American Welfare State Research Articles

What the COVID-19 Pandemic Reveals about Racial Differences in Child Welfare and Child Well-Being: An Introduction to the Special Issue

This paper introduces the special issue on race, child welfare, and child well-being. In doing so, I summarize the evidence of racial/ethnic disparities in child well-being after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Recent findings demonstrate that, compared to white children, black and Latino children are more likely to have experienced poverty and food insufficiency, to have had parents lose their jobs, and to be exposed to distance learning and school closures during the pandemic. I argue that though COVID-19 has indeed worsened racial/ethnic disparities in child well-being, it has also served to place a spotlight on the American welfare state’s historical mistreatment of low-income families and black and Latino families in particular. Consider that around three-fourths of black and Latino children facing food insufficiency during the pandemic also experienced food insufficiency prior to the onset of the pandemic. Moving forward, analyses of racial/ethnic disparities in child well-being during the pandemic, I argue, must not only consider the economic shock and high unemployment rates of 2020, but the failure of the American welfare state to adequately support jobless parents, and black and Latino parents in particular, long before the COVID-19 pandemic arrived.

Territorial Exceptionalism and the American Welfare State

Federal law excludes millions of American citizens from crucial public benefits simply because they live in the United States territories. If the Social Security Administration determines a low-income individual has a disability, that person can move to another state and continue to receive benefits. But if that person moves to, say, Guam or the U.S. Virgin Islands, that person loses their right to federal aid. Similarly with SNAP (food stamps), federal spending rises with increased demand—whether because of a recession, a pandemic, or a climate disaster. But unlike the rest of the United States, Puerto Rico, the Northern Mariana Islands, and American Samoa receive a limited amount of federal food assistance, regardless of need. That’s why, after Hurricane Maria, despite additional congressional action, over a million Puerto Rican residents lost food assistance. And with Medicaid, federal law caps medical assistance for each of these five territories, a limit that does not exist for the fifty states or the District of Columbia. This Article draws much-needed attention to these discrepancies in legal status and social protection. It surveys the eligibility rules and financing structure of disability benefits, food assistance, and health insurance for low-income Americans in the states and the territories. A comprehensive account of these practices provokes questions about the tiers of citizenship built by a fragmented and devolved American state. Part I invokes the scholarship on social citizenship, the idea that an individual cannot meaningfully participate in society without some modicum of economic security. Part I then explores the tension between that normative commitment and one of the defining features of the American welfare state—federalism. It then elaborates the exceptional legal status of Americans who live in U.S. territories. Part II provides a comprehensive overview of federal food, medical, and disability assistance and, in doing so, demonstrates how the American territories inhabit a different and, in many ways, dilapidated corner of the American welfare state. Part III begins with an analysis of ongoing cases in federal court that challenge this facial discrimination. It then canvasses legislation introduced in Congress that would make significant progress in putting territorial Americans on par with Americans in the fifty states. To conclude, Part IV brings the states back in, using the earlier discussion of territories as an invitation to imagine an American welfare state built on a foundation other than a racial order.

