Work requirement changes for government assistance began rolling out in 2025, with more changes coming in 2026 and beyond.
The Trump administration has placed a premium on ensuring that those who are able to work and receive federal tax dollars contribute to the economy.
Programs impacted include food and rental assistance, as well as government-assisted health care.
Sweeping Changes
In what is seen as a whole-of-government change, the departments of Health and Human Services (HHS), Agriculture, and Housing and Urban Development (HUD) have adopted changes to work requirements during Trump’s second term.The requirements have focused on health care, food stamps, and rental assistance benefits at the federal level.
The administration officials said, “The increased share of welfare spending dedicated to able-bodied working-age adults distracts from what should be the focus of these programs: the truly needy.”
According to a November 2025 Pew Research Center report on the most recent data from 2023, around 61 percent of adult Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients had not been employed that year.
SNAP
President Donald Trump signed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act into law on July 4, 2025, expanding SNAP’s work requirements for adults without children.The law now requires adults up to the age of 64 to complete 80 hours per month of activities that fall under the work requirement. Previously, those over the age of 54 were exempt.
The previous terms also allowed recipients to avoid the work requirement if they had a child at home under the age of 18. That has now been changed, with those who have children between the ages of 14 and 17 also falling under the work requirements.
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act also eliminated exemptions for veterans, the homeless, and those who have aged out of foster care.
The Brookings Institution reported in March last year that work requirements for SNAP and other benefit programs may not lead to higher labor force participation.
“From a policy perspective, work requirements encourage a punitive view of welfare—framing it as a liability rather than an integral investment in economic support for low-income communities,” Brookings Institution fellow Farah Khan said.
She said that “decades of economic research” show that “work requirements do little to increase employment and often strip essential benefits from society’s most vulnerable, while also adding bureaucratic barriers that disproportionately harm those already struggling.”
Meanwhile, Heritage Foundation senior fellow Robert Rector said that “work requirements reduce unnecessary enrollments in welfare and spur more rapid exits.”
In a paper from 2023, Rector stated that this is “not just an employment issue.”
“While it is critical to provide assistance to those who truly need it, the government must avoid trapping people on welfare if they can find work,” he wrote.
In addition to changes at the federal level, residents in five states saw the implementation of new local restrictions on how they can use SNAP benefits.
Medicaid and HUD
Similar to requirements placed on SNAP qualifications, Medicaid has changed to require 80 hours per month of work, educational, or volunteering activity. Those requirements apply to recipients who are between the ages of 19 and 64.Those changes mean that Medicaid participation will no longer be based solely on income for able-bodied adults. As with SNAP benefits, pregnancy and disabilities exclude an individual from the able-bodied status, as does being the caregiver of a dependent under the age of 14.
This requirement will be implemented on Jan. 1, 2027, though states have the option to adopt the requirement earlier or ask for an extension through late 2028.
The new requirements are expected to affect over 18 million adults currently in the Medicaid program.
The state of Nebraska has become the first state to pursue implementation of the new plan, with May 1 of this year the expected start date for the new requirements.
HUD requirements differ in that they allow, but do not mandate, public housing authorities to impose work requirements and time limits on Section 8 and other federal housing programs.
Those requirements could apply to residents aged 18 to 61 who aren’t disabled, college students, or any other exempted class.
Proposed changes still being considered in the 2026 budget could also limit the housing assistance to two years, pushing recipients to find other accommodations or work to improve their situation during that time.
According to research from New York University, implementation of a two-year limit on benefits could cut off almost 1.4 million households using public housing subsidies.
At the individual level, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities said that more than 3 million individuals, around half of whom are children, could be displaced if the two-year limit is imposed.
HUD spokesperson Kasey Lovett rejected that argument. “There is plenty of data that strongly supports time limits and shows that long-term government assistance without any incentive disincentivizes able-bodied Americans to work,” she said in a statement.
