Financing the Welfare Program

Abstract

POOR relief has been accepted as a function of local government since the beginning of our colonial history. In fact, some of our colonies transplanted the Elizabethan poor law to this country without substantial modification. But public welfare, which implies much more than provision of a minimum of subsistence for those incapable of supporting themselves, is comparatively new, and welfare as a responsibility of the national government has barely come of age. Fifty years ago welfare expenditures accounted for about 5 per cent of all state and local costs; and more than twothirds of these expenditures fell on local revenues. The federal government had no welfare program at all, except for the incidental welfare aspects of such programs as soldiers' pensions and the Indian Service. Also, very little of the state and local expenditures was for the care of people in their own homes. The public welfare program was basically one of institutional care, while churches, tradeunions, and other private philanthropic agencies were looked to for much of the support of those in financial need. Even the depression of the nineties had not brought any great increases in public assistance. In New York City, for example, the Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor quadrupled its expenditures between 1890 and 1894, but the public funds available increased only 15 per cent in this same period. And a large part of such public funds as were appropriated for relief was distributed through private agencies rather than directly by the city Department of Charities and Correction. Public expenditures for outdoor relief in the state of Indiana increased just 14 per cent in this same period and declined to half the 1890 level in the first decade of this century. At the peak in the 1890's, Indiana welfare expenditures totaled twenty-five cents per capita-one-fortieth of the per capita cost in 1951.