Introduction to the 60th Anniversary Issue of Population Review

Introduction to the 60th Anniversary Issue of Population Review William J. Haller The first volume of Population Review–a peer-reviewed journal of sociological demography–appeared in 1957. In 2003, the journal went 'digital' and formed a solid and productive relationship with Project MUSE–one that we are very grateful for. Now, we have reached a milestone: our 60th volume! 60th Anniversary To celebrate this accomplishment, Population Review is presenting a digitalonly issue that features the journal's 10 most-read articles on Project MUSE. The articles are free to download until 2022. This special collection highlights articles that fall under the general category of sociological demography–a science (more quantitative than qualitative) that attempts to understand population composition and change through a sociodemographic lens. Click for larger view View full resolution We did not select them; rather, our readers did. Through this special collection, we hope to inspire young sociologists and demographers to explore sociological demography. Although sociological demography can cover many topics, those of population well-being in terms of health and equity have been the most frequent among our articles so far over the past 12 years. Within the broad areas of health and socioeconomic equity, the ten articles can be categorized into three main areas: health and longevity gaps resulting from racial and economic inequalities, populations traditionally addressed only infrequently in the research literature, and interactions between population change and economic pressure on the welfare state, mainly due to the drops in fertility in highly economically developed (and some less developed) countries. Each paper–summarized thematically below–demonstrates their impact in a wide range of subject areas. The events during the months since the COVID-19 outbreak morphed into an epidemic and then into a pandemic emphasize the crucial nature of population studies that are not bounded by specific territories and geographies. Although Population Review was founded through the auspices of the Indian Institute for Population Studies it has evolved into a global venture, encouraging submissions that address population processes and characteristics in all parts of the world and on emergent population issues and understudied populations. In many ways, the concerns of our contributors and readers in this special collection emphasize population health, and prospects for the welfare state and global civil society. In their 2020 article, "Who's Skeptical of Vaccines? Prevalence and Determinants of Anti-Vaccination Attitudes in Italy" Engin and Vezzoni show that the core groups embracing an anti-vaccination position are younger and less-educated adults who exhibit distrust in both political institutions and the health-care system. In the Italian context, they found no association between religiousity and anti-vaccination attitudes, perhaps because of the religious homogeneity of Italian society and that the Catholic Church removed ethical and moral concerns about common childhood vaccines. Surprisingly, higher trust in others is associated with greater anti-vaccination attitudes, which is somewhat alarming given that the disease, of course, spreads through close physical proximity. Political orientations on the right or the left do not drive anti-vaccination attitudes but those attitudes are most common among those who refuse to situate themselves in terms of the left-right political spectrum (including the 5-star movement), so there is nevertheless some link between populism and anti-vaccination attitudes in Italy. "Socio-Economic Status and Life Expectancy in the United States, 1970-1990" by Swanson, McGehee, and Hoque (published in 2009) examines the overall increase in the life-expectancy gap between high- and low-SES populations (seven of the eight states examined: Colorado, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Ohio, South Dakota, and Washington) and a small but statistically significant narrowing of the gap in Pennsylvania. The political economy of the US welfare state changed dramatically between 1970 and 1990 between the years of the Nixon and Bush presidencies, through a combination of global economic shocks (e.g., the oil crisis of 1973, stagflation, US Federal Reserve response raising the prime rate to nearly 22%) and the largely general implementation of neoliberal economic policies that led to cutting social welfare programs even while socioeconomic inequalities were increasing. Health disparities and SES inequalities rose during this time, as did rapid advancements in medical technologies. Because socially driven investments in...

Does Social Parameters and Landholding Size Affect Household Food Security in Rural India?

Past studies have proved that various factors affect household food security. This paper presents whether social groups, family size and landholding sizes are related to food security of the households. Consumption of food groups as per household recommended requirement is considered as food security in this paper. Subsample of 315 households from 39 villages of Mathapada Gram Panchayat and 8 villages from Doraguda Gram Panchayat in Boipariguda block in Koraput district of Odisha state, India were taken for the study. Results of the study show that social group and family size have significant effect on the gap between consumption and household food groups and nutrients requirement, while landholding did not show any effect. Intervention studies and knowledge on consumption of own production and marketing of excess produce should be emphasized. Government entitlements should focus on decreasing the gap between the consumption and household requirement by increasing the accessibility to foods and making the rural households food secure.

An Unintended Abolition: Family Regulation During the COVID-19 Crisis

In a typical year, New York City’s vast family regulation system, fueled by an army of mandated reporters, investigates tens of thousands of reports of child neglect and abuse, policing almost exclusively poor Black and Latinx families even as the government provides those families extremely limited support. When the City shut down in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic, this system shrunk in almost every conceivable way as mandated reporters retreated, caseworkers adopted less intrusive investigatory tactics, and family courts constrained their operations. Reports fell, the number of cases filed in court fell, and the number of children separated from their parents fell. At the same time, families found support elsewhere, through suddenly ubiquitous mutual aid networks and through infusions of new government entitlements. This large-scale reconfiguration of the family regulation system represents a short-term experiment in abolition: in this period, New Yorkers moved away from a system that oppressed poor Black and Latinx and not only envisioned but built a more democratic and humane model to protect families.This Article argues that this new model kept families just as safe. Data from the courts and from the City’s Administration for Children’s Services reveals that during the shutdown period, there was no rise in child abuse. Furthermore, once the City began to re-open, there was no perceivable “rebound effect,” i.e. a delayed, compensatory rise in reports. Thus, this Article positions the COVID-19 shutdown period as a successful case study, demonstrating one possible future absent the massive, oppressive apparatus of the family regulation system.

