Thanks to a bizarre alliance between a Republican Congress and a Democratic president, almost all welfare recipients are going to have to move into "jobs" of some sort, generally paying the minimum wage. For the first time since the New Deal created Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), the federal government no longer guarantees, as a right of citizenship, assistance to poor mothers with young children.

Welfare has long been widely misperceived. Contrary to public belief, most AFDC recipients are white. And for all the hand-wringing about teenage mothers, fewer than 8 percent of AFDC parents are under age 20.