years, though they often have skillsdeveloped in homemaking, past work experience, or volunteer activities. However,the combination of little recent experience in paid work, little or no source of in-come and, often, falling self-esteem gives them significant handicaps in findingnew jobs to support themselves and their families, In the Vocational EducationAct of 1984, Congress added significantly to the funds available to serve displacedhomemakers.

While the impact of new funding and emphasis on the problems of displacedhomemakers cannot be fully judged yet, there are many issues Congress may wishto address as new programs develop. For example, even with the augmented Voca-tional Education programs, will adequate funding be directed specifically to dis-placed homemakers? Can displaced homemakers, who often have no source of in-come support, afford training? Do the programs that serve displaced homemakersmeet their special needs (for example, job readiness counseling, peer group sup-port, and training for nontraditional jobs)? Educational technology may play animportant role in preparing displaced homemakers for paid jobs. The full reportconsiders both the potential of technology to improve the work skills of displacedadults and the effect of technology on the kinds of jobs available in the U.S. economy.

The viewpoints of people in the private sector, State and local government,academia, and displaced homemakers’ groups were sought in conducting this study.Several private and public organizations cooperated in providing information, data,and advice. OTA thanks the many people—advisory panel members, governmentofficials, reviewers, and consultants—for their assistance, As with all OTA studies,the information, analyses, and findings of this report are solely those of OTA.

Director

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Technology and Structural Unemployment:Reemploying Displaced Workers Advisory Panel

Joseph Weizenbaum, ChairmanMassachusetts Institute of Technology

Kathy AlessandroDownriver Community Conference

Paul BartonNational Assessment of Educational

Progress

Marc BendickThe Urban Institute

Paul BoyerUniversity of Wisconsin-Madison

Dennis CareyHay Associates

Dick GreenwoodInternational Association of Machinists and

Aerospace Workers

Donald HancockVanderbilt University

Carol HollensheadUniversity of Michigan

Robert KarasekUniversity of Southern California

Sar A. LevitanThe George Washington University

Robert MachinAlliance Mortgage Co.

Jill MillerDisplaced Homemakers Network

Iles MinoffHuman Resources Development Institute

Ronnie StrawCommunications Workers of America

Burdette G. TaylorIBM Corp.

Vi TraynorAmerican Electronics Association

Elizabeth UseemUniversity of Massachusetts

Gary WuslichLTV Steel Co.

NOTE: The Advisory Panel provided advice and comment throughout the assessment, but the members do not necessarily approve, disapprove, orendorse the report for which OTA assumes full responsibility.

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OTA Project Staff–Technology and Structural Unemployment:Reemploying Displaced Adults

Lionel S. Johns,Energy, Materials, and

Assistant Director, OTAInternational Security Division

Audrey Buyrn,Industry, Technology, and Employment Program Manager

Julie Fox Gorte, Project Director

Katherine Gillman, Senior Analyst W. Wendell Fletcher, Senior Analyst

Bradley T. Shaw, Analyst Deborah R. Cichon, Analyst

Paula M. Wolferseder, Research Assistant

Margaret Hilton, Analyst 1

John A. Alic, Senior Analyst

Eric Basques, Analyst

Edna Saunders, Administrative Assistant

Andrea Amiri, Secretary

Individual Contractors

Joel Fadem

John Hansen

Bernard Ingster

Howard Rosen

Anne Covalt, Editor

Contractors

Human Resources Data Systems, Inc.

National Institute for Work and Learning

Norman D. Kurland & Associates

The Urban Institute

Industry and Trade Strategies

I Analyst from August 1983 to September 1984

PageOverview and Findings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Definition and Dimensions of Homemaker Displacement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1Characteristics of Displaced Homemakers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1Displaced Homemaker Programs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1Design and Performance of Displaced Homemaker Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Policy Issues and Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4The Perkins Vocational Education Act and Displaced Homemakers . . . . . . . . 4

Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4Intent of the Set-Aside . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

The Job Training Partnership Act and Displaced Homemakers . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6Eligibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6Relations With the JTPA System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Income Support for Displaced Homemakers in Vocational Training orEducation Programs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Options for Assistance to Displaced Homemakers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Population and Needs of Displaced Homemakers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9Definition and Dimensions of Homemaker Displacement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9Characteristics of Displaced Homemakers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Income . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12Family Size and Children at Home . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13Employment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

National Displaced Homemaker Programs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15Levels of Service and Funding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15Sources of fending . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16JTPA and Displaced Homemaker Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19The Perkins Vocational Education Act and Displaced Homemakers . . . . . . . . 22

Opportunities Under the New Law . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24Data Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25Definition of Displaced Homemakers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

Design and Performance of Displaced Homemaker Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28Characteristics of Displaced Homemaker Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Location of Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30Characteristics of Clients . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30Eligibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Services Offered and Their Effectiveness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31Personal Counseling.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31Job Readiness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32Education and Training . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32Job Placement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33Support Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

List of TablesTable No. Page1.2.

3.

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Characteristics of Displaced Homemakers, Selected Years . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11Principal Sources of Funding for Displaced Homemaker Programs,1980 and 1984 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17Funding for Displaced Homemaker Programs, by Source, 1984 . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Contents–continued

List of FiguresFigure No. Page1. Distribution of Family Income of Displaced Homemakers,

by Family Size, 1983 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132. Sources of Displaced Homemakers’ Personal Income, 1975 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133. Family Size of Displaced Homemakers, 1983 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144. Number of Children at Home, Displaced Homemaker Families, 1983 .,..... 145. Reported Number of Displaced Homemaker Projects in the United States,

Selected Years, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156. Services to Displaced Homemakers Under JTPA Contracts, Dollar Amount

of Contract and Women Served, April 1985.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207. Services to Displaced Homemakers Under JTPA Contracts,

Numbers Served, April 1985 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

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OVERVIEW AND FINDINGSDisplaced homemakers are women whose

principal job has been homemaking and whohave lost their main source of income becauseof divorce, separation, widowhood, disabilityor long-term unemployment of a spouse, or lossof eligibility for public assistance, Many ofthese women have serious trouble finding jobsthat are adequate to support themselves andtheir families. Estimates of the number of dis-placed homemakers range from over 2 millionto about 4 million.

This report provides the first national esti-mates of the displaced homemaker populationfor more than 1 year. Because of the definitionand database used, the estimates are conserva-tive—rising from 1.7 million in 1975 to 2.2 mil-lion in 1983. Different definitions and differ-ent databases have yielded estimates for singleyears that are more than twice as large. Thedefinitions in various State and Federal lawsand programs also differ, with little consist-ency in those considered eligible for programservices.

Under the definition used for descriptive pur-poses here, displaced homemakers are womenwho:

1. are between the ages of 35 and 64, and are:●

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divorced, separated, or widowed; ormarried but husband is absent, seriouslydisabled, or long-term unemployed; orlosing income from public assistance be-cause the youngest child is 17 to 19 yearsold; and

2. have had serious employment problems,including unemployment, working at paybelow the minimum wage, working parttime but preferring full time, or droppingout of the labor force from discouragement.

The number of displaced homemakers rose28 percent from 1975 to 1983. At the same timethe population of all U.S. women in the agegroup rose only 10 percent.

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Characteristics of Displaced Homemakers

Of the estimated 2.2 million displaced home-makers in 1983, over 1 million were divorced,separated, or had an absent spouse. Rapidgrowth in this group (54 percent) accountedfor much of the increase in numbers of dis-placed homemakers from 1975 to 1983.

Many displaced homemakers are living inor close to poverty. In 1982-83, nearly halfof them had family incomes below $10,000a year (1982 dollars). At least 30 percent ofthose in families of four or more were be-low the poverty level in 1983, compared with15 percent of all families at that time.

A majority (61 percent) of displaced home-makers had children living at home; for 45percent of the group, the youngest child athome was of school age. Families were gen-erally small; nearly three-fifths of the dis-placed homemakers were in families of twoor three people. Slightly over one-fifth werein single-person families; another one-fifthwere in families with four or more members.

By definition, all of the displaced homemak-ers were having trouble finding satisfactoryjobs. Half were employed, but at pay belowthe minimum wage or in a part-time job whenthey wanted a full-time job. In 1975 (latestdata available) disproportionate numbers ofdisplaced homemakers, compared to otherwomen workers, were service workers, insuch jobs as waitress, hotel maid, or nurs-ing home aide; they were underrepresentedin clerical, professional, technical, andadministrative jobs.

Federal support for displaced homemakerprograms began in 1976 in amendments tothe Vocational Education Act; Congress re-cently strengthened support in the Carl D.Perkins Vocational Education Act of 1984.Despite the increased support, however, Fed-eral funding of displaced homemaker proj-

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ects is still modest in relation to the eligiblepopulation of 2 to 4 million.

In 1984, several hundred displaced home-maker projects existed across the country,probably serving at least 100,000 women ayear. Data on displaced homemakers and theprograms serving them is sparse, but OTA’sresearch and review of available evidence in-dicate that the number of displaced home-makers receiving employment and trainingservices has grown in recent years, with therise in their numbers and a growing awarenessthat services are available. Funding to sup-port the projects has also apparently grown,though barely keeping up with demand.

State funds were the main support of dis-placed homemaker programs in 1984. Thissituation may change, with the increasedfunding available to displaced homemakerprograms under the Perkins Voc Ed Act.Congress has appropriated about $63 millionunder the act for services to single parentsand homemakers, including displaced home-makers, for fiscal year 1985, How much ofthis will go to displaced homemaker pro-grams is uncertain, but it is likely to be alarge share and to exceed substantially Fed-eral funding of the past. Despite some resis-tance from the vocational education estab-lishment to the idea of set-asides under thePerkins Act (especially the set-aside for sin-gle parents and homemakers), the act opensnew opportunities to projects serving dis-placed homemakers.

Many of the services displaced homemakersneed can be funded under the Perkins VocEd Act, but the main focus of the act is stillon vocational training. The Job TrainingPartnership Act (JTPA) stresses job searchassistance more heavily. Also, JTPA is anothersource of funds for services that are still verymodestly supported, despite the increasedVoc Ed funding for services to single par-ents and homemakers in the Perkins Act. Forthese reasons, many displaced homemakerswill benefit from access to JTPA as well asto the federally funded vocational trainingsystem,

JTPA funds were a minor source of supportfor displaced homemaker programs in 1984.By early 1985, it appeared that use of JTPAfunds to provide services to displaced home-makers might be increasing, but they werestill not a principal source of support. More-over, most of the JTPA-funded projects werenot specially designed to serve displacedhomemakers, but served other clients aswell. For some displaced homemakers, withlittle work experience and confidence, thisis a substantial disadvantage.

A serious difficulty in serving displacedhomemakers with JTPA funds is that manyof these women do not qualify as economi-cally disadvantaged, often because theirprevious income, before they became dis-placed, was too high. Thus they are not eligi-ble for JTPA Title IIA programs, which areintended primarily to serve disadvantaged,low-income people. Although there are ex-ceptions to the low-income rules, not toomany service providers are making use ofthem. There are no income limits to serviceunder JTPA Title III (for displaced workers),but in many States, displaced homemakersare not considered eligible because the def-inition of dislocated workers in the law doesnot necessarily include them. Other prob-lems are that displaced homemaker projectstaff often lack information about JTPA, orthat local Private Industry Councils, whichdirect JTPA programs, oppose special serv-ices for this group of workers.

The administrators of displaced homemak-er and other women’s programs under theVoc Ed Act see data collection as an urgentissue, so that when reports are required af-ter the first 3 years of the new program theycan show Congress the results. The act doesnot specifically require regular reports onservices provided to single parents and home-makers, and the U.S. Department of Educa-tion has no such requirement. State officialsare beginning to develop a consistent, na-tional system of data collection for charac-teristics of clients served in the women’s pro-grams, services provided, outcomes, and

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results one year later. If successful, this ef-fort will fill a longstanding need for infor-mation about displaced homemakers and theprograms designed to serve them.

Although no systematic evaluations of dis-placed homemakers programs have ever beendone, a few findings can be drawn from theexperience of women who have received theservices and from experienced project direc-tors. From OTA-sponsored interviews with 20directors of displaced homemaker projects andfrom a few other sources, the following obser-vations emerge:

● Women seeking services from displacedhomemaker programs are a diverse group,in age, education, and financial background,Different kinds of services are appropri-ate to meet the needs of different types ofclients, especially rural women, long timerecipients of welfare, minorities, widows,

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and older women. The groups least servedat present are minority and rural women.For all groups of displaced homemakers,a comprehensive program of services is de-sirable, particularly one which combinespersonal counseling with job readinessand skills training. A considerable num-ber of displaced homemakers need reme-dial or brushup courses in reading andmath to qualify for training or good jobs.Many displaced homemakers cannot takeadvantage of the training and educationopen to them because of lack of incomesupport. Most are not eligible for unem-ployment insurance, and few have incomefrom other family members. Voc Ed fundscan be used to provide child care and othersupport services, and training stipends incases of acute economic need, but usuallyhave not been used in this way in the past.JTPA funds can also be used for supportiveservices and some forms of income sup-port, but little is currently being spent forthese services,

POLICY ISSUES AND OPTIONS

In passing the Carl D. Perkins VocationalEducation Act in 1984, Congress demonstrateda strong interest in providing Federal supportfor services to displaced homemakers. Of theapproximately $63 million that Congress hasappropriated under the act for programs serv-ing single parents and homemakers in fiscalyear 1985, an undetermined but probably quitelarge share will go to displaced homemakerprograms. Records on past Federal spendingtargeted to displaced homemakers are incom-plete, but it probably never exceeded $8 to $10million per year. Even so, the increased fund-ing is a comparatively small sum for a train-ing, education, and employment program opento a population of millions (see section entitledJTPA and Displaced Homemaker Projects).

Vocational education programs under thePerkins Act were just gearing up in 1985; it wasstill too early to identify all the major policyissues that might arise under the new law. Oneissue already under debate, however, is whetherand how to amplify the extremely sparse dataabout displaced homemakers—how many thereare, their characteristics (e.g., age, family size,income, cause of displacement); level and kindof services provided to them; and program out-comes (e.g., training completed, placement injobs), Another issue likely to come up is whetherthe State administrators in charge of thewomen’s programs under the Voc Ed Act arein fact able to exercise the authority the lawgrants them, and are actually dispensing thefunds that the law sets aside for these programsfor the benefit of the targeted groups.