Suffer the Children, Don’t Let Them Suffer: 1920s Child Welfare Services and Reforms in the Queen City

Suffer the Children, Don’t Let Them Suffer1920s Child Welfare Services and Reforms in the Queen City Brandon Borgemenke (bio) early movements in child welfare Throughout American history, some children have always been cared for by individuals other than their biological parents, but the ways in which they have been cared for have changed. Stemming from the basic issue of “unworthy vs. worthy poor,” the philosophy of the Elizabethan Poor Laws was the foundation of the American welfare system in the years leading up to and following the American Revolution.1 Children were categorized, under this set of laws, to be “worthy” of public welfare support, which was primarily offered through group housing and apprenticeships. The Elizabethan Poor Laws fed into a conception of child welfare that persisted in America for roughly another 150 years after they were first established.2 Under the British system, politicians and community leaders in colonial America hoped that dependent and neglected children who required out-of-home care would be reformed by their apprenticeships and acquire skills to be molded into contributing members of society. This sentiment carried over into the early years of the American nation. In the early days of the American Republic, for example, it was common for children to be indentured to families outside of their biological parents so that they might work and learn a trade. This was an accepted way of caring for all [End Page 42] types of children, ranging from orphans and other dependent children to children from other classes as well.3 Until the middle of the nineteenth century, orphan asylums provided communities with the means to deal with runaway children from impoverished families. Simultaneously, changing conceptions of childhood effectively narrowed the use of indenture to children from very poor families.4 In the 1850s, “placing-out” emerged as an alternative to indenture and began moving children from poor urban families to rural homes. Unlike indenture, placing-out was partially inspired by anti-urban, anti-immigrant ideologies.5 In the 1880s and 1890s, some agencies began to pay foster parents for boarding young children, so that the children would not be forced to work. Additionally, foster parents cared for children who were difficult to live with or who had special needs.6 the push for orphanages Orphanages began to spring up in the early 1800s as part of a concerted effort in America to build up its institutions. The United States was a very young country—socially unsettled and all but devoid of institutions.7 Many Americans could not escape the feeling that they had lost the established social order imbued by the British colonial system, but there had been nothing with which to replace it.8 In Republican society, the traditional British dichotomy of rank and privilege no longer existed. Historian Matthew A. Crenson writes about Republican society in his research on the prehistory of the American welfare state. Crenson claims, “The population was literally in motion, with workers moving into cities and mill towns to take jobs in the newly industrializing northern economy; other people migrating westward to settle new land in the territories; and immigrants arriving by the boatload in eastern seaboard cities.”9 Things we take for granted in our modern society did not yet exist. In [End Page 43] the early 1800s, there were few social services, public health institutions were almost nonexistent, and a system of public education was rudimentary.10 To many, society had become dangerously unstable and unhealthy. Social critics cited runaway ambition and the frantic pace and flexible principles of the marketplace for increases in crime and insanity.11 In response, many communities in the United States began to embrace the idea of asylums.12 The asylum was designed to take people who were at risk or who were causing harm to society and isolate them. The idea was that if one were to remove a problematic individual from bad influences and unhealthful conditions and put them in a regimented, regulated environment, you might restore them to health or turn them into a responsible citizen. If it was a child who was problematic, many individuals believed that if you removed them from the corrupting influence...

The Natural Profits of Their Years of Labor

AbstractThis article uses the politics of old age to help explain the moral conservatism of the American welfare state. It argues that the onset of Fordism caused both uneven economic displacement of old workers and broader anxiety among social reformers about dependency and the forms of social disorder it produced by disturbing normative families. The management of this disturbance became a key promise of the movement for old-age pensions in the 1920s, in which Progressive labor reformers and conservative workers’ and fraternal organizations combined in an effort to support and rehabilitate the patriarchal family form through social policy. This logic ultimately became embedded in Social Security. Grasping this helps clarify the conservative dimensions of the New Deal as a moment of class, state, and racial formation.

Du Bois'sDark Princess, Kautilya'sArthashastra, and the Welfare State

AbstractW. E. B. Du Bois's novelDark Princess(1928) has become a paradigmatic text for left internationalism and Afro-Asian solidarity. Du Bois's hybrid progressivism enchants the American welfare state by giving it an intellectual genealogy that emphasizes Eastern political thought.Dark Princessengages with theArthashastra, an ancient work of political theory that was ostensibly written by the chief adviser to Chandragupta, who unified the Indian subcontinent. TheArthashastra, and the legend concerning its composition, stimulated a Du Boisian fantasy of global leadership, one that parallels the contemporary recuperation of theArthashastrafor power politics. However, theArthashastra's discussion of social programs and infrastructure also introduces the concept of the welfare state. Interweaving theArthashastrawith Black life in Chicago, Du Bois gives the progressive activist Sara Andrews a surprising agency. Today the most important aspect ofDark Princessis its vision of an antiracist and culturally syncretic New Deal.

