42 U.S.C. § 607 — Mandatory work requirements

(a) Participation rates. (1) All families. A State receiving a section 603 grant must meet these minimum rates for families receiving assistance under the State program or another program funded with qualified State expenditures: 25% in 1997, 30% in 1998, 35% in 1999, 40% in 2000, 45% in 2001, and 50% in 2002 and later. (2) Two-parent families. The minimum rates are 75% in 1997, 75% in 1998, and 90% in 1999 and later. (b) Calculating rates. (1)(A) For all families, the yearly rate is the average of the State’s monthly rates. (B) The monthly percentage is the number of assisted families whose adult or minor head of household is engaged in work, divided by the number of assisted families with an assisted adult or minor head of household, minus families that are subject to an (e)(1) penalty that has lasted no more than three months in the prior 12 months, whether consecutive or not. (2)(A) The two-parent yearly rate is the average of its monthly rates. (B) Its monthly rate uses the same formula, substituting “two-parent families” wherever the formula says “families.” (C) A family with a disabled parent is not a two-parent family for this subsection. (3)(A) The Secretary must issue rules reducing a fiscal year’s required minimum by the percentage-point decrease, if any, between the prior fiscal year’s average monthly caseload and the average monthly caseload in fiscal year 2015. The reduction does not include a decrease the Secretary finds Federal law required. (B) The rules may not count families diverted because of differences between current State eligibility rules and those in 2015; the Secretary bears the burden of proving direct diversion for that reason. (4) A State may include, for paragraphs (1)(B) and (2)(B), families receiving tribal-plan assistance or tribal-work-program assistance. (5) A State may choose not to require a single custodial parent caring for a child under 12 months to work and may leave that person out of the rates for no more than 12 months. (6) The Secretary must calculate rates without counting a person working in a family receiving no assistance under this part and less than $35 in assistance funded with qualified State expenditures. (c) Engaged in work. (1)(A) For all families, a recipient counts as working for a month if participating in work activities for at least these average weekly hours: 20 in 1997, 20 in 1998, 25 in 1999, and 30 in 2000 and later. At least 20 hours must be in subsection (d)(1), (2), (3), (4), (5), (6), (7), (8), or (12). (B) For two-parent families, both parents together must participate at least 35 hours weekly, including at least 30 hours in those listed activities. If the family receives federally funded child care and no adult is disabled or caring for a severely disabled child, they must participate at least 55 hours, including at least 50 in those activities. (2)(A)(i) Job search or job-readiness activity counts only through six weeks, or 12 weeks if the State unemployment rate is at least 50% above the national rate or the State is needy; it also does not count for a week immediately after four consecutive weeks of it. (ii) Once per person, the State must count three or four days of such activity as a full week. (B) A sole parent or caretaker relative of a child under six counts as working at 20 average hours weekly. (C) A married person or head of household under 20 counts as working if the person attends secondary school or its equivalent satisfactorily, or receives employment-related education at 20 average hours weekly. (D) No more than 30% of people counted as working in all families, and in two-parent families, may be counted because of vocational education or, from fiscal year 2000 onward, subparagraph (C). (d) “Work activities” defined. In this section, “work activities” means: (1) unsubsidized employment; (2) subsidized private employment; (3) subsidized public employment; (4) work experience, including refurbishing publicly assisted housing, if enough private work is unavailable; (5) on-the-job training; (6) job search and readiness help; (7) community service; (8) vocational education, for no more than 12 months per person; (9) employment-related job-skills training; (10) employment-related education for a recipient without a high-school diploma or equivalent certificate; (11) satisfactory secondary-school or equivalent-course attendance for a recipient who has not finished secondary school or received that certificate; and (12) child-care services for a person in a community-service program. (e) Penalties against individuals. (1) Unless paragraph (2) applies, if a person in an assisted family refuses required work, the State must reduce the family’s assistance proportionally, or more if the State chooses, for the part of the month of refusal, or terminate assistance subject to State-established good-cause and other exceptions. (2) The State may not reduce or terminate assistance for a sole custodial parent of a child under six who proves, as the State determines, an inability to obtain needed child care because (A) suitable care is unavailable within a reasonable distance of home or work, (B) informal relative or other care is unavailable or unsuitable, or (C) suitable affordable formal care is unavailable. (f) No displacement. (1) Subject to paragraph (2), a federally funded assisted adult may fill a vacant job to perform a subsection (d) activity. (2) The adult may not be employed or assigned when someone else is laid off from the same or substantially equivalent job, or when the employer fired a regular employee or otherwise involuntarily reduced its workforce to create the vacancy. (3) A State program must maintain a grievance process for alleged violations. (4) This subsection does not override State or local law giving employees greater protection. (g) Congress encourages each State program to give highest priority to requiring work activities for adults in two-parent families and single-parent families with older preschool or school-age children. (h) Congress states that States should require noncustodial, nonsupporting parents under 18 to perform community work and attend suitable parenting or money-management classes after school. (i) Verification. (1)(A)(i) By June 30, 2006, the Secretary must issue rules for consistent work-rate measurement, covering (I) whether an activity may count under (d), (II) uniform reporting of work hours, (III) documentation needed to verify hours, and (IV) when a parent living with an assisted child belongs in the rates. (ii) These rules may take effect immediately as interim final rules when published. If used, the Secretary must allow public comment afterward and may change or revise them after comment. (B) The Secretary must review State procedures under paragraph (2) for consistency with these rules and for accurate measurement. (2) By September 30, 2006, every State receiving a section 603 grant must establish procedures, consistent with the regulations, to decide which activities count, count and verify reported hours, and identify work-eligible people, and must establish internal controls to ensure compliance.