JTPA, the other major Federal program serv-ing some displaced homemakers, also presentssome policy issues that merit consideration.OTA’s review of service to displaced home-makers under JTPA indicates that it is at a mod-est level so far. Issues of interest to Congressin reviewing how the JTPA program is meet-ing the employment and training needs of dis-placed homemakers might include: 1) eligibil-ity of displaced homemakers, under both TitleIIA and Title III; and 2) relations between dis-

placed homemaker projects and the JTPA sys-tem—i.e., State JTPA program managers, localdirectors of Service Delivery Areas, and localPrivate Industry Councils.

An issue relevant to both the Voc Ed andJTPA programs is the special barriers faced bydisplaced homemakers who are interested intraining or education. Unlike the majority ofworkers displaced from paid jobs, few dis-placed homemakers have unemployment insur-ance for income support during even a brieftraining course; and not many have incomefrom a spouse or other family member to relyon. Although supportive services and trainingallowances for trainees in acute economic needare authorized in both the Voc Ed Act andJTPA, they have not been used much in eitherprogram. Competition for student financial aid,another possible source of income support, iskeen; and the aid is often more readily avail-able to young people going directly into col-lege from high school than to displaced adultsentering or reentering training in preparationfor a job.

The Perkins Vocational Education Act and

Current, consistent national information ondisplaced homemakers and the programs thatserve them is not available. States could be re-quired to provide such information under thePerkins Act, but the Administration has notdone so. Thus, if Congress wishes to see thedevelopment of such data, it may have to con-sider ways of mandating it.

Little systematic information has ever beencollected about displaced homemakers or theprojects created to serve them. Nationwide esti-mates of the number of displaced homemakersvary widely according to the definition selected(e.g., whether women under 35 years old areincluded or excluded). Many State vocationaleducation agencies do not have reliable data

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on how many displaced homemakers reside intheir States. Even less information is availableabout single parents and homemakers—thegroup entitled to set-aside funding under thePerkins Act. Systematic evaluations of the ef-fects of displaced homemaker programs havenot been conducted, even though some pro-grams are now more than 10 years old.

The Perkins Act does not explicitly requireany routine reporting from States on numbersand characteristics of single parents and home-makers (including displaced homemakers) re-ceiving assistance from Federal Voc Ed grants,of services provided, or of outcomes. The U.S.Department of Education is not requiring suchreports. Officials of the department contactedby OTA say that the reports are unnecessary,and would be inaccurate and intrusive if re-quired. In general, the Administration opposesFederal requirements for reporting of data notconsidered essential to an agency’s mission orexplicitly demanded by law.

A number of State administrators of Voc Edwomen’s programs (the State Sex Equity Coor-dinators) consider it essential to collect system-atic data on single parents and homemakers,to give Congress a factual basis for decidingwhether the needs of these target groups arebeing met in accordance with the law, whetherthe programs serving them are effective, andwhat spending levels are appropriate. SomeState officials are taking the lead in develop-ing a data collection system that could be usedto build a consistent set of statistics, A num-ber of States may participate in the system, butit is not likely that all will.

An alternative would be to require a specialstudy on the characteristics of services pro-vided to single parents and homemakers. ThePerkins Act directs the U.S. Secretary of Edu-cation to conduct applied research on aspectsof vocational education emphasized in the act;one of these is effective methods for providingquality vocational education to target groups,including single parents and homemakers. Inmid-1985, the department had no plans under-way for an applied research study on the topicof single parents and homemakers.

The Perkins Act also unequivocally requiresa national assessment of vocational educationassisted under the law, through independentstudies and analysis and in consultation withCongress, to be delivered by January 1, 1989(9 months before the Perkins Act is due to ex-pire). 1 A description and evaluation of the voca-tional education services delivered to targetgroups, including single parents and home-makers, must be included in the assessment.

The Perkins Act places substantial empha-sis on set-asides, or targeting portions of thegrants to States to special populations. Theseset-asides amount to 57 percent of the grantsand, for some groups, are entirely new. The set-asides, especially the 8.5 percent for single par-ents and homemakers, were adopted over thestrong opposition of much of the vocationaleducation establishment. Under the old Voc EdAct, displaced homemakers were named as atarget group, but no specific amounts were des-ignated for services to them. As programs un-der the Perkins Act get underway, Congressmay wish to exercise a considerable degree ofoversight on whether the set-aside provisionsare being implemented in the way it intended.

A potential topic for oversight is whether theSex Equity Coordinators are able to wield theauthority the law gives them to administer thesingle parents and homemakers programs, andwhether the set-aside funds are reaching theirintended beneficiaries. Suppose, for example,that a State allocates Federal grant funds tovocational education in secondary and post-secondary schools by the usual formulas, withan extra effort to enroll single parents orhomemakers in an attempt to meet the 8.5 per-cent “quota” –but with no attempt to set upspecial programs for the group. Congress maywish to assure itself that States are using the

IThe act specifies that the National Institute of Education inthe U.S. Department of Education shall carry out the study. How-ever, the Institute was not reauthorized in 1985, and the depart-ment intends to let it expire. The department proposes to carryout the mandated study in its Office of Policy, Budget, andEvaluation.

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specified part of their Federal grants to “meetthe special needs” of single parents and home-makers and other targeted groups.

A different but related subject for oversightis whether the States are able to use this largeinfusion of new funds effectively. The eligiblepopulation, though uncertain in numbers, iscertainly very large in relation to the funds. Butare those eligible aware of the programs; arethey seeking services; is the system able to ab-sorb the new funds efficiently and provideservices that are genuinely helpful and in de-mand? These are some of the questions thatCongress might want to pursue.

Although Congress did not define displaced

better off, but still need the counseling, assess-ment, and job readiness training that a dis-placed homemaker project can provide. JTPAdoes provide for Title 11A services to certaingroups, including displaced homemakers, whoexceed the income limits; roughly 10 percentof funds available to Service Delivery Areas areset aside for this purpose. According to earlyreports, however, most States are not using thelo-percent-window money to provide servicesto these groups.

A few States are serving displaced homemak-ers under Title III, which has no income limi-tations. JTPA gives States a great deal of lati-tude in defining eligible dislocated workers,and some consider that displaced homemakersfit under the category of long-term unemployedworkers who are not likely to find reemploy-ment in the same or a similar occupation.

homemakers as a principal target group forJTPA programs, they are specifically men-tioned in the law as one of the groups facingemployment barriers and therefore eligible forsome services. Because of the various eligibil-ity criteria in the law, however, it can be diffi-cult to use JTPA funds in projects designed toserve the specific needs of displaced home-makers.

Large numbers of displaced homemakers arepoor enough to meet JTPA’s definition of dis-advantaged, and therefore would be eligible forservice in most Title IIA projects. The prob-lem is that many displaced homemakers, be-cause of their lack of confidence and experi-ence in the job market, and their sudden lossof personal and financial support, do better inprojects designed to meet their needs, ratherthan in larger employment and training proj-ects serving a variety of clients.

In addition, if employment and training proj-ects accept only women who meet the incomecriteria for Title 11A, they exclude many otherswho need and could benefit from their serv-ices. Some displaced homemakers exceed theincome limits because their loss in income wasrecent, and their previous income before theybecame displaced was too high. Others may be

Relations With the JTPA System

Altogether, it is hard for many projects spe-cializing in serving displaced homemakers toapply for and get JTPA funds. The biggest dif-ficulties reported by project directors, in addi-tion to the tangle of determining eligibility, are:1) that project staff lack information and areoutside the JTPA system, and 2) that PrivateIndustry Councils are not interested in fund-ing special programs for special populations.The “outsider” problem may well disappearover time. But the disinclination of PICs tofund projects for special groups could pose acontinuing difficulty for displaced homemakerprojects, since most of the projects are foundedon the idea that their clients need a special setof services,

The eligibility and special population prob-lems might usefully be considered together. Ifprojects serving only displaced homemakersare able to get JTPA Title IIA funding, and ifStates allow services to 10 percent of the clientsof these projects without regard for their in-come, then many of the barriers that displacedhomemakers face in taking advantage of JTPAservices would be lowered. This might be anappropriate subject for legislative guidancethrough JTPA oversight.

7

Alternatively, Congress might wish to encour-age or direct States to fund displaced home-makers projects under Title III. This wouldsimplify the eligibility problem, since there areno income limits in Title III. A number ofStates have expressed interest in serving dis-placed homemakers under Title III, and somehave sought information from the States whichare already doing so, such as Florida, Pennsyl-vania, and New York. On the other hand, ifmore effective delivery of Title III services isdeveloped, participation of mainstream dis-placed workers might rise markedly, as dis-cussed in chapters 5 and 6 of the full report.Quite possibly, funding for the Title III pro-gram might have to be increased if anotherlarge group (2 to 4 million displaced homemak-ers) were unequivocally made eligible.

The Vocational Education Act Amendmentsof 1976 (now superseded by the Perkins Act)mentioned displaced homemakers specificallyas a group eligible for income support duringtraining, in cases of acute need, but anecdotalreports indicate that it was seldom provided.The Perkins Act does not mention displacedhomemakers in connection with income sup-port, though there is a general provision for sti-pends in cases of acute economic need whichcannot be met under work-study programs.The Perkins Act does state that set-aside grantmoney may used for supportive services, in-cluding day care and transportation costs, forsingle parents and homemakers in training; itmay also be used for the purpose of schedul-ing and organizing training programs to makethem more accessible to single parents andhomemakers.

Under JTPA Title 11A, 30 percent of spend-ing may go for a combination of administra-tive costs and costs of supportive services andneeds-based income payments, There is a 15-percent limit on the administrative costs, sothat at least 15 percent is theoretically avail-able for supportive services and income pay-ments. The limit can be waived under certain

circumstances, such as a high local unemploy-ment rate. Under Title III, there is a similar butless stringent limit on costs of supportive serv-ices, wages, allowances, stipends, and admin-istration; the limit applies to no more than halfof the combined Federal and non-Federal fundsavailable to a Title III program. In the transi-tion year, substantially less than the limit wasspent for supportive services and income pay-ments; 10 percent of Title 11A funds and 6 per-cent of Title III funds were spent for these pur-poses. It is not known how much, if any, of whatwas spent went to displaced homemakers.

Should Congress wish to encourage the pro-vision of income support to displaced home-makers in training, Voc Ed grants and JTPAprograms could be used to deliver this service.The unemployment insurance (UI) system, whichhas sometimes been proposed as both the fund-ing source and delivery system for extendedincome support during training for mainstreamdisplaced workers, is not available to mostdisplaced homemakers. Legislative guidance,through oversight hearings, is one way inwhich Congress might encourage or directgreater emphasis on income support for dis-placed homemakers in the Voc Ed and JTPAprograms. However, because of the dearth ofdata about numbers of displaced homemakersdemanding services, and how many are inter-ested in training, a solid information base doesnot exist for estimating participation and costsof increased income support.

Assuming income support were provided todisplaced homemakers in training at the levelof average UI payments ($119 per week in1984), the cost would be about $3,100 per per-son for 26 weeks, or $6,200 for a year. Programcosts might be estimated at $31 to $62 millionfor every 10,000 people who took advantage ofthe program. Such costs are high in relationto present levels of funding; the Voc Ed grantsset aside for single parents and homemakerswere funded at approximately $63 million forfiscal year 1985. Assuming 15 percent is thepractical limit for supportive services and in-come payments under JTPA, about $33 millionwas available for these purposes under Title

8

III in fiscal year 1985, and approximately $280million under Title IIA.

Considering the lack of experience with anincome support program for displaced home-makers in training, its possible high cost in re-lation to present sources of funding, and thescarcity of information about displaced home-maker programs, a full-scale national programmay be premature. An alternative might be forCongress to require the Department of Educa-tion to develop improved information on ex-isting displaced homemaker programs sup-ported by Voc Ed grants, including numbersof clients and services provided. At the sametime, Congress might wish to consider specialfunding for a small pilot program, offering in-come support to displaced homemakers en-rolled in training courses needed for employ-ment. Evaluation of the pilot project could helpin identifying likely participation rates andcosts for future projects.

OTA’s assessment of experience so far withFederal programs offering assistance to dis-placed homemakers identifies several problemsthat have already arisen and others that mayarise in bringing employment and trainingservices to this group. If Congress wishes toencourage greater delivery of services to dis-placed homemakers, it might consider the fol-lowing actions:

● Encourage the collection on a nationwidebasis of data on single parents and home-makers, including displaced homemakers,served under the Carl D. Perkins Voca-tional Education Act. One option wouldbe congressional direction to the Depart-ment of Education to collect data fromStates through routine reports, or to un-dertake a special study. This might be done

●

●

●

●

in one of several ways—through legislativeguidance in oversight hearings, by directcommunication with the Department ofEducation, or through the appropriationsprocess.Assure that State Sex Equity Coordinatorswho are in charge of Voc Ed women’s pro-grams have the authority to establish thespecial programs for single parents andhomemakers that are called for in the law,and that the set-asides in Federal fundswhich the law provides for this group arereaching the intended beneficiaries in away that “meets their special needs.”Clarify that projects serving only displacedhomemakers may be funded under JTPATitle 11A, and assure that States are allow-ing the use of lo-percent-window moneyto serve groups that face special barriersto employment (including displaced home-makers), without regard to income.Consider taking action that would eitherclarify to States that they may consider dis-placed homemakers eligible for services inTitle III programs, or would direct themto do so. Clarification might be accom-plished through legislative guidance inoversight hearings. A direction to Statesto consider displaced homemakers eligi-ble for Title III would probably require achange in the law.Consider providing income support to dis-placed homemakers in job training andeducation programs. One option would beto first require better information on ex-isting displaced homemaker programs, in-cluding participation rates and types ofservices provided. While this informationis developed, Congress might also wish toconsider funding a pilot project that wouldprovide income support to displaced home-makers in vocational training needed foremployment.

