Offering One-On-One Economic Stability Services as Part of HMRE Programming: Evidence from the Empowering Families Program
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Offering One-On-One Economic Stability Services as Part of HMRE Programming: Evidence from the Empowering Families Program

OPRE Report #2022-310
Published: Dec 30, 2022
Publisher: Washington, DC: Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation, Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
Human Services Family Support Strengthening Families and Responsible Fatherhood Federal State and Local Research and Evaluation
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Associated Project

Strengthening Relationship Education and Marriage Services (STREAMS) Evaluation

Time frame: 2015-2022

Prepared for:

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation

Clients
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Authors

April Yanyuan Wu

Julius Anastasio

Quinn Moore

Robert Wood

Key Findings

We learned the following about Empowering Families’ one-on-one employment counseling services and one-on-one financial coaching:

  • Empowering Families had no impact on the outcomes most likely to be directly affected by one-on-one employment counseling—including monthly earnings and hours worked per week. In addition, there were no impacts on these outcomes among the roughly 3 in 10 participants who met with an employment counselor.
  • Empowering Families improved the outcomes most likely to be directly affected by one-on-one financial coaching—including the frequency with which participants’ experienced economic hardships and participants’ perceptions of whether they were better off financially than they were a year ago. In general, the impacts on these outcomes were larger among couples who met with a financial coach.

This report expands on findings from the Empowering Families impact report, which examined the program’s overall impacts after one year. It explores the likely contribution of the program’s one-on-one employment counseling and financial coaching services to impacts on economic outcomes most likely to be directly affected by these services. We conducted this analysis by comparing the outcomes of Empowering Families participants who engaged in one-on-one economic stability services to those in the control group who would have likely engaged in them if they had been offered access to the program. The report also provides information on participants’ level of participation in one-on-one economic stability services and the costs of these services. Earlier reports provided detailed information on the program’s design, implementation, and overall impact.

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