ADMINISTERED ENTITLEMENTS: COLLECTIVE BARGAINING TO AFFIRMATIVE ACTION

AbstractThis essay tells the story of the development of two of the most significant and controversial entitlement programs in twentieth-century U.S. history—collective bargaining and affirmative action. It focuses on the nexus between them—how New Deal empowerment of labor unions contributed to racial discrimination, and thus fed the Great Society race-based programs of affirmative action. The evolving relationship between the courts and the bureaucracies is emphasized, particularly how the judiciary went from an obstacle to an enabler of the entitlement state.

Fiscal sustainability under entitlement spending

AbstractWe develop a simple theoretical framework that can be used not only to assess the stability of debt, but also to evaluate the sustainability of the commitments of the public sector in the presence of entitlement spending. We model the optimal intertemporal path of fiscal variables and the optimal policy responses in this environment, which requires a dynamic framework. Our analysis suggests that even with near-zero interest rates the stability of debt is not guaranteed and that the sustainability of public finances depends on the level of taxes and the persistence of expenditure, as much as on the level of debt. We estimate the model with panel data techniques, finding that our modelling strategy is supported by the empirical evidence and we use calibrated versions of our model to compare different countries.

COVID‐19 and the Marshallese

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Catherine E. Rymph: Raising Government Children: A History of Foster Care and the American Welfare State

Catherine E. Rymph: Raising Government Children: A History of Foster Care and the American Welfare State

Editorial Introduction: Advances in Theory and Practice of Policy Research from National to Local Level

Editorial Introduction: Advances in Theory and Practice of Policy Research from National to Local Level

Entitlement programmes for garnering votes? The impact of local elections on targeted social protection in decentralised Indonesia

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to find the relationship between local direct elections and the change in social spending, controlling for GDP per capita, revenues and wide-range socio-welfare indicators at the regional level. Design/methodology/approach This research uses a model of time-series cross-sectional panel data set for 33 provinces in Indonesia from 2001 to 2012. Findings The main finding of this research is that the political budget cycle does exist in Indonesia. Incumbents responded to the direct elections more sensitively rather than to other variables in the model. The most important variables that are significant in the model are not only direct election but also inter-governmental grants. Interestingly, the local economy (as measured by GDP per capita) does not clearly exhibit a meaningful impact. Research limitations/implications Although the importance of decentralisation in Indonesia is actually at the regency level, obtaining the data is really challenging. Therefore the exercise on this paper is currently limited only for the provincial level. Practical implications This finding conveys the message that there is large room for improvement in inter-governmental transfer formulation, more importantly to the regions where they still entail significant budget support from central government. In addition, transfers during specific periods such as elections need to be modified to avoid the misappropriation of local budget and to mitigate the adverse impact of PBC. The formulation of inter-governmental transfers is pivotal in reducing over-dependence to the central government funding and to ensure the effectiveness of budget devolved at the local level. Originality/value To the author’s understanding, the paper is the first to discuss the presence of the political budget cycle on social protection programs in Indonesia. The expected contribution of the current work is twofold: Firstly, the author used a recent data set hosted by the World Bank (INDO-DAPOER). Secondly, the findings are relevant to the discussion within the sphere of development studies and political science.

The Role of Electoral Incentives for Policy Innovation: Evidence from the US Welfare Reform

How do governors’ reelection motives affect policy experimentation? We develop a theoretical model of this situation, and then test the predictions in data on US state-level welfare reforms from 1978 to 2007. This period marked the most dramatic shift in social policy since the New Deal. Our findings indicate that governors with strong electoral support are less likely to experiment than governors with little support. Yet, governors who cannot be reelected actually experiment more than governors striving for reelection. These findings are robust to controlling for ideology, preferences for redistribution, the state legislature, and cross-state learning. (JEL D72, H75, I32, I38)

Medicaid Expansion and Work Requirements in Georgia

Georgia’s Section 1115 waiver application, titled “Georgia Pathways to Coverage,” seeks to simultaneously expand the state’s Medicaid program and condition eligibility on work requirements. Though Section 1115 waivers have become a common vehicle for state Medicaid expansion, the imposition of work requirements is a novel departure. This article explores whether approval of Georgia Pathways to Coverage by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services can withstand judicial review. Recent precedent, beginning with the seminal Stewart v. Azar case, strongly suggests that a legal challenge would be successful on the merits. The features and justifications of Georgia Pathways to Coverage, examined in light of current data on work requirements in entitlement programs, make it likely that approval of the program would be found arbitrary and capricious under the Administrative Procedure Act. However, unique aspects of Georgia Pathways to Coverage, as compared with similar state waivers, raise significant hurdles related to constitutional standing requirements and the appropriate judicial remedy.