POPULATION AND NEEDS OF DISPLACED HOMEMAKERS

Displaced homemakers, like workers displacedfrom factory and office, have lost their accus-tomed source of income, and face painful re-adjustment and employment problems. Theyare women whose main job has been home andfamily, but must now support themselves be-cause of divorce, separation, widowhood, dis-ability or prolonged unemployment of theirspouse, or loss of eligibility for public assis-tance.2 Although definitions of displaced home-makers differ from one State, one law, and oneprogram to the next, and estimates of theirnumbers vary accordingly, it is clear that thisgroup of displaced workers is large and grow-ing, Estimates of the number of displaced home-makers range from over 2 to 4 million.

The usual image of the displaced homemakeris a woman of middle years who has spent mostof her adult life caring for her home and fam-ily full time; who has little experience with paidwork, certainly none recently; and who hasbeen thrust on her own either by widowhoodor by divorce, in an age when divorce after 20or 30 years of marriage has become sociallyacceptable. The term “displaced homemaker, ”coined by Sommers in 1975, implied forcibleexile of a full-time homemaker into a labor mar-ket for which she was ill-prepared. Too youngfor Social Security, ineligible for welfare or un-willing to ask for it, with too little work experi-ence to receive unemployment insurance, thesewomen were seen as falling through the cracksof government social service and income sup-port systems.3

This picture, while not inaccurate, is incom-plete. Many of the definitions of displaced home-makers appearing in State or Federal laws aremore broadly inclusive, especially in addingwomen as young as 22 years old; women in

‘Although a few men may fit the definition of displaced home-maker, the analysis in this report is confined to women.

31.aurie Shields, Displaced Homemakers: Organizing for a Nevt’Life (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1981).

poverty (not necessarily ever married) who areabout to lose public assistance as their mainsource of income, as their last child reaches18 years of age; and women whose husbandsare too disabled to work or have been unem-ployed for 6 months or more, Some definitionsare quite restrictive about work experience out-side the home, ruling out women who haveworked in paid jobs in the past 5 years. Otherslimit the definition to women over 35 or 40years old.

The figure most often cited for numbers ofdisplaced homemakers is 4.1 million, an esti-mate developed by the Women’s Bureau of theU.S. Department of Labor in 1976, Based onthe Survey of Income and Education of 1975,the estimate counted women 22 to 64 years oldwho were widowed, divorced, separated, ormarried with a disabled spouse; or who re-ceived Aid to Families with Dependent Chil-dren and whose youngest child was 16 or 17years old; and who had worked less than 500hours the previous year or had not worked atall for 5 years or more. The ComprehensiveEmployment and Training Act Amendmentsof 1978, which named displaced homemakersas a targeted group eligible for services, useda similar definition, but changed the employ-ment proviso, requiring that the displacedhomemaker must be unemployed or under-employed and experiencing difficulty in ob-taining or upgrading employment.

For this report, OTA has used a somewhatdifferent definition of displaced homemakersand a database—the Current Population Sur-vey (CRS)—which permits comparisons fromone year to the next.4 The Survey of Incomeand Education (SIE), though rich in detail, was

4This definition was provided to OTA in a report preparedby the Urban Institute, as a basis for estimates of numbers ofdisplaced homemakers. See Carolyn Taylor O’Brien and DemetraSmith Nightingale, Programs for Displaced Homemakers in the1980s, report to the Office of Technology Assessment (Wash-ington, DC: The Urban Institute, 1984), Much of the materialhere is drawn from the report, Estimates in the report are basedon data in the March Current Population Sur~re~ (CPS) of 1976,1980, 1983, and 1984. The CPS is a month]} surt’ey conductedby the Census Bureau of a sample of 60,000 households.

53-307 0 - 85 - 29

10

a one-time effort, not repeated since 1975. Byusing the CPS, OTA was able to provide thefirst national estimates of the displaced home-maker population for more than 1 year. Partlybecause of differences in definition, and partlybecause of unexplained differences betweenthe CPS and the SIE databases, OTA’s multi-year estimates of the displaced homemakerpopulation— rising from 1.7 million in 1975 to2.2 million in 1983—must be regarded as con-servative.

Under the definition used here, displacedhomemakers are women who:

1. are between the ages of 35 and 64 andare divorced, separated, or widowed; orare married but their husband is absent,seriously disabled, or long-term unem-ployed; orreceive income from Aid to Familieswith Dependent Children (AFDC), So-cial Security, or child support, but ex-pect to lose it because the youngest childis 17 to 19 years old; and

2. have had serious employment problems.

This definition distinguishes between formerhomemakers who encounter real difficulty infinding work, as they enter or reenter the jobmarket, from those who do not. Even wiveswho have been working may find it very hardto make the transition from secondary to pri-mary or sole wage earner. Often a wife’s in-come is relatively meager; in the late 1970s theaverage working wife contributed about one-quarter of the total family income. For the pur-pose of defining displaced homemakers, indi-cations of difficulty in finding work are currentunemployment plus having been unemployedfor at least 26 weeks of the previous year orout of the labor force; working part time whena full-time job is preferred; receiving pay be-low the minimum wage; or dropping out of thelabor force because of discouragement aboutthe prospects of finding a job.

The definition rejects the criterion that awoman be totally out of the labor force for anumber of years. Most women have some workexperience, particularly once their youngestchild enters school. A woman who works for

—

a few weeks in the Christmas rush or part timeduring school hours to boost the family incomemay still be at a loss if she has to provide fullsupport for herself and her family. To excludewomen with any recent work experience fromthe definition would leave out the majority offormer homemakers, especially women of lowerand middle income levels, who are most likelyto have combined some paid work with home-making. Also included are women who mustseek a job because their husbands are unableto work—either the husband did not work atall in the previous year, mainly because of ill-ness or disability, or he was unemployed (look-ing for a job but could not find one) for at least26 weeks out of the previous year.

In this definition, the term “displaced” is re-served for women between 35 and 64, on theargument that both younger and older womenare likely to have more options and resourcesthan those of middle years. Women over 64 aregenerally eligible for some form of Social Secu-rity or pension. Younger women, with recenttraining or work experience, are often moreemployable; if they have young children, theymay qualify for public assistance; and they aremore likely to remarry. On the other hand, itmay be argued that younger women with youngchildren face even more difficult employmentand income problems than displaced home-makers of middle years. Many displaced home-maker programs do in fact serve women youngerthan 35, and many others do not inquire toostringently into the work history of formerhomemakers seeking help in finding a job. Defi-nitions of displaced homemakers constructedto fit an existing database, and used for the pur-pose of estimating numbers and characteris-tics of the displaced homemaker population,may be different, and perhaps less flexible,than definitions used by service providers.

On the basis of the definition outlined above,there were 1.7 million displaced homemakersin 1975, 1.9 million in 1979, 2.3 million in 1982,and 2.2 million in 1983 (the most recent yearfor which figures were available when this re-port was written) (see table 1). It is quite likelythat these numbers, though large, are under-stated, Another estimate for 1975, using virtu-

11

Table 1 .—Characteristics of Displaced Homemakers, Selected Years (numbers and percentages)

Numbers in thousands Percentages

1975 1979 1982 1983. --- . --- . --- . ---

1982 1983

Marital status:Married, disabled or

unemp loyed spouse . . . . 641.0Divorced/separated/spouse

absent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 653.0Widowed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 438.4Never married . . . . . . . . . . . . . . N/A

T o t a l , ....,..,.........,.. —Race:

White . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,311.0Black. ...,....,,. . . . . . . . . 392.1Other. ,., ..,., . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29.2

Total . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . —Age:

35-44 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 504.545-54 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ,.,,.. 615.255-64 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 612.6

Total . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . —Family income: a

Less than $10,000/yr . . . . . . . . . 734.6$10,001-$20,000/yr . . . . . . . . . . . . 595.0$20,001-$30,000/yr . . . . . . . . . . . . 239.8More than $30,001/yr . . . . . . . . 163,0

Total . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . —

Total . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,732.2

911.3 769.9

1,005.6433.0

13.4—

1,750.3409.6

61.8—

860.8701.3659.8

—

1,033.7605.6343.1239.5

—

2,221.6

739.1

769.2409.1

3.5—

1,494.5385.640.5—

619.7674.9626.2

—

755.3600.2303.0262,3

—

1,920.5

37.0 38.5 39.0 34.7

978.1438,5

11.1—

37.725,3N/A

100.0

40.121.3

0.2100.0

41.818.80.5

100.0

45.319.50.6

100.0

1,811.5453.2

74.1—

75.722.6

1.7100.0

77.820.1

2.1100.0

77.519.43.2

100.0

78.818.42.8

100.0

907.8746.1685.1

—

29.135.534.4

100.0

32.335.132.6

100.0

38.831.929.3

100.0

38.731.629.7

100.0

1,055.6698,3314.4270.7

—

42.434.313.89.4

100.0

39.331.315.813.7

100.0

45.129.913.411.6

100,0

46,527.315.410,8

100.02,338.6 —

NIA—Too few In this category to be estimated from the Current Popu/atior? Surveysa1982 constant dollars

SOURCE Carolyn Taylor O”Brlen and Demetra Smith N!ghtlngale Programs for D/sp/aced Homemakers In the 1980s, report to the Off[ce of Technology Assessment(Washington, DC The Urban Instflute, 1984~ based on Current Population Surveys, 1976, 1980, 1983, 1984

ally the same definition, but drawn from theSurvey of Income and Education, produced afigure of 2.2 million displaced homemakers;this compares with the figure of 1.7 million for1975 presented here.5 Also, the definition usedhere excludes women younger than 35, an argu-able point. Even so, the 1983 figure of 2.2 mil-lion represents about 6 percent of all womenin the age group for that year. The rise in num-bers of displaced homemakers is striking--a 28-percent increase from 1975 to 1983. At thesame time, the population of all U.S. women inthe age group rose only 11 percent.6

Comparisons with other groups of displacedor unemployed workers shed some light on thesignificance of the displaced homemaker prob-lem. For example, the number of mainstream

workers displaced from paid jobs was probablywell over 2 million in 1983,7 In the same year,displaced homemakers numbered at least 2,2million, according to the conservative esti-mates developed for OTA based on CPS yearlysurveys. The average number of unemployedAmerican workers in 1983 was 10.7 million.From 1984 through mid-1985, the number ofunemployed workers hovered around 8.2 to 8,5million.

Of the estimated 2.2 million displaced home-makers in 1983, over 1 million were divorced,

7The number of displaced tiorkers eligible for JT”f]A Title I [ Iser~’ices in 1984-85 is uncounted and uncertain, but an estimatema}’ be based on numbers in years when a sur~e~’ was done.

In the 5 years 1979-83, 1 I,5 adult workers lost their jobs due toplant closings or relocations, abolition of shifts or positions. orslack work. It is IikeI\’ that most of these workers met the de fi -n itlon of eligih i] itj’ i n Title I I 1, and that It’ell o~’er 2 million wereeligible in 1983. There is 1 ittle e~’idence that the pace of displace-ment slowed markedl} in 1984-85, See chs, 3 and 4 of the finalreport for details.

sBoth estimates were prepared by the Urban Institute. See JeanF;. Vanski, [)emetra Smith N i g h t i n g a l e , a n d Carolyn TaylorO’Brien, Emplo~ment lle~’elopment Needs of Displaced Hon]c-makers (Washington DC: ‘rhe Urban Institute, 1983); and O’Brierand Nightingale, op. cit.

“[’h is i nc I udes c it’ i} i an women outside of institutions.

separated, or had an absent spouse (see table1). Rapid growth (54 percent) in this group ac-counted for much of the increase in numbersof displaced homemakers from 1975 to 1983.In 1982, at the depth of the recession, there wasa bulge in the category of married women withdisabled or long-term unemployed husbands;but with the beginning of recovery in 1983, thebulge flattened out. Equally striking was the in-crease (71 percent) in numbers of women at theyounger end of the range, those between 35 and44 years old. Black women are overrepresented;18 percent of the displaced homemakers in1983 were black, compared to 12 percent of allwomen in the age group. Finally, many of thesewomen were close to poverty, In 1982 and1983, nearly half of them had family incomesbelow $10,000 a year.

Income8

Most of the evidence indicates that displacedhomemakers, like other female heads of house-holds, are disproportionately poor. In 1982,their mean family income was reported to be$15,000, compared to $25,000 for all families.However, this figure may well overstate the ac-tual income status of displaced homemakers.The same is true of the data in table 1 whichshow the distribution of family income amonggroups of displaced homemakers. Reportedly,25 to 29 percent of these women received fam-ily incomes of $20,000 or more per year be-tween 1979 and 1983. This percentage is sur-prisingly large considering that, by definition,these displaced homemakers were unemployedor underemployed.

One possible explanation is that the incomefigures are out of date—that they representformer, not present, family income. In variousyears, some 54 to 58 percent of the women withincomes in the two upper income brackets($20,000 to $30,000 and over $30,000) were inthe category of married with husbands eitherphysically disabled or persistently unemployed.The reported family income is based on theprevious 12 months, and therefore could in-

81ncome figures in this section, unless otherwise noted, arein constant 1982 dollars.

elude earnings from a period when the hus-band was still employed.

An additional factor (probably less impor-tant) is that some of the higher incomes reflectalimony or child support payments. Earlierstudies show that quite a small minority of dis-placed homemakers (about 15 percent) receivealimony or child support.9 Indeed, of all di-vorced women in 1975, about 14 percent wereawarded alimony and 47 percent child support—but fewer than half who were entitled to sup-port ever received regular payments.10 Yet, forthe minority of women who receive them, childsupport payments may sometimes be an impor-tant source of family income—at least for atime, Analysis of the CPS data shows that abouthalf the divorced and separated displacedhomemakers in the upper two income bracketswho were receiving some child support at thetime of the survey were likely to lose that in-come soon because their youngest child wasapproaching 18 years of age. The two factorsdescribed above probably account for a gooddeal of the higher-than-expected incomes ofabout one-quarter of displaced homemakers;limitations in the data and analysis of the datamake it difficult to be more precise.

