US Social Welfare

Policies
Flaws and Their Impact
Jennifer Alspaugh July 7, 2019
Categories
 Social insurance
 Income support
 Health services
 Food and shelter
 Employment
 Personal social services (Title XX etc)
 Analysis: good programs

 Social security  Reaches a majority of their

target demographic
 School lunch program
 Widespread knowledge of
 Medical assistance availability
 Veteran’s benefits  Less stigma than other need
based programs
 Public/ voter support
 Effectively reduces incidence of
hunger and poverty
 Little ‘running costs’ or waste
Programs in Need of Reform
 Social Security
 Without intervention funds will run out
 Long term soon – baby boomers
availability of funds  Originally intended to supplement an
individual’s retirement income, not
main source

 Raise the age of retirement

 Implement new taxes or increase existing
 Decrease benefit payments
 Restructure using investment accounts
 Unemployment insurance
 Does not reach enough people
 Only 36% of unemployed
persons receive unemployment
 Farmers, domestic workers and
self employed don’t qualify
 Poor especially are excluded
 Earning less than the given
threshold to qualify
 Reason for losing the job
 Time spent in job training
disqualified for benefits

 Reexamine income based criteria for qualification

 Provide alternative coverage method for excluded occupations
 Reward those seeking job training
 Ask why they lost the job, determinations case by case
Temporary Assistance to Needy
Families
 Withdraw of benefits to whole family for
refusal of work, including medical
benefits
 No assistance in childcare for those who
cannot work because of caretaking
requirements

 Guarantee health services for children

regardless of parents actions
 Pay more attention to addressing why they
cannot work, as in caretaking needs
General Assistance

 Not available in all place

 Only 41 states provide
coverage, and not all
counties within those
states
 Housing

Public housing Section 8

 Increased segregation  Better alternative to public
housing
 Violence and vandalism
 Landlord discrimination
 Poor living conditions
 High operating costs

 Spend less money helping middle income families

 More efforts fighting homelessness and drastically
increasing rent prices
 More efforts to define and enforce basic minimum
housing quality
Resources
 Marx, J. (2010). Current issues and programs in social
welfare. Retrieved 07/01/2019 from 
http://socialwelfare.library.vcu.edu/recollections/current-i
ssues-and-programs-in-social-welfare/

 Dolgoff, Randy, and Donald Feldstein. Understanding

Social Welfare: A Search for Social Justice . 9th ed.,
Pearson, 2013.