Public income transfers and wealth accumulation at the bottom: Within and between country differences in Canada and the United States

AbstractBoth Canada and the United States are considered liberal welfare states, yet exhibit notable differences in income poverty attributed to social policy. While a more generous welfare system lifts many above income poverty, models of household financial behaviour suggest that more income from the state should displace private savings via a substitution effect. Using nationally representative wealth surveys from Canada and the US from 1998/1999 to 2016 we extend knowledge on the relationship between the welfare state and private wealth accumulation. Specifically, we study household asset poverty defined as financial asset levels that fall below three‐month adjusted income poverty threshold. Asset poverty rates varied over time in the two countries and were higher in the less generous US welfare state. Further, income transfer share was positively related to asset poverty in Canada but not in the US. Counterfactual estimates offered evidence of the substitution effect in Canada, where higher levels of transfers may crowd out private asset accumulation. Results invite further consideration of the concept of asset poverty and its relationship to welfare state characteristics.

Risk perceptions and food-handling practices in the home

Unsafe food-handling practices in the home are linked with foodborne illnesses that represent sizable costs on the US healthcare industry and welfare losses to households. Past consumer food-safety education programs have only been modestly successful. Optimism bias may distort food-safety risk perceptions encouraging participation in risky food behaviors. Using multiple years of the FDA Food Safety Survey data, we explore the link between behavior-specific risk perceptions and three food-handling practices: handwashing, avoiding cross-contamination, and proper refrigeration of cooked foods. This approach describes risk perceptions as endogenous variables and allows for the decomposition of factors that directly influence food-safety behaviors, from those that indirectly influence behavior by changing risk perceptions. Our results suggest well-designed targeted information campaigns aimed at improving people’s safe food-handling practices must first decrease people’s optimism in the safety of their current practices. Given the lack of regulatory options to influence behavior in the home, this may provide an effective tool to address issues in performing safe food handling.

What Kind of Relief? Consumer Bankruptcy and Private Administration in the Neoliberal American Welfare State

ABSTRACT This article examines the administrative structure of Chapter 7 bankruptcy to better understand the neoliberal welfare state. Studying the administrative workings of the bankruptcy system offers a clear example of the consequences that follow from delegating governance of state social programs to non-state—in this case private, profitseeking—actors. In consumer bankruptcy, considerable authority is delegated to private trustees and private attorneys incentivized to work in their own interests and those of creditors, rather than prioritizing the possibility of a “fresh start” allegedly offered by the bankruptcy system. Drawing on interviews and an original survey of the front-line workers of the bankruptcy system, I argue that consumer bankruptcy’s structure aligns with creditors rather than debtors, exposes debtors to asset extraction by profit-oriented administrators, and relies on private attorneys in ways that both limit access and often hurt low-income debtors.

Mobilizing for Entitlement: A Randomised Evaluation of a Homestead Land Rights Initiative in Bihar, India

Across much of India, potentially transformative development programs are hampered by barriers to implementation. A case in point is Bihar, a province of over 100 million inhabitants, where state law guarantees each otherwise landless rural household the right to hold title over a plot of homestead land. Yet most eligible Scheduled Caste (SC) households remain untitled. This article studies a social accountability program that established, trained, and mobilised village-level community-based organisations to assist SC households in obtaining homestead title. The study employs a mixed methods design in which a survey-based field experiment estimates program impact while analysis of data from qualitative fieldwork documents ground-level processes. Results indicate that the program strongly increased land security and access to government entitlements, moderately increased asset ownership and homestead satisfaction, and had a weak positive effect on food security. However, the main impact estimates do not show statistically significant treatment effects on investment in dwellings or homestead -based livelihood activities. The qualitative analysis suggests that a key mechanism by which the program improved entitlement access was enabling target households to circumvent rent-seeking intermediaries. Results contribute to development studies research on social accountability, government service delivery, and land rights.