"The lower-wage labor market is hiring anyone who breathes," she said.

While Massachusetts has taken a hard-line stance on welfare reform, Bane hopes that the historical-liberal state will help the 5,000 families who will be kicked off the rolls next year. She says that politicians who have played themselves as "tough" on welfare reform now should try to help the families who struggle the most.

Wiener Professor of Public Policy Professor David T. Ellwood '75, who helped guide Clinton's welfare program as an assistant secretary in the early years of the administration, said that while some benefits--such as health care for young children--have been increased, families near the poverty line will still suffer if the economy takes a downturn.

"When the economy stumbles, the working poor are the first to fall," he said.

In addition to the dearth of adequate safety nets, some professors said the reform perpetuates class bias. Richard P. Taub, a visiting scholar in the W.E.B. DuBois Institute who teaches Afro-American Studies 194z: "Economic Development in the Inner City," said the hard-lined stance indicates widening class schisms.

"We're being distracted from serious issues of income inequality," he said. "What does a low unemployment rate mean if people are making $6.50 a hour?"

Taub also was concerned with what he called a "conservative impulse," where conservatives stress the need for a strong family, yet insist that single welfare mothers work.

"When the economy takes a downturn, setting these people back on the streets is no solution to anything," he said.