Altogether, it is likely that the reportedfigures understate the financial adversity ex-perienced by displaced homemakers, Even so,the figures indicate that the majority face seri-ous problems. In 1983, at least 30 percent ofdisplaced homemakers’ families were belowthe poverty level (then at about $10,000 a yearfor a family of four). This compares to a na-tional figure of 15.2 percent below the povertylevel in 1983.11 Figure 1 illustrates the distri-bution of displaced homemaker family income,by family size,

QVanski, Nightingale, and O’Brien, op. cit.locaro] Jones, Nancy Gordon, and Isabel Sawhill, ‘‘Child SUP-

port Payments in the United States, ” Working Paper 992-03(Washington DC: The Urban Institute, 1976),

1 I Thirty percent of displaced homemaker fami] ies of four ormore had incomes below the poverty level, which equaled about$lG,000 (1982 dollars) in 1983. It is likely that smaller familieswere below the poverty level in at least the same proportion,although displaced homemaker incomes \vere not broken outbelow the $10,000 level for the OTA analysls. (The poverty levelin 1982 dollars was about $5,000 for a one-person family, andabout $7,5oo for a three-person family.)

13

Figure 1.— Distribution of Family Income ofDisplaced Homemakers, by Family Size, 1983

1

E 70 -z 60 “F 50z 40 “: 30 -~ 20 -

10 -0

Under $10,000 $10,000- $20,000- Over $30,000$20,000 $30,000

Family income

SOURCE. Demetra Smith N!ghtlngale and Carolyn Taylor O’Brien, Est/rnates ofthe D/sp/aced Homemaker Popu/at/orr report to the Off Ice ofTechnology Assessment (JVashlngton, DC The Urban Institute,1 985)

Another indicator of the economic situationof displaced homemakers is personal income.An analysis of 1975 data from the Survey ofIncome and Education found that the averagepersonal income of displaced homemakers inthat year was $4,317 (current dollars), whichwas $155 less than a full-time job at the mini-mum wage would have paid.12 Employed womenof the same age and marital status had an aver-age personal income of $8,749 in 1975. Themost important source of income for displacedhomemakers is their own earnings, as shownin the same study. Seventy percent of displacedhomemakers earned money in 1975, and overhalf of their personal income came from earn-ings.13 Figure 2 shows the source of displacedhomemakers’ personal income at that time,based on data in the Survey of Income andEducation.

Some sources of income varied quite sub-stantially among groups. For example, aboutone-third of divorced or separated white womenreported receiving some alimony or child sup-

Izvanskl, Nl~htlnga]e, and O’ B rien, op. cit. The Current pop-ulation S’urt’ej?s, on which the present analysis is based, showfamily income. The 1976 Survey of Income and Education, onwhich the earlier analysis was based, showed personal income.In 1982 dollars (the basis for most income figures in this dis-cussion], the average personal income for displaced homemak-ers in 1975 was about $7,730. Personal income as defined in theearlier analysis included earnings, public assistance, Social Secu-rity benefits for minor children of widows, alimony and childsupport, Supplemental Security Income (SSI) and veterans’ ben-efits, interest and dividends, and pensions.

I q Ibid,

Figure 2.—Sources of Displaced Homemakers’Personal Income, 1975

53.1%

Interest/dividends 7,6° o

SOURCE Jean E Vanskl, Demetra Smith Nlghtlngale, and Carolyn TaylorO’Brien, Ernp/oyrnenf Development Needs of D/sp/aced Homemakers, report to the U S Department o f Health and H u manServices, Admlmstration on Aging (Washington DC The UrbanInstitute, 1983)

port payments in 1975, with the amount aver-aging about $3,000 a year (current dollars) perrecipient. Only 16 percent of divorced blackwomen, and 9 percent of separated black wom-en, got alimony or child support; the averageamount received was about $1,300. The dis-placed homemakers most dependent on pub-lic assistance were divorced and separated,with 24 to 31 percent of white women in thesegroups receiving welfare payments, and 40 to56 percent of divorced and separated blackwomen. For the group of displaced homemak-ers as a whole, alimony and child support ac-counted for about 9 percent of personal in-come; public assistance provided about thesame share.

Family Size and Children at Home

Families of displaced homemakers in 1983were typically small (families are defined as re-lated individuals living in the same household).About 22 percent were in families of four ormore people; approximately the same numberwere the sole family member in their house-hold (figure 3). As figure 1 indicates, thesmallest families were generally the poorest.About 70 percent of the one-person familieshad incomes below $10,000 a year (1982 dol-lars). However, 30 percent of the larger fam-ilies (four people or more) had family incomesbelow the $10,000 level.

14 —

Figure 3.— Family Size of Displaced Homemakers,

.

1983

.

One Two

,

1

IThree Four Five or more

Family size

SOURCE. Demetra Smith Nmhtingale and Carolyn Taylor O’Brien, Esf/rnates ofthe D/sp/aced H;mem-akers Popu/af/on, “report to the Off Ice ofTechnology Assessment (Washington, DC The Urban Institute,1985)

All of the 2.2 million displaced homemakersin 1983 were, by definition, at least 35 yearsold, and 1.36 million were over 45. Even so,a majority (61 percent) had children at home.Figure 4 shows the distribution of numbers ofchildren living at home with a displacedhomemaker mother. Typically, the children inthe families were of school age. Only 3 percentof displaced homemakers (as defined here) hadchildren under 6; for 43 percent, the youngestchild at home was 6 to 18 years old, and for15 percent the youngest was over 18.

Employment

By definition, all of the displaced homemak-ers were having trouble finding satisfactoryjobs. The Urban Institute study of displacedhomemakers as of 1975 was able to providethese details about employment at that time:Over half were underemployed, most of themworking full time but below the minimumwage, and the rest working part time althoughthey wanted a full-time job. Twenty percent

Figure 4.—Number of Children at Home, Displaced

No

SOURCE

childrenOnechild

T w o Three Fourch i l d ren ch i l d ren o r mo re

children

Number of children at h o m eDemetra Smith Nlghttnaale and Carolyn Taylor O’Brien, Es f/mafes offhe L3/sp/aced Homem-akers Popu/at/on, repor t to the Office ofTechnology Assessment (Washington, DC The Urban lnstltute,1985)

had been out of work at least half the preced-ing year, or out of the labor force because ofdiscouragement. Fifteen percent were cur-rently out of the labor force but intended tolook for work within a year, and another 15percent were about to lose AFDC or other in-come related to dependent children.

The jobs these displaced homemakers held(currently or recently) were by and large poorlypaid. Forty-two percent were service workers,in such jobs as waitress, hotel maid, or nurs-ing home aide. By way of comparison, only 22percent of all female workers were in serviceworkers jobs in 1975. Displaced homemakerswere far less likely to have clerical jobs thanother women workers—17 percent comparedwith 35 percent. At the middle and top end ofthe job scale, 21 percent of all women work-ers had professional, technical, and adminis-trative jobs in 1975; only 13 percent of the dis-placed homemakers were in these occupations.

NATIONAL DISPLACED HOMEMAKER PROGRAMS

Government programs to assist displacedhomemakers are no more than a decade old,California’s 1975 law established the Nation’sfirst program designed specifically to servewomen who had lost their main source of in-come due to a husband’s death, desertion, ordivorce or to loss of eligibility for public assis-tance, and who consequently had to find paidwork to support themselves and their families.

The first Federal legislation to assist dis-placed homemakers was the 1976 amendmentsto the Vocational Education Act, which di-rected that States could use Voc Ed grants pro-vided by the Federal Government to meet theneeds of displaced homemakers. Next, the 1978amendments to CETA specifically named dis-placed homemakers as facing disadvantages inentering the labor market, and made them a tar-get group for employment and training, Inaddition, for fiscal year 1980, Congress pro-vided a special $5 million fund under CETAfor 47 demonstration projects serving displacedhomemakers.

JTPA, passed in 1982, weakened Federal as-sistance to displaced homemakers; it madeservices to this group optional, instead of tar-geting them for special attention as CETA haddone. Two years later, however, in the Carl D.Perkins Vocational Education Act of 1984,Congress strongly increased Federal supportfor displaced homemaker programs. The newlaw authorized about $84 million in fiscal year1985 for Voc Ed grants that are specifically des-ignated for services to single parents and home-makers—including displaced homemakers—and thus opened a large new source of Federalfunds to displaced homemaker programs. Yeteven with the increased Voc Ed funding, Fed-eral support for employment and training serv-ices targeted directly to displaced homemakersremains at a very modest level for a programopen to several million eligible people.

about funding for displaced homemaker pro-grams is incomplete, it appears that State sup-port has grown over the past few years, andin 1984 was the major source of money forthese programs.

Exactly how many displaced homemakerprojects exist across the country—in commu-nity colleges, in vocational technical schools,in community-based organizations such asYWCAs, in city or State agencies, or in inde-pendent centers—is uncertain, but there appearto be several hundred, The Displaced Home-makers Network, a national information ex-change for the local centers, lists 425 suchcenters, but this is not a complete count.14 Itappears that the number of projects is expand-ing modestly, after a sharp decline in 1981-82.As figure 5 shows, displaced homemaker proj-ects multiplied between 1978 to 1980; the num-ber listed with the Displaced Homemaker Net-work rose from 50 to 407. With a drop in CETAfunding in 1981, projects listed with the net-work also fell, to 337. By 1984, the number hadonce more risen.

lqThe 425 centers ]isted by the Network are those that repliedto a 1984 survey, which was sent to over 900 organizations onthe Network’s mailing list. OTA analyzed the survey results. Ofthe projects that replied to the survey, 364 from 46 States andthe District of Columbia provided enough usable data that their

Meanwhile, by 1985, 24 States had enactedtheir own laws in support of displaced home-makers, with 19 appropriating funds for pro- Year

grams to benefit them, Although information SOURCE Surveys conducted by the Displaced Homemakers Network

1980 1981—

1984

15

16

The number of people served by the pro-grams each year is likewise uncertain, but isprobably at least 100,000. Displaced homemak-er centers replying to a 1984 survey by the Net-work reported that they serve anywhere from15 to 3,800 clients per year, with an averageof 200 to 230 per program. According to thesurvey, increasing numbers of women are seek-ing services. A large majority of respondentssaid that both their funding and the numberof clients they serve had risen over the previ-ous year.

Interviews with directors of 20 displacedhomemaker projects in the spring of 1984painted a less favorable picture—one of ex-panding demands for services but no corre-sponding increase in funds.15 Sixteen of the di-rectors said the number of clients they servedhad grown steadily; four reported their clientload had remained relatively stable. Economicconditions had something to do with the de-mand for services. For example, one projectdirector linked the rise in number of partici-pants to layoffs in the steel and auto industries,which pushed homemakers into the breadwin-ner role. Four directors noted that outreach ef-forts were related to the growth in demand forservices. Many displaced homemakers do notknow that they can be defined as such, muchless that there are programs designed to helpthem. Publicity in the community about theprograms draws in these women.

As for funds, about equal numbers of the 20project directors said their budgets had in-creased, decreased, or remained stable; onehad been on a roller coaster, with budgets fluc-tuating between $300,000 and $40,000 over thepast few years. Nearly all the project directorssaid there were displaced homemakers in theircommunities who were not being served, mostlybecause funds and staff were lacking. Two di-rectors reported that they have continued toserve more clients each year as funding wascut, but are concerned about the quality of serv-ice as staff and resources are stretched thin.

lsThe interviews Were conducted by the Urban Institute un-der contract to OTA. Results are reported in full in O’Brien andNightingale, op. cit.

Others turned away applicants, or put them ona waiting list.

The typical displaced homemaker centerruns on very modest resources. Half of the 307centers which reported their levels of fundingto the Network survey said they operated on$41,000 a year or less, and two-thirds on$62,000 or less. Only one-sixth of the projectsreported receiving as much as $100,000 a year.Almost certainly, these figures are understated.Many of the projects reported only cash fund-ing, omitting in-kind contributions from com-munity colleges or vocational technical insti-tutes where they were housed. Nonetheless, onthe whole, the survey supports the conclusionthat these are lean programs, staffed by one ortwo full-time and one or two part-time people,with a few volunteers.

From the incomplete information availableabout displaced homemaker programs, it ap-pears that Federal funds were their mainstaya few years ago, that these funds declined from1981 to 1984, and that other sources—mainlyspecial State funds—have recently been mod-estly increasing. With the passage of the Per-kins Vocational Education Act late in 1984, asubstantial new source of Federal funds be-came available for services to displaced home-makers.

In 1980, CETA was the main source of Fed-eral funds for displaced homemaker programs.As shown in table 2, two-thirds of the displacedhomemaker centers surveyed by the Networkin 1980 reported that CETA was a provider offunds for them. About one-quarter cited VocEd grants (these are generally made up of two-thirds Federal money and one-third State). Thirty-one percent named State funds.

In 1984 the funding situation was quite dif-ferent. Only 16 percent of the centers reportedreceiving funds from JTPA, CETA’s successor.Special State funds were now cited by nearlyhalf the centers as a source of support, and Voc

17

Table 2.— Principal Sources of Funding for DisplacedHomemaker Programs, 1980 and 1984

Percent of programs reportingfunds from source a

Funding source 1980 1984

Vocational Education . . . . . 26% 43% b

CETA ... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 N/AJTPA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . N/A 16Special State funds. . . . . . . 31 48b

Private c . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . N/A 37Foundations and

corporations . . . . . . 10 N/AOther public funds . . . . . . . 11 N/ACollege . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . N/A 8Other . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . N/A 25N/A—Not avadableor not applicableapercentages add to more than 100 because most programs report more than

one source of fundingbAbout 12 to 15 programs reported what were probably VOcatlOnal Education

funds as State funds If these apparent misstatements were corrected, the per.centages would be more even —State funds 44 percent and Vocational Educa-tion 46 percent

cprlvate sources In 1984 Included corporations, foundations, and Ct’wltableOrgan lzatlons such as United Way

dother’, In 1 g84 included such sources as fees for services and Informal fundralslng actlvltles such as bake sales

SOURCE 1980 and 1984 surveys by Dtsplaced Homemakers Network, OTA anal-ysis of 1984 survey

Ed funds by more than 40 percent.16 Privatesources—foundations, corporations, and char-itable organizations—had gained in impor-tance, and were now mentioned by over one-third of respondents, compared with one-tenthin 1980.

