Welfare in Perspective: Political Development and Policy
Date
2004
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Haverford College. Department of Political Science
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Thesis
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Award
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eng
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Haverford users only
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Abstract
The American Welfare state evolved in a much different manner from the welfare states of other industrial nations. The formation of the welfare state in America was not the result of the political mobilization of labor but emerged during an economic crisis in an attempt to return the country to and reaffirm the capitalist economic system. The decentralized structure of the federal government, which shares power with the states in areas like social protection, has impeded the formation of a more comprehensive system. As such, the welfare state in the U.S. is market conforming and attempts to reaffirm market values of self-sufficiency. The welfare state that was created has remained largely incomplete with the majority of worker social protections to the private sector. In response, labor unions pursued a "mixed-benefit" strategy, which largely relied on private negotiations with individual employers and sought government intervention only to augment these efforts. Those left out of private sector benefits, the poor, racial minorities, and disabled, have had to rely on the paltry means-tested programs which were originally designed to phase out. As such they have been tarred with the brush of "undeservedness" that has helped fuel public hatred of means-tested programs. Growing backlash against the failure of these programs to disappear and the perception that only undeserving people benefit has prompted the abolition of entitlement cash assistance programs and the creation of assistance programs that require employment within the private sector.