The Republican party's intellectual guru, Wisconsin congressman Paul Ryan, has proposed a radical experiment to scrap federal welfare benefits – such as food stamps, housing assistance and childcare – and divert the funds directly to states, which would be required to come up with new models for reducing poverty.

Ryan's long-awaited plan, the result of months of traveling to some of America's most deprived communities, would do away with the safety net that has provided support to the economically disadvantaged in the US for half a century.

Instead, Ryan, the House budget committee chairman and, some believe, a potential presidential contender in 2016, argues that money from 11 federal programs should be converged into a single grant to states, which would have the power to determine how the funds are spent.



Ryan said the proposal, which he called an 'opportunity grant', would first be introduced on a pilot basis, and said the federal government would monitor and test states to measure the success of projects designed to give "customised and personalised aid" to poor people.

Republicans and Democrats began the year pledging a renewed effort to tackle poverty, although next to nothing has been done in the months since.

With Congress gridlocked and disinclined to compromise, most energy has been invested in debating the solutions to the problem, and Republicans have been reluctant, during an election year, to concede ground on what has historically been Democratic territory.



Ryan unveiled the initiative in a speech at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative thinktank in Washington. "We spend almost $800bn on 92 federal programs each year to fight poverty," he said. "And yet the poverty rate is the highest in a generation."

He said the new, single, funding stream, which would devolve responsibility for dealing with poverty to states and local communities, would be "budget neutral", ensuring the same level of federal money is spent on tackling poverty.

"In effect, the state would say: ‘Give us some space, and we can figure this out’," Ryan said. "And the federal government would say: ‘Got it, on four conditions.'"

Those conditions include: that states spend the money on poverty programs and not, he said, "funny business"; compel people to work if they are able to; and provide more choice – with an emphasis on third-sector and private-sector provision of services aimed at lifting people out of poverty.

It would also be necessary for a federally funded body to monitor and test those programs' effectiveness.



Ryan's proposal was not entirely new, and similar ideas have been voiced by Republican contenders Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz.



The Republican vice-presidential candidate in 2012 said his idea was "very different" from the block grant raised by others. He stressed that states would need to opt in to the program, and would not be given federal funds without conditions. He said his plan involved a shift from spending money on the "symptoms" of poverty to what he called a "results-orientated system".

Ryan cast his plan as an effort to cut bureaucracy.

Asked if a state might be empowered under his proposal to deny a single mom food stamps, Ryan said the ambition was to allow for flexibility: "Maybe she needs more support for transportation. Maybe she needs more for childcare."

Ryan also lent his support to other poverty-related ideas floated by Republicans in recent months, including changing of job training programs and reform of the penal code and criminal justice system.

The second of those enjoys bipartisan support, but Democrats are mostly hostile to the Republican desire to overhaul America's federal welfare system – which, compared to other countries, is already meagre.

One much smaller idea mentioned by Ryan that does enjoy bipartisan support – and is backed by President Obama – is an expansion of the earned income tax credit for childless workers. Ryan said he would double the effective benefit to $1,005 and lower the minimum age of eligibility from 25 to 21.