The actual amounts of funding from varioussources over the past 4 or 5 years are harderto pin down. The Federal Government hasnever tracked either CETA or JTPA funds totheir destination in local displaced homemak-er centers, nor is there any information of thiskind available for Voc Ed funds after the 1981-82 school year. From indirect evidence, itseems safe to conclude that JTPA/CETA fund-ing shrank absolutely as well as relatively from1980 to 1984, In the first place, CETA was abigger program than JTPA. At CETA’s highpoint in fiscal year 1979, appropriations were$10.3 billion, and were still as great as $7,6 bil-lion in 1981. By contrast, JTPA appropriations

1~1 t is ~, robab]e that special State funds were somewhat olrer-reported as a source of funding and \’o(: Ed underreported; someIZ to 15 of the respondents recorded what were probably t’ocEd funds as State-provided. If correction is made for this proh-able misstatement, it appears that the percentage of programsrecei~’ i ng \roc Ed funding and special State funding are aboutthe same,

for 1985 were $3,8 billion. Furthermore, JTPAdoes not target displaced homemakers as CETAdid. Nor did Congress ever add to the $5 mil-lion it provided for national demonstration dis-placed homemaker projects in 1980. Indeed,only 15 of the 35 national demonstration proj-ects operating in 1981 had obtained funds fromother sources (mostly CETA and Voc Ed) tocontinue after the demonstration period, Dur-ing 1981 there was also an apparent overall de-cline in the number of displaced homemakerprograms, from 407 to 337,

By 1984, Vocational Education grants werethe main source of Federal funds for displacedhomemaker programs, This source also prob-ably declined in amount after the 1981-82school year. Between 1979-80 and 1981-82 (thelast year for which data are available) the Fed-eral share of Voc Ed contributions to displacedhomemaker projects rose, from $3,1 to $4.4 mil-lion. Afterwards, in all likelihood, it declined,since total Federal Voc Ed grants (of whichgrants for displaced homemaker services werea small part) were cut by one-third from fiscalyears 1981 to 1983.

The Perkins Vocational Education Act of1984 represents an important change in direc-tion. Its authorization of as much as $84 mil-lion in one year for services to single parentsor homemakers (including displaced home-makers) makes it likely that Voc Ed grants willbe a much larger source of funding for dis-placed homemaker projects than in the past.So far as is known, the Voc Ed grants for serv-ices to this group never before totaled morethan $4.4 million per year. Although the tar-get group for the Voc Ed grants is now broad-er,17 it is expected that displaced homemakerprograms will be a major recipient, Moreover,the new law designates where Federal contri-

1 TThe drafters of the law used the term ‘‘homemakers’ ratherthan “displaced homemakers” to give more latitude to Statesin providing services. Women who might foresee the necessit y

to find work outside the home can be helped to start trainingor a job search, rather than waiting till divorce, widowhood, orsome other factor forces them to do so. The inclusion of ‘‘sin-gle parents” in the target groups opens the program more em-phaticall~’ to men, and removes any requirement of marriageor dissolution of marriage, or of inexperience in the labor mar-ket, The effect is to open the program both to all working singleparents and to parents (mostly mothers) on welfare.

18

butions are to go, in a way not done before. Pre-viously, States were allowed to use Federal VocEd grants for assistance to displaced homemak-ers; some chose to give virtually nothing tothese programs. The new law imposes manda-tory set-asides for single parents or homemak-ers. Although displaced homemakers are notexplicitly named in the set-aside, they are in-cluded in the category.

Results from the Displaced Homemaker Net-work’s 1984 survey suggest that at that time nomore than about one-quarter of the financialsupport for displaced homemaker programswas coming from the Federal Government. Ta-ble 3 shows the amounts and sources of fund-ing reported by 307 programs in the survey.(Comparisons with 1980 are not possible, be-cause information on amounts of funding bysource was not collected in the 1980 survey.)Ten percent of the programs’ funding camefrom JTPA, and another 19 percent from VocEd (recall that about two-thirds of this is Fed-eral money). “Other” sources of funding—forexample, fees or informal fund raisers such asbake sales–were reported to provide as muchmoney to these programs as JTPA. Statesemerged as the biggest contributors, providingabout half of the projects’ funds.

These figures should not be taken too liter-ally. A few JTPA-funded projects were unableto distinguish services to displaced homemak-ers, so their records were not entered and theirpossible contributions went unrecorded. Also,JTPA was still less than 2 years old at the timeof the survey; more recent evidence (discussed

below) suggests that by 1985 a larger numberof projects—but still definitely a minority—were able to take advantage of JTPA support.Moreover, some of the funds credited to spe-cial State funds in the survey returns may ac-tually be Federal block grant or revenue shar-ing money. On the other hand, States were notspecifically credited with their share of Voc Edmoney.

It is interesting to note that displaced home-maker projects which reported getting JTPAfunding were quite heavily concentrated in afew States. Of the 57 projects reporting somefunds from JTPA, nearly half (28) were in justfour States: Ohio had nine, Kentucky eight,Montana six, and Wisconsin five. This suggeststhat someone in those States—possibly theState JTPA director or directors of trainingprojects at the local level—took early advantageof the options JTPA offers for supporting dis-placed homemaker services.

Overall, the survey results probably give areasonably accurate impression of where themoney came from in 1984. Information fromother sources was consistent with the surveyfindings. Six of the twenty project directors in-terviewed by the Urban Institute said that theycurrently had JTPA support, but of those, threementioned sharp reductions in level of fund-ing in the changeover from CETA to JTPA. (Atleast one director, however, foresaw an oppor-tunity for increased funding through JTPA.) Sixproject directors also specifically mentionedthat their Voc Ed funds had been shrinking, in

Table 3.—Funding for Displaced Homemaker Programs, by Source, 1984

Amount of funds Percent Number of Average funds per Median funds perFunding source in $1,000 of total programs reporting program in $1,OOOb program in $1,000

Vocational Education . . . . . . . . $3,787.1—

19“/0 133 $28.5 —

JTPA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2,025.3 10 45 44.0Special State funds . . . . . . . . .

—10,078.7 51 151 66.7 —

Private. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,590.1 8 64 24.8 —College . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 278.1 1 19 14.6Other. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

—2,149.6 11 72 29.9 —

Total . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $19,908.9 100%0 307 $64.9 41.0a“programs repo~ing” in this table means those that reported the amount of funds received, by source. The sum of programs reporting is more than the total numberof programs reporting, because most programs had more than one source of funds

b“Average” IS the arithmetical mean.C“prlvate” sources Included corporations, foundations, and charitable organizations such as United way.

SOURCE” 1984 survey by Displaced Homemaker Network and OTA analysts of the survey

19

some cases drastically. (These commentsmade before the passage of the Perkins

In general, States seem to have taken

wereAct.)

overa major role of provider for displaced home-maker programs. Although support has weak-ened in some States (e. g., California’s law ex-pired in 1983 and was not renewed), it is risingin others. In the 19 States providing funds asof 1985, the typical contribution was somethingbetween $100,000 a year to $500,000, althoughsix States provided more than $500,000 andtwo over $1 million. The number of projectsfunded ranged from 3 to 25.18

Some States have found ingenious ways tofund the programs, For example, Idaho, Mon-tana, and North Dakota have inaugurated sev-eral new displaced homemaker centers withfunds derived from a tax on divorce filing fees.Minnesota and Washington earmark moneyfrom marriage licenses as well as from divorcefiling fees. New Jersey is considering settingaside $1 million a year from the State lotteryfor displaced homemakers. New York has afunding scheme, begun in 1979, which allo-cates to displaced homemaker programsmoney from a special account in the State’s un-employment insurance trust fund. (The ac-count is made up of interest and penalties ondelinquent taxes due to the fund from employ-ers.) Contributions from this account haverisen steadily, reaching $1.6 million in 1984-85. The State supports 14 displaced homemak-er centers from the account; three of themopened in 1984.

Some of the States with unusual sources offunding for displaced homemaker programsare considering supplementing or perhaps re-placing them with regular legislative appropri-ations, so as to have a more reliable level offunding. In New York, for example, the spe-cial UI account that funds displaced homemak-er projects is being depleted. Some States arefinding that divorce filing fees are a rathersmall and irregular source of funds,

The two major sources of Federal support forservices to displaced homemakers are Voc Ed

lsDiSp]aCe~ Homemakers Network, Dispiaced HomemakerState Legislation (Washington DC: The Network, 1985),

grants and JTPA. Even before passage of thePerkins Act, Voc Ed grants were the biggercontributor. With the major changes in the newlaw, Voc Ed grants are likely to assume stillgreater importance. For two reasons, however,access to JTPA services remains important fordisplaced homemakers. First, although thereis a good deal of flexibility in both the JTPAand the Voc Ed programs, JTPA more stronglyemphasizes job search assistance and promptemployment, while the primary focus of VocEd is on training, For many displaced home-makers, getting a job as soon as possible is im-perative. Projects that have placement as theircentral goal may serve their needs best.

Second, despite the increased funding desig-nated for services to single parents or home-makers under the Perkins Act, the amounts in-volved are still relatively small for a training,education, and employment program open tomillions of people. No estimate has been madeso far of the number of single parents or home-makers eligible for Voc Ed programs which areauthorized at approximately $84 million a year,and have been funded at about $63 million forfiscal year 1985, The population of displacedhomemakers is estimated at about 2 to 4 mil-lion; if the two-thirds of the fiscal year 1985 VocEd grants for single parents or homemakerswere spread over this group alone, they wouldamount only to about $10 to $21 per person peryear. For comparative purposes, consider theJTPA Title III program for dislocated workers,funded in fiscal year 1985 at $223 million andopen to roughly 2 million workers. If everyeligible person took advantage of the Title 111program, the funding would amount to about$110 per capita. Another comparison may bemade with the general CETA programs whichserved a population of about 16 million dis-advantaged workers in 1980 and were fundedat about $4 billion, or approximately $250 percapita.19

The foregoing comparisons are only illustra-tive. It is unrealistic to suppose that every eligi-ble person will be served in an employment

IQThe funding of $4 billion for fisca] year 1980 refers Onl}r forthe general training and employment programs open to all eligi-ble disadvantaged workers; it omits programs for special popu-lations such as the Job Corps and the Native Americans, migrantand seasonal farmworkers, and dislocated workers programs.Total CETA funding in 1980 was $8,1 billion.

20

and training program. (In fact, about 1,377,000disadvantaged workers participated in CETA’sgeneral employment and training programs in1980, at a cost of approximately $2,900 per per-son. Under JTPA Title III, 96,100 workers par-ticipated during the 9-month transition year,October 1983-June 1984, at a cost of $768 perworker.) The point remains however, that de-spite the remarkable new infusion of Federalfunds for services to displaced homemakers inthe Perkins Act, funding for these programs isrelatively thin.

By early 1985, it appeared that use of JTPAfunds to support services to displaced home-makers might be increasing, but was still nota principal source of support. In the firstmonths of that year, the Displaced Homemak-er Network queried the 425 projects listed inits directory on their experiences with JTPA.Replies came from 176 projects, of which 55reported that they had JTPA-funded contractsand 121 said they had not.20 This compareswith replies to the Network’s 1984 survey theprevious year, in which 355 projects reportedsources of funding and 57 said they got somefunds from JTPA.

The amount of JTPA money devoted to serv-ices for displaced homemakers in the 55 proj-ects is uncertain, because only one-quarter ofthe projects’ contracts served displaced home-makers exclusively; three-quarters served otherclients as well. About half the projects reportedthey were serving small numbers of displacedhomemakers—l to 20 over the life of the con-tract, which was usually a year. Figure 6 showsthe distribution of dollar amounts of JTPA con-tracts in the 55 projects, and figure 7 the dis-tribution of numbers of displaced homemakersserved.

.—ZODisp]aced Homemakers Network, Services to Displaced Home-

makers Under JTPA, Preliminary Figures 4/85 (Washington DC:The Network, 1985).

Figure 6.—Services to Displaced HomemakersUnder JTPA Contracts, Dollar Amount of Contract

and Women Seined, April 1985

Dollar amount of contract

$20,001-$60,000300/0

Women served by contract

Displacedhomemakers

only 27°10

Groupincludingdisplaced

homemakersand others

73%.

Note: Total may not equal 1000/. due to rounding

SOURCE. Displaced Homemakers Network.

Figure 7.—Services to Displaced HomemakersUnder JTPA Contracts, Numbers Served, April 1985

50 “ 4

40 “

30 “

20 - /

10 -

0 t 4 [ I1 –20 21 –50 51 – 100 101 – 150151 – 500

Number of womenSOURCE: Displaced Homemakers Network.

21

These data indicate that the typical JTPA-funded project serving displaced homemakersserves other clients as well. This works wellfor some displaced homemakers but, as dis-cussed later in this report, many of thesewomen benefit from services designed ex-pressly to meet their needs. Unlike workers dis-placed from factories or offices, a great manydisplaced homemakers lack recent work ex-perience; often they are less confident, and lessattractive to employers, than someone with along stable history at a paid job. The suddenloss of personal and financial support that dis-placed homemakers have undergone can alsocompound the job readiness problem. Theymay do better in special projects than in largermainstream employment and training projects,or in general women’s programs. So far, mostJTPA-funded projects do not serve displacedhomemakers as a special group,

A serious eligibility issue arises in the use ofJTPA Title 11A funds for displaced homemak-ers. The Title 11A program is intended primar-ily to serve economically disadvantaged peo-ple; the problem is how to serve displacedhomemakers who do not qualify as economi-cally disadvantaged, According to the law, theterm economically disadvantaged includespeople who are on welfare or receiving foodstamps, or whose family income in the previ-ous 6 months was either below the federallyestablished poverty level, or was no more than70 percent of the lower living standard incomelevel (whichever was higher). Often a newlydisplaced homemaker’s family income for theprevious 6 months, when she still had her hus-band’s income support, is too high to meet theJTPA requirement. Even though her incomemay have been drastically reduced by the timeshe applies for services, she is still ineligible.Also, many displaced homemakers need as-sessment, counseling, and job search assistanceservices even when their income continues toexceed the JTPA limits.

It is possible to serve people who are not eco-nomically disadvantaged under JTPA. Title III,for displaced workers, has no income limits;but the definition of displaced worker in theact does not necessarily and obviously extendto displaced homemakers. Several States doserve displaced homemakers under Title III,reasoning that many of them fit the definitionof long-term unemployed. (See ch. 5 of the fullreport for a discussion of eligibility for TitleIII programs.) Florida has even included Title111 services to displaced homemakers in the 2-year coordination plan that States must submitto qualify for JTPA funds. Florida’s plan allowsincreased costs per placement for displacedhomemakers, taking into account their needsfor more extensive training and services.21

Title 11A, which has the largest appropria-tion of any part of the law, makes some provi-sion for people who are not economically dis-advantaged, but face employment barriers.Roughly 10 percent of Title 11A funds can bespent for service to these groups. Displacedhomemakers are among the ten groups namedin the law as examples of those eligible for thelo-percent-window money. Anecdotal evi-dence suggests that although some States arein fact using the 10 percent money to servehard-to-employ groups (including displacedhomemakers), most are not. Instead, they aresaving the money to pay back the Federal treas-ury in case any of the people they have alreadyserved as eligible are disallowed on audits. Peo-ple who are above JTPA’s low-income levelmay also qualify for a portion of the employ-ment and training services which State educa-tion agencies provide with JTPA money, undercooperative agreements with JTPA agencies,Some States (Wisconsin is an example) havetaken an active lead in using this education set-

Z1 pau]a Roberts, Center for Law and Social Policy, memora n-dum to People Interested in Women and JTPA on an analysis,by the Coalition on Women and JTPA, of the Governors’ JTPACoordination Plans for Program Years 1984-86.

2 2

aside money for service to displaced home-makers.

Theoretically, all displaced homemakers,without regard for income, were eligible for—but not necessarily entitled to–JTPA Title 11Aprograms that were funded at about $177 mil-lion in fiscal year 1985. The remainder of thegeneral program for disadvantaged adults andyouth, funded at $1.5 billion, was also open tothose meeting the income limits. Some servicesunder Title III, funded at $223 million in 1985,were also available to displaced homemakers,without regard to income. The JTPA funds ac-tually spent on services to displaced homemak-ers is not known, but is surely no more thana small fraction of these amounts. As table 3shows, projects replying to the DisplacedHomemaker Network 1984 survey reported re-ceiving $2 million in JTPA funds. This figureis undoubtedly too low; many projects did notreport amounts of funding, and also JTPA wasa new program in 1984. However, the Net-work’s 1985 survey on experiences with JTPAindicated that it was still true that only a mod-erate number of displaced homemaker proj-ects, and a modest amount of services, werepaid for by JTPA funds.

In interviews, directors of local displacedhomemaker projects repeatedly mentioned thelow-income requirement as a drawback ofJTPA funding. They added that in some Statesrestrictive definitions as to who is a displacedhomemaker puts up more barriers to entry toJTPA projects. (The Federal Government leavesit to the States to define displaced homemak-ers, both for the Voc Ed program and JTPA.)One displaced homemaker center reported thatit sent 200 income-eligible women to a JTPAService Delivery Area for employment andtraining assistance, and only 17 were enrolled,because the State definition of displaced home-maker was so restrictive as to how much thewoman could have earned over the past fewyears .22

Answers to the Network’s 1985 survey offeradditional insights into why more projects donot tap into JTPA as a source of funding. Of

Zz]nformation provided by Displaced Homemakers Network.

the 121 projects which reported they had noJTPA contracts, 11 had tried for one and beenturned down. The rest did not bid. The reasonmost commonly given was lack of informa-tion—a feeling of being too far removed fromthe local JTPA system to try for funds. Themain reasons given by the 110 projects which

not bid, and the numbers of projects giv-the reasons, are as follows:23

Lack of information: our project is not suf-ficiently tied into the local JTPA system(39).Displaced homemakers not targeted: thePrivate Industry Councils (PICs) which areresponsible for direction of local JTPA pro-grams are not funding programs for spe-cial populations but are “mainstreaming”service delivery instead (36).Services not being funded: PICs are giv-ing contracts for vocational skills training,which is not our project’s focus (30).Eligibility: displaced homemakers are notbeing served under the 10 percent “win-dow” for people who face barriers to em-ployment but are not low income (29).Performance-based contracts: Many JTPAcontracts do not pay the contractor untilthe client is placed in a job, but our projectcannot wait that long to be paid (22).Community-based organizations: these or-ganizations, which often provide servicesspecifically designed for displaced home-makers, are not getting contracts (20).Eligibility: displaced homemakers are notqualifying as economically disadvantaged(19).Performance standards: the job placementrate set by the U.S. Department of Laborfor JTPA training, and adapted by States,is too high (16).

Under the Perkins Act, Federal Voc Ed grantsmay continue to be a larger and more reliablesource of funding for displaced homemaker

ZsDiSp]aCed Homemakers Network, Services to Displaced ~ome-

makers Under JTPA, Preliminary Figures 4/85 (Washington DC:The Network, 1985).

23

programs than JTPA. In the Perkins Act, Con-gress unequivocally designated funds for theuse of single parents or homemakers, includ-ing displaced homemakers. Two programs un-der the act have mandatory set-asides for thisgroup:

8.5 percent of basic grants to States—themajor program funded by the act, author-ization of $835 million for fiscal year1985—must be spent for services to singleparents and homemakers;24 and50 percent of the services in a new, smallerprogram to encourage retraining and re-employment of adults—authorization of$35 million but not funded by Congress infiscal year 1985—must be delivered to sin-gle parents and homemakers.

In addition to the programs that can directlybenefit displaced homemakers, two more pro-visions of the act are of particular interest:

3.5 percent of basic State grants must goto sex equity programs, which are de-signed to eliminate sex bias and stereotyp-ing in vocational education, to help pre-pare young women for well-paying jobs,and to help prevent the emergence of moredisplaced homemaker problems in the fu-ture; andcommunity-based organizations, whichoften serve displaced- homemakers veryeffectively, may get special funding—author-ized at $15 million but not funded by Con-gress in fiscal year 1985—to provide voca-tional education support programs.

The women’s programs in the Perkins Act—both the set-asides for single parents and home-makers and the sex equity programs for girlsand young women—are tied very specificallyto the goal of helping women overcome bar-riers to entering or reentering the job market.To make use of set-aside grants, displacedhomemaker projects presumably will not haveto compete with other worthy aims or targetgroups, nor will they have to persuade skepti-

24u P t. 7 percent of basic State grants may be used for Stateadministration expenses. Of the balance remaining, 57 percentis designated for specific uses, including the 8.5 percent for singleparents and homemakers.

cal PICs or State JTPA managers that there isa place for employment and training projectsdesigned to meet the particular needs of formerhomemakers. That, at least, is how the programis supposed to work, In reality, there may besome hitches.

When the Perkins Act was under considera-tion by Congress in 1984, most State directorsof vocational education strongly opposed des-ignation of specific uses for Federal Voc Edgrants. They much preferred contributions onthe block grant model. In the event, however,Congress reserved 57 percent of basic Stategrants for specific uses. Targeted groups andprograms, besides single parents and home-makers and sex equity programs, are the eco-nomically disadvantaged (22 percent of basicState grants), adults (12 percent), the handi-capped (10 percent), and criminal offenders incorrectional institutions (1 percent).

In mid-1985, States were still sorting out howto comply with these designations. Some StateVoc Ed administrators were planning to estab-lish or add support for projects designed toserve displaced homemakers. In others, it wasnot yet clear what the response would be to thelaw’s requirement that States use the specifiedpart of their Federal grants to “meet the spe-cial needs” of single parents or homemakers.

Overall, despite some initial confusion or re-luctance on the part of some education officialsto change past ways of allocating funds, thePerkins Act undoubtedly opens new opportu-nities to projects serving displaced homemak-ers. Despite the broadening of the populationto be served, to include single parents as wellas homemakers, there is little question thatStates will have more Voc Ed funds than everbefore to serve displaced homemakers. A Mary-land official reported, for example, that herState was allocating $100,000 of Federal VocEd funds to adolescent parents—but was re-serving $867,000 for displaced homemakers,for whom no more than $200,000 had ever beenavailable in any year before.

At this writing (September 1985), Congresshad appropriated $784.5 million for basic Stategrants under the Perkins Act for fiscal year

24

1985; about $63 million of this was set asidefor services to single parents and homemakers.Congress did not provide funds in fiscal year1985 for the new adult training and employ-ment program authorized under the act, halfof which would be directed to serving singleparents and homemakers, nor did it providethe special funding for community-based orga-nizations.

Various sections of the Perkins Act spell outa broad range of fundable activities. In oneplace or another, it authorizes the use of Fed-eral grant money to provide most of the serv-ices that displaced homemaker program direc-tors see as necessary for their clients. The mainpurpose of the law, however, is to support vo-cational training, and it is training that receivesmost emphasis. The bulk of Federal Voc Edfunds are provided in basic grants to the States,of which 8.5 percent (after a deduction for Stateadministration costs) is reserved for single par-ents and homemakers. States may use this por-tion of basic grants only for the following pur-poses:

●

●

●

●

●

●

paying for vocational education and train-ing, including basic literacy instruction,that will furnish single parents and home-makers with marketable skills;making grants to educational agencies andpost-secondary schools to expand vocationaleducation services to single parents andhomemakers, so long as the expansion willresult in providing marketable skills to thetarget group;making grants to community-based orga-nizations that have proven their ability toprovide effective vocational education tosingle parents and homemakers;assisting single parents and homemakerswith child care and transportation ex-penses;scheduling programs to be more accessi-ble to single parents and homemakers; andproviding the target group with informa-tion about the vocational education andsupport services open to them.

The basic State grants that are not specifi-cally designated for target groups may be usedfor many other purposes related to vocationaleducation, such as:

● counseling, including self-assessment andcareer planning and guidance;

● placement services for students who havesuccessfully completed vocational educa-tion programs; and

● stipends for students who have “acute eco-nomic needs” which cannot be met underwork-study programs.

The new program in the Perkins Act (author-ization of $35 million) which offers special en-couragement for adult training, retraining, andemployment development programs was notfunded.25 This program was designed with anemphasis on cooperation with employers andplacement in jobs, and half of it is designatedfor single parents and homemakers. Among theservices this new program may support, if andwhen it is funded, are:

education and training programs designedcooperatively with employers, such as ap-prenticeships, on-the-job training, cus-tomized training;entrepreneurship training;counseling and job search assistance; andinformation and outreach to encourageparticipation by eligible adults, especiallywomen, older workers, people with limitedEnglish proficiency, the handicapped, andthe disadvantaged,

Finally, the Perkins Act emphasizes trainingfor young women in secondary and post-sec-ondary schools in nontraditional occupations,setting aside 3.5 percent of basic State grantsfor the program. The purpose is to give youngwomen an alternative to low-paid, traditionallyfemale jobs.

Although displaced homemaker projects usingVoc Ed funds are usually located in commu-nity colleges or vocational-technical institutes,

zsln a supplementary appropriations bill passed in August 1985,the Senate voted to appropriate $15 million in fiscal year 1985for the adult training and employment program, but the Housedid not, and the provision was dropped in conference.

25

they do not have to be. For example, some com-munity-based organizations, such as the YWCA,receive Voc Ed funding for displaced home-maker projects. Although the Perkins Act au-thorizes special funding (up to $15 million infiscal year 1985) for Voc Ed support programsto be provided by community-based organiza-tions, Congress did not fund this part of theact in fiscal year 1985.26 Even if the section iseventually funded, States are not required todeliver services through community-based or-ganizations. One service authorized by the Per-kins Act, which does not seem a likely candi-date for funding by States, is stipends to VocEd students. The 1976 Voc Ed law, which thePerkins Act replaced, specifically named dis-placed homemakers as possible recipients forstipends, but very few were ever provided bythe States.

. The law requires that every State receivingVoc Ed grants designate one person to admin-ister the program for single parents and home-makers and the sex equity program, and spendat least $60,000 a year for administering thewomen’s programs. In most States, the admin-istrator is the Sex Equity Coordinator, a mid-dle-level official in the State Voc Ed hierarchy.How much real authority this official is given,and how effectively she or he uses that author-ity, will determine to a considerable degreewhether the opportunities the law opens up arerealized.

Altogether, the list of services that may beoffered under the new Voc Ed act is impres-sively broad and flexible, yet the focus on voca-tional training is clear. The services mostprominent in JTPA—training in job searchtechniques, job development and job matching,on-the-job-training—are not emphasized to agreat extent except in the new adult trainingprogram which was not funded in fiscal year1985, Relocation assistance is not offered at all.Neither is education toward an academic de-gree. The fact that most displaced homemak-er projects funded by Voc Ed funds are physi-

cally located in educational institutions, andoften are run by someone on the school’s staff,probably discourages many displaced home-makers who urgently need a job from applyingfor services. JTPA, insofar as it serves dis-placed homemakers, plays a different and com-plementary role.

Data Collection

An issue of special concern to Sex EquityCoordinators in 1985, as States were gearingup to implement the new law, was data collec-tion. Information about displaced homemak-ers and programs set up to serve them is ex-tremely deficient. In 1976 the Women’s Bureauof the Department of Labor attempted a nation-wide count of displaced homemakers, and the1983 report of the Urban Institute for the U.S.Department of Health and Human Services,Administration of Aging, made another na-tional estimate, with additional information onservices available to displaced homemakers. Asmentioned, the estimates developed for OTAfor four selected years from 1975 to 1983 arethe only existing national estimates coveringmore than 1 year. In addition, many Stateshave no idea of how many displaced homemak-ers they have, or the extent of services that maybe needed.

Systematic evaluations of displaced home-maker programs—some of which are over 10years old—do not exist. Even noncomparativereports on outcomes of individual projects—how many participants went into training, howmany got jobs, what kind of jobs at what kindof wages—are scarce. Studies of program im-pacts, similar to those for displaced workersserved under the Manpower Development andTraining Act of 1962, or for disadvantagedworkers under CETA, have never been done.The largest study in existence was descriptive,not evaluative; it gave an account of the na-tional demonstration displacement homemak-er program (consisting of 47 projects) fundedunder the special CETA demonstration grantsin 1980.27

Ze]n a supplementary appropriations bill passed in August 1985,the Senate voted $15 million for Voc Ed support services to beprovided by community-based organizations, but the House didnot, and the provision was dropped in conference.

ZTDeborah Kogan, Lois Greenwood, and Mary Venci]], Assess-ment of the National Displaced Homemaker Program, A Cross-Project Analysis (Berkeley CA: Berkeley Planning Associates,1981).

The Perkins Act does not contain specific re-porting requirements about single parents andhomemakers, It requires that States submit tothe U.S. Secretary of Education a vocationaleducation plan, initially covering 3 years andafterwards 2 years, which includes an assess-ment of the special needs of target groups, andassurances that the State will comply with therequirements of the law in meeting those needs.The U.S. Department of Education does not re-quire any reports, other than the general assur-ances contained in the State plans, on whatStates are doing to serve single parents andhomemakers,

The Perkins Act directs the Secretary of Edu-cation to conduct applied research on aspectsof vocational education specifically related tothe act, including effective methods for provid-ing quality vocational education to single par-ents or homemakers (among other targetgroups). In mid-1985, the Department of Edu-cation had no plans to carry out a study of thiskind. The department must conduct a long-term national assessment of vocational educa-tion under the act (including services to tar-geted groups), but the final report is not dueuntil January 1, 1989, 9 months before the ex-piration date of the Perkins Act.

Meanwhile, many of the State Sex Equity Co-ordinators see an urgent need for systematiccollection of information on how many peo-ple qualify for services under the women’s pro-grams, how many actually are served, whattheir characteristics are, and what happens tothem after they receive education, training, andemployment assistance. The coordinators seethese data as essential for writing State reports,at the end of the first 3-year planning cycle, toexplain to Congress the effects of the new law,and the new emphasis on service to single par-ents and homemakers. Accordingly, at their1985 annual meeting (which they organizedand convened themselves) a group of Statecoordinators laid plans for an unprecedentedprogram of consistent, nationwide data gather-ing. The Voc Ed departments of the cooperat-ing States will pay for the program, which isbeing developed under the leadership of the

Maryland and Wisconsin Sex Equity Coordi-nators.

The Maryland Department of VocationalEducation has set aside funds for developinga computer program which will include thesemajor items:

● a count of single parent/homemaker/womenclients, including those in regular voca-tional education classes (so far as possible)as well as those in special programs;

● a profile of clients, including factors suchas age, education, amount and source ofincome, number and age of children, ado-lescent parentage;

● an account of the services the clientreceives—what type, how often, how manyhours of service;

● outcomes after service, including detailson quality of employment such as wages,occupational category, full- or part-timework; and

● a l-year follow-up on outcomes.

Maryland officials expect the system to bein place by July 1, 1986, and anticipate that atleast 30 States will buy into the program. Theresult will be a rich and consistent set of datacovering many if not all States.

At the same time, the national DisplacedHomemakers Network is offering to every Statea relatively inexpensive service, worked outwith the U.S. Bureau of the Census and basedon the 1980 census, to provide a profile of sin-gle parents and homemakers within the State—and within Metropolitan Statistical Areas ifdesired. Characteristics of the population to becovered include age, race, education, income,type of displacement, number of dependentchildren, and labor force participation.

Definition of Displaced Homemakers

In the Perkins Act, “homemaker” is definedas an adult who has worked as an adult pri-marily without renumeration to care for thehome and family, and for that reason has di-minished marketable skills. The law adds, how-ever, that the U.S. Secretary of Education may

27

not prescribe the manner in which the Statescomply with “the application of the definition. ”The law further specifies that State plans shallprovide assurances that in serving single par-ents and homemakers, the State will empha-size assistance to those with the greatest finan-cial need; and in serving homemakers the Statewill give special consideration to “homemak-ers who because of divorce, separation, or thedeath or disability of a spouse must prepare forpaid employ merit.” This is the guidance thelaw provides as to who gets service as a “home-maker, ” and who is at the front of the queue.

Since the Perkins Act is barely in operationyet, it is hard to say whether differences inState definitions of homemakers will make formarked differences among States in who getsserved. As noted above, anecdotal evidencesuggests that differences in definition are im-portant in determining who receives servicesunder JTPA. In some States it is proving quitedifficult for displaced homemakers to get assis-tance under JTPA, because even if they passthe hurdle of income qualification, they maystill not meet a restrictive State definition ofdisplaced homemaker.

DESIGN AND PERFORMANCE OF DISPLACED HOMEMAKER PROJECTS

Displaced homemakers entering the job mar-ket need all the same services as workers dis-placed from paid jobs, and often more. Gener-ally, these women lack the long stable workhistory of displaced workers, and some haveno work experience at all outside the home.A substantial number (about 15 percent) aremothers receiving public assistance who areabout to lose their eligibility because their lastchild is nearing the age of 18. Some of thesewomen are seriously handicapped in gettinga job because of lack of skills or education,Other displaced homemakers have held goodjobs or had an excellent education, but theirskills may be rusty or obsolete, or they may lackconfidence after a long spell out of the job mar-ket. Many who have developed valuable skillsin volunteer jobs need help in exploiting thoseskills for a paid job. In addition to the practi-cal difficulties of finding work, many displacedhomemakers must struggle with feelings ofabandonment and personal inadequacy. Themajority have gone through divorce or sepa-ration, or are widowed.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that the dis-placed homemaker projects of the last 10 yearshave helped many of these women gain confi-dence, learn job search skills, get training, andfind jobs. Because systematic studies of theproject results are lacking, this kind of evidenceis the best we have. Likewise, knowledge aboutwhat program elements are most importantand successful in assisting displaced home-makers comes mostly from accounts of womenwho went through the programs and observa-tions of project directors. The national Dis-placed Homemakers Network, which is intouch with hundreds of individual projectsthroughout the country, has distilled informa-tion on what constitutes a comprehensive pro-gram of services to displaced homemakers (seebox A). State officials dealing with displacedhomemaker programs (often the Sex Equity Co-ordinators in the States’ vocational educationsystems) are also sources of information onwhat works best in helping these women findadequate jobs.

OTA has added some recent informed obser-vations to these accounts. In 1984, an OTA con-tractor interviewed by telephone 20 directorsof selected local displaced homemaker projectsthroughout the country, discussing the kindsof services the projects offer and their effec-tiveness. Although they were not a true statis-tical sample, the projects were of differenttypes and sizes in a variety of geographic loca-tions. OTA’s contractor also conducted brieftelephone interviews with the person respon-sible for overseeing displaced homemaker pro-grams (usually the Sex Equity Coordinator) ineach of 16 States. Another source of informa-tion about the operation of displaced home-maker projects is the 1984 survey conductedby the Displaced Homemaker Network andanalyzed by OTA.

From these various sources it is possible todraw a few conclusions, at least tentative ones,concerning displaced homemakers and theprograms designed to serve them.

In size and structure, the projects vary a greatdeal. The range of funding among programsin the Network’s survey is from $2,000 a yearto $862,000, and clients served range from 14to 3,800. In some States (e.g., Texas and Okla-homa) services are offered mostly throughthe State vocational-technical school systems,Others fund programs in many kinds of organiza-tions, including women’s groups and YWCAs.Some, like New York and New Jersey, encour-age the development of special purpose proj-ects targeted to such groups as Hispanics, Hait-ians, rural women, and older women. Someconcentrate on outreach. For example, Wiscon-sin makes special efforts to reach women onIndian reservations and in black neighbor-hoods. Washington State has a toll-free num-ber where women can call for help.

The greatest points of similarity among theseprojects are in defining the clients they wish

2 8

2 9

Box A.-Comprehensive Services to Displaced Homemaken: A Policy Statement by the Displaced Homemaken Network

People who have worked in displaced homemaker programs over the last 10 years agree that the best programs offer a wide range of services, tailored to the special needs of displaced homemakers and putting foremost the goal of job placement. In the absence of systematic evaluations, the obser­vations of experienced project directors are the best guide to what works in these programs, and what is less effective. The national Displaced Homemaker Network, through its contacts with hun­dreds of projects and its familiarity with their eXperience, has compiled a comprehensive list of the elements an outstanding program should include. OT A's research confirms that most of these ele­ments are necessary for a well-rounded program: mAny of them are discussed in the text of this re­port. There follows the program policy statement of the Network:

The Displaced Homemakers Network believes that a comprehensive displaced homemaker program provides or secures the following component services that have been identified as meeting the unique needs of displaced homemakers. Whlle every program may not have all of these components, it is an ideal to be worked toward. Job placement is a top priority and ultimate goal of program services: • Outreach. Adequate outreach that specifically targets displaced homemakers, and is matched to the ra­

cial/ethnic/age distribution of the displaced homemakers in the geographic area being served; in rural areas, may require itinerant programming [periodic delivery of services to displaced homemaker in re­mote, scattered areas].

• Intake/Orientation. Procedures that recognize the lack of confidence common to displaced homemakers and the need for an immediate positive experie~ce; orientation procedures that provide displaced homemakers with an introduction to the program and especially to other participants.

• Penonal C01Ul88Ilns. Individual personal counseling. guided support groups, crisis intervention serv­ices, ongoing counseling both on a regular and a.needed basis, and appropriate referrals to mental health professionals and alcohol/drug abuse programs.

• ASl88sment and Testin,. A balanced use of interest inventories, skill testing, work samples, educational assessments, employability development plans, and other instruments and activities useful to adult women, with an emphasis on se1f-assessment and, personal decisionmaking, and the identification and transfer of skills developed in homemaking, child-rearing, and volunteer work to the paid labor force.

• Career/Educational CoUD88llq. Activities and resources presenting a broad range of career and educa­tional options in the context of local labor market data, and including information about nontraditional jobs, vocational training, basic education, high school equivalency, financial aid, and short-term as well as traditional programs .

• Life Skill DevelopmenL Workshops on assertiveness training, single parenting, short- and long-range planning and goal setting, financial management, dressing for the labor force, health concerns of mature women, and other requested topics.

• Skills Tralnlna. Access to skill training: nl'02I'ams fincludinfl classroom trainiDlil. internshins. and nn­the-job training) inb~th tl-a(Uttonal and iontradition~fareu. -------- ---- ---------<;>, -~---------r-· ---- ---

• Pre-Employment Preparation. Activities to prepare for finding and keeping a job, such as preparing a resume, filling out job applications, taking tests, handling interviews, and negotiating salary; discus­sions of rights and responsibilities on the job.

• Supportive Services. Needed services such as stipends, transportation allowances, books, arrangements for child care, emergency loan fund, clothes, tuition, equipment, and tutoring.

• Referrals. Initial referrals and follow-up advocacy for such services as legal aid, health care, housing, debt management, and vocational l'ehabilitation.

• Job DevelopmentIPlacement. Outreach to potential employers, advocacy with employment services, di­rect program placement, guided job clubs, assisted self-placement; adequate follow-up and continued support.

• Program Manalement~ Sta.ffi..ng that reflects the racial/ethnje composition of the geographic area served and that includes former displaced homemakers at all levels; appropriate management information sys­tems that include up-to-date client files and monthly compilation of data on client characteristics and program results; public information activities to educate potential employers and the general public on displaced homemakers' needs and skills; appropriate linlrages with other agencies; a.'Ild fiscal accountability.

30

to serve—women whose main job has beenhomemaker but must now take on the role offamily provider– and in providing the specialhelp that their clients need to bridge the gapbetween home and work.

Half of the projects in the survey were lo-cated in educational institutions—communitycolleges or vocational-technical schools—wherethey could draw directly on the educationaland training programs of the host institution.Community-based organizations such as wom-en’s centers or YWCAs housed approximatelyone-quarter of the projects. The rest describedthemselves as “independent” or “other” (e.g.,a university counseling program, or a Stateagency).

Characteristics of Clients

The population is quite diverse. The 20 di-rectors of local projects reported in interviewsthat the age of their clients ranges from 16 to67, with the majority between 35 and 55. Theaverage age tends to be lower in the south andin rural areas, where women tend to marryyounger. According to half of the project di-rectors, their typical client has a high schooleducation. Others reported a wide range ofeducation, some serving clients who mostlyhave some college or a degree, and others serv-ing disadvantaged women, half of whom havenot completed high school. The clients alsocome from all kinds of economic backgrounds,from poverty to affluence. However, at the timethese women come to the projects for assis-tance, most are trying to survive on very lowincomes. The affluence is usually former, notcurrent.

Project directors consider it important to of-fer services that are comprehensive and flexi-ble enough to meet the needs of many typesof clients; most do not offer separate programcomponents for different subgroups. There areexceptions however. Three projects have setup separate counseling and support groups forwidows and for divorced or separated women.The groups did not work well together. Widows

were offended by the other women’s negativeattitudes about their former husbands, andtended to drop out of the program, until theywere given a group to themselves.

A few projects have recently begun specialprograms, usually supported by State funds, forwomen who are receiving Aid to Families withDependent Children (AFDC, or welfare). Onecenter in Texas is providing intensive pre-vocational and job training for AFDC mothers.Another in Massachusetts is sponsoring a pro-gram for welfare mothers who never com-pleted high school which combines personaland job-related counseling with classroom in-struction in general educational development(GED), leading to a high school diploma.

Most of the project directors felt the need toreach out more effectively to groups of dis-placed homemakers who are not being ade-quately served, especially rural and minoritywomen. A project in Connecticut was able toinvolve Hispanic women in project activitiesthrough a Hispanic outreach counselor. Otherproject directors expressed a desire for bi-lingual counselors, and also for staff who canreach black and other minority women whomight not know about the projects, or mightbe reluctant to go for help to a white, subur-ban college campus.

Rural women are not only hard to reach, buthave special needs for service. Many have nolocal public transportation and few if any lo-cal job opportunities. Some may benefit fromspecial assistance in creating their own jobsor businesses.

Most of the project directors interviewed re-ported that their eligibility requirements forclients are informal. The Network’s survey un-derscored the point: only about half the re-spondents reported any eligibility require-ments. If limitations existed, the ones mostfrequently cited were that the client had spentsome years primarily as a homemaker, and hadlost her main source of income support. Someprojects responded that participants had to

meet either a definition laid down by a Statelaw, or requirements of a funding source.

As discussed previously, clients of projectsfunded under JTPA usually have to meet theeconomically disadvantaged criterion whichapplies to Title 11A programs. Several of theproject directors who receive funding fromJTPA expressed concern because they have toturn away displaced homemakers in need ofassistance who do not fit the definition. Despitethe exceptions under JTPA to the income limi-tations, projects that have JTPA funding arebound by the terms of their individual con-tracts, which may not make any exceptions.Under the Carl D. Perkins Vocational Educa-tion Act, Federal funding to displaced home-makers has no income limitations, althoughStates in their vocational education plans mustprovide assurance that they are serving dis-placed homemakers who are in financial need.

The range of services provided by differentdisplaced homemaker projects varies fromcounseling and referral only to comprehensivemulti-component programs which cover allaspects of the home-to-work transition, fromintake and assessment to follow-up after place-ment in a job. As a guide to project managers,the national Displaced Homemakers Networkhas compiled a comprehensive list of the serv-ices that it considers to meet the unique needsof displaced homemakers (see box A).

Services provided in displaced homemakerprograms overlap and interconnect, but for thesake of simplicity can be grouped as follows:

Personal counseling: includes one-to-oneor group counseling, peer support groups,and workshops on self-awareness and as-sessment.Job readiness: includes skills and aptitudeassessments, job counseling, academiccounseling, provision of labor market in-formation, referrals to other local jobsearch agencies, assistance in preparingresumes and filling out job applications,and mock interviews.

Education and training: includes coursesin brush-up on the basics, GED prepara-tion, English as a second language, onsiteskills training, on-the-job training, work ex-perience, career internships, and referralto educational or training programs.Job placement: includes maintenance ofjob banks, job development, job matchingand referrals to local job openings, andfollow-up.Support services: includes seminars ontopics of practical interest (e.g., moneymanagement, taxes, insurance), child care,transportation assistance, emergency loans,training stipends (if any are available) andscholarship funds,

Most of the 20 project directors agreed thata comprehensive program including every-thing but onsite training is ideal, but themajority had neither the staff nor funding todo it all, They had to save their efforts for whatthey could do best, and what they believed tobe most successful. Most did not claim to knowwhat works best for their clients. In the absenceof any national full-scale program evaluations,they rely on their own experience (the majorityof the projects are 5 or 6 years old) and the ex-perience of others, which they share throughregional conferences and through the Dis-placed Homemaker Network.

There follow some notes on how services todisplaced homemakers may be delivered mosteffectively, based on the observations of theseexperienced project directors plus the findingsof a few studies28 and year-end reports froma few States with displaced homemaker pro-grams of their own.

Personal Counseling

Nearly all of the program directors empha-sized the importance of this component; all ofthem offer it. The Berkeley Planning Associ-ates study of the national demonstration dis-placed homemaker projects especially noted

Zesee especia]]y KOgan, et al., op. cit., the descriptive studyof the 47-project national demonstration displaced homemakerprogram.

3 2

the need of displaced homemakers for resto-ration of a sense of self-worth and confidencebuilding.

Peer support is almost universally considereda highly effective form of counseling. Most ofthe directors observed that peer support orother forms of counseling need to be continuedthroughout the program, in conjunction withother services such as job readiness and skillstraining, A very few program directors disagreed;they believed that the most urgent requirementfor displaced homemakers is to find a job, af-ter which other problems tend to take care ofthemselves. The majority, however, consideredit essential to provide continuing emotionalsupport.

An example of a successful program basedon continuing support is the Safety in Num-bers program sponsored by the DisplacedHomemaker Program at the Mississippi GulfCoast Junior College. Designed for students 25and older, the program’s classes are composedentirely of beginning adult students of similarage so they can help one another with the nec-essary home and school adjustments. Includedin the basic curriculum are English, math,reading and study skills, and the psychologyof personal adjustment.

Job Readiness

This is another essential service, provided byall 20 projects. Small, modestly funded projectsmay not be able to do their own job develop-ment or job matching, but they all help to pre-pare their inexperienced clients for the worldof paid work. Offering job readiness trainingin a classroom format appears to be very suc-cessful. It is not only an efficient use of staffresources, but also draws on the benefits ofpeer support. Further, the organized instruc-tion—having a class to go to—helps give manydisplaced homemakers a sense of purpose,countering feelings of helplessness and iso-lation.

Most displaced homemaker centers do notoffer skills training or education, but refer their

clients to the appropriate educational institu-tion. A few (5 of 20) have offered skills train-ing for such jobs as word processor, clerk-typist, nurse’s aide, and food manager, andbrush-up courses for nurses and secretaries.

Referring clients to other institutions fortraining has not always worked well. BerkeleyPlanning Associates found that more than halfof the projects in the national demonstrationprogram experienced serious difficulty in get-ting displaced homemakers into CETA train-ing programs, despite their own CETA spon-sorship. There were two problems: CETA hadfew training slots not reserved for other targetgroups; and many displaced homemakers wereconfused by the red tape and delays during theCETA intake process. The red tape problemmay also arise with referrals of displaced home-maker clients to larger JTPA projects, espe-cially around questions of income-eligibility.

Project directors would like to offer moretraining themselves, or have more influence ondesign of training courses. One director men-tioned the need for short-term or refreshertraining in clerical skills; many displaced home-makers have far too little income support toundertake a 6- or 8-month course. Schedulingof courses to meet the needs of displaced home-makers is also important. For example, theSafety in Numbers course for displaced home-makers at the Mississippi Gulf Coast JuniorCollege offered the core curriculum in classes2 days a week, freeing the student for familyresponsibilities on the remaining days.

Many project directors expressed a desire toencourage or offer more training in nontradi-tional fields; in fact two projects recently spon-sored training courses in electronics and inplastics mold injection. Needs for remedialeducation were stressed; some displaced home-makers must upgrade reading and math com-petencies before they can enter any kind ofskills training, or even look for a job.

Five projects that were able to establish on-the-job training, work experience, or career in-ternships were impressed with their effective-ness. Short-term work experience was espe-cially important for women who had either

.

33

never had a paid job, or had not had one foryears.

Job Placement

The Displaced Homemakers Network, andproject directors in general, consider job place-ment “a top priority and ultimate goal of pro-gram service, ” Nonetheless, limited staff andfunds make it difficult for many projects to pro-vide all the placement services that they see asdesirable.

The majority of project directors interviewed(17 out of 20) said their projects do some kindof placement work, even if only informally.Several maintain job banks and keep in closetouch with local employers or employmentagencies about possible openings. Only fourhave staff job developers, who work on turn-ing up job openings that have not been adver-tised or listed. Several directors indicated theneed for more staff in job development andcoordination of job placement, especially forolder clients. Projects that are able to get ad-ditional funding, either from Perkins Actgrants or from other sources, may choose toadd staff job developers or to obtain the serv-ice for their clients by contract, A number ofJTPA projects have contracts with the localEmployment Service (ES), under which ESstaff develop jobs specifically for the project’sclients. The typical displaced homemaker proj-ect does not have the funds to offer this spe-cial service to its clients,

The kind of jobs that clients of displacedhomemaker projects find are varied, but on thewhole are weighted toward traditionally fe-male, generally low-paid jobs in the clerical,retail sales, and service fields. For example, afact sheet from the State of Minnesota indicatesthat of the displaced homemaker program cli-ents who are placed, 42 percent are in servicejobs, 30 percent in clerical work, and 14 per-cent in sales. This particular group actually hadbetter average pay than other working womenin Minnesota: the median wage was $5 perhour for former program participants, com-pared to a median wage of $3.38 per hour forother Minnesota women. Very little other in-

formation exists on wage rates for participantsin displaced homemaker programs comparedto other groups. One study of a past programin Massachusetts found that wage gainsachieved through the program were minimal;most clients who worked before entering theprogram received the minimum wage, and sodid most who completed the program. Of theproject directors interviewed, most reportedthat their clients’ wages were generally low,hovering around minimum wage.

The most obvious explanation for displacedhomemakers taking traditional women’s jobsat low pay is that these are easy jobs to fill, withfew skill requirements and frequent openings.As one director acknowledged, it is not clearthat these are the right jobs for the project’sclients, but at least they do get placed.

Another explanation is that many displacedhomemakers seem to gravitate toward tradi-tional jobs when asked their preferences. Fewolder women are interested in nontraditionaljobs, and they generally reject training becausethey believe they will not be able to competewith younger, better-educated women even af-ter training. In any case, displaced homemak-ers often have little choice. Many need a sourceof income immediately. Without training sti-pends or loans, they are forced to accept low-paid jobs with little prospect of advancement.For women at very low income levels, publicassistance may be the best choice financially,although many resist going on welfare.

On the other hand, some of the placementsare in a variety of nontraditional occupations.Some women have been helped to start theirown businesses, sometimes unusual ones; forexample, a group of women developed a cabservice in an area that did not have one. Onedirector reported that women used to heavywork at home were not afraid of competingwith men in physically demanding, nontradi-tional occupations—for instance, one womantook a job as a UPS delivery person.

One of the best auguries for successful place-ment is a sympathetic employer, familiar withthe needs of displaced homemakers and ableto provide feedback to an inexperienced work-

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er on her performance. Previous acquaintancewith an employer through on-the-job training,work experience, or an internship often resultsin a permanent job.

Support Services

Many projects provide specialized workshopsor counseling on matters not directly relatedto job search—e.g., money management, taxes,insurance, housing and mortgages, legal rightsof women, health care, single parenting, evenautomobile repair and maintenance. Few areable to offer substantial help in the forms mostneeded by many displaced homemakers—childcare, transportation, and financial assistance.Some women who could most benefit fromtraining are unable to take classes withoutsome form of financial assistance—possiblyloans, if not grants. Unlike displaced workers,most displaced homemakers have no unem-ployment insurance. Few can rely on otherfamily members for support.

A few project directors said they have someresources, mostly through grants and privatedonations, to provide limited financial assis-tance to their clients. Four programs offertransportation assistance; three, scholarshipprograms; three, limited emergency loans; two,limited training stipends; and two, child careat the displaced homemaker centers. In addi-tion, some referred clients to local communitycolleges for financial aid, and to the commu-nity colleges or social service agencies for childcare available to low-income women.

The Perkins Vocational Education Act of1984 promises assistance in some of theseareas. Under the previous Voc Ed law, childcare, transportation assistance, and even train-ing stipends in limited situations were author-ized for displaced homemakers. It appears theywere rarely made available, possibly becauseFederal Voc Ed funds for displaced homemak-ers were limited, and State administrators didnot choose to use them in this way. With theincreases in funds targeted to homemakers inthe 1984 act, support services might be morefeasible. The new law specifically allows fundsto be used for child care and transportation

assistance. It also authorizes training stipendsfor Voc Ed students in general (not single par-ents and homemakers in particular) but onlyin cases of “acute economic needs which can-not be met under work-study programs. ” Theconsensus so far among Sex Equity Coordina-tors is that little if any Voc Ed grant money willbe used to provide training stipends.

JTPA is no more promising as a source of in-come support for displaced homemakers un-dertaking training or education in search of ajob. In passing JTPA in 1982, Congress put lim-its on supportive services (e. g., child care,transportation allowances, and health care)and any form of income payment (includingneeds-based payments, under Title 11A, andtraining allowances or stipends, under TitleIII). Spending for these purposes, plus admin-istrative spending, was generally limited to 30percent of JTPA funding. Administrative ex-penses, in turn, were limited to 15 percentwhich, in effect, kept spending for income sup-port and supportive services to no more than15 percent. Private industry councils and JTPAprogram directors have generally kept a stilltighter rein on supportive services and incomepayments than the law requires. In the JTPAtransition year (October 1983-June 1984), spend-ing for supportive services and needs-basedpayments in Title 11A was 10 percent, and forsimilar services in Title III, 6 percent. Noth-ing is known of how much of these paymentswent to displaced homemakers, but since JTPAspending overall for this group is limited, theamount was certainly very small.

A possible source of income for displacedhomemakers during education or training isone of the Federal aid programs for post-sec-ondary students. As chapter 7 of the full reportdiscusses, these programs are designed primarilyfor financially dependent young people, not foradults—even low-income adults. Some changesthat have been proposed in the student aid pro-grams (discussed in chs. 2 and 7 of the full re-port) might make this source of income moreeasily accessible to displaced homemakers.However, the competition for student aid is ex-tremely keen; whatever goes to a displacedhomemaker would be subtracted from the pool

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available to young students (unless, as seemsunlikely, the program were enlarged).

Another possibility for some displaced home-makers is part-time studies at night. The Per-kins Act offers funds to allow scheduling ofvocational education courses to make themmore accessible to single parents and home-makers. Night studies may be a useful optionfor some, especially those without young chil-dren at home. On-the-job training, even thoughit often does not offer genuine transferabletraining but rather is a placement device (seech. 6 of the full report), may still be very use-ful to some displaced homemakers.

The problem of income support for peoplewho need ‘training to get a decent job with

chances of advancement is not an easy one.There were abuses under CETA, with somepeople signing up for courses mainly for thepurpose of collecting training allowances. Yetthe dilemma of a woman who has no sourceof support but what she can earn, yet with toolittle preparation for work to get better than amarginal job, is a painful one. Many of thesewomen cannot undertake the triple job of earn-ing a living, caring for a child, and training fora better job. It may be in the interest of soci-ety, as well as the personal interest of womensuch as these to make use of programs whichalready exist for income support of seriousadult students, or to develop ones which fittheir needs.