American social welfare policy has produced a health system with skyrocketing costs, a disability insurance program that consigns many otherwise productive people to lives of inactivity, and a welfare program that attracts wide criticism. Making Social Welfare Policy in America explains how this happened by examining the historical development of three key programs—Social Security Disability Insurance, Medicare, and Temporary Aid to Needy Families. Edward D. Berkowitz traces the developments that led to each program’s creation. Policy makers often find it difficult to dislodge a program’s administrative structure, even as political, economic, and cultural circumstances change. Faced with this situation, they therefore solve contemporary problems with outdated programs and must improvise politically acceptable solutions. The results vary according to the political popularity of the program and the changes in the conventional wisdom. Some programs, such as Social Security Disability Insurance, remain in place over time. Policy makers have added new parts to Medicare to reflect modern developments. Congress has abolished Aid to Families of Dependent Children and replaced with a new program intended to encourage work among adult welfare recipients raising young children. Written in an accessible style and using a minimum of academic jargon, this book illuminates how three of our most important social welfare programs have come into existence and how they have fared over time.

This book examines the conceptual, historical and practical implications that various social policies in the United States have had on ethnic minorities.

Social Welfare Policy in a Changing World is an approachable and student-friendly text that links policy and practice and employs a critical analytic lens to U.S. social welfare policy. With particular attention to disparities based on class, race/ethnicity, ability, sexual orientation and gender, authors Shannon R. Lane, Elizabeth Palley, and Corey Shdaimah assess the impact of policies at the micro, meso, and macro levels.

From housing, pensions and family benefits, to health care, unemployment insