Giving Compass' Take:

• H. Claire Brown explains that Wisconsin’s expanded work requirements were profitable for the company hired to implement the programs even though they returned underwhelming results. 

• How can funders work increase the impact and efficiency of SNAP benefits and other government programs? 

• Learn more about efforts to expand work requirements for SNAP beneficiaries. 

A New Food Economy analysis of hundreds of pages of documents, interviews with former caseworkers, program participants, advocates, and one member of Congress revealed that one of the companies hired to manage Wisconsin’s expanded work requirements has repeatedly fallen short of expectations. Statewide, the program is expensive, it doesn’t find jobs for most people, and its practices have violated participants’ civil rights on numerous occasions. One contracted company has been credibly accused of coerced labor.

Our analysis shows that the true beneficiary of Wisconsin’s mandatory employment training program wasn’t its enrollees. It was the company the state hired to oversee the program, at least in Milwaukee and other regions. Wisconsin provides a glimpse into how expanded work requirements might play out if they are mandated across the country.

Since 2015, Wisconsin has required adults without dependents to work 20 hours a week or enroll in a workforce training program if they want to receive SNAP benefits for longer than three months. At the end of 2018, in a lame duck session, the legislature codified a plan to dramatically expand the policy. (Those laws are now facing legal challenges.)

When Wisconsin first implemented those work requirements, the state awarded the employment training contract for three of its most populous regions to a Louisville, Kentucky-based company that, at the time, was called ResCare. (In 2018, the company changed its name to BrightSpring Health Services, but for the duration of this story we’ll refer to it as ResCare.) The company earns an estimated $1.7 billion in annual revenue in exchange for providing hospice care, pharmacy services, and foster care, in addition to its work programs in regions throughout the United States.

ResCare did not respond to a detailed list of questions from The New Food Economy, instead opting to forward our queries to Wisconsin’s Department of Health Services. The agency did not respond by press time.

Corporations like ResCare stand to make a lot more money from expanded work requirements, even though the entities that manage Wisconsin’s program have collectively found jobs for only about a third of enrollees. ResCare’s track record in the state is spotty at best. According to documents reviewed by The New Food Economy, it has also been caught billing the state for irrelevant services and received multiple violations during USDA audits for failing to follow FoodShare Employment Training Program (FSET, the work training program the company administers) guidelines.

Read the full article about profiting from work requirements by H. Claire Brown at The New Food Economy.