It was a return trip for Samantha, a former ECS intern in the Inclusion and Advocacy department. At ECS, her specific role was to research the benefits cliff. Her work involved reviewing policy documents, following up with existing ECS partners and making new connections with other organizations that are also addressing the benefits cliff issue.
Part of her presentation included a description of the cliff, as the phenomenon is commonly encountered, but not widely understood. “The benefits cliff is the sudden and often unexpected decrease or loss of public benefits that can occur with a small increase in earnings. When lost benefits outpace a wage increase, many families fall off the cliff’s edge,” Samantha said. She added that the risk of “falling off the cliff” begins the second a person starts receiving government benefits.
Samantha explained that there is a lack of solutions to address this dynamic. One of the reasons is that benefits are managed by different agencies. There is no one benefits program nor umbrella agency they all fall under. Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is different from Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) which is different from The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), and so on.
Additionally, there is no cross-communication between agencies. Different agencies mean different requirements and eligibilities. This makes a “one-size fits all” solution impossible.
What Samantha found in her own research was that getting funding through legislation was the best way organizations could move things forward. Her suggestion? Recruit members for a coalition to support potential members. She quoted, “The myth is that people don’t want to work. People want to work. But they are making rational choices about what is best for them and their families. We just have to put better choices in front of them.”
In talking about the benefits cliff at ECS, Samantha was in the right place. ECS has in recent years become an important voice and resource on the benefits cliff and related issues. In May of this year, 2024, ECS announced their participation in a newly formed Beyond the Cliff Coalition. This Coalition is a first-of-its-kind national collaborative of nonprofits, state and local governments, and collaborative stakeholders focused on helping families achieve economic prosperity and specifically eliminating the Benefits Cliff. It is just the kind of coalition Samantha’s research suggested could help.
This year, ECS also led a pilot program through funding received from Brook J. Lenfest Foundation to launch a benefits program that was able to support 10 households facing benefits cliff issues through financial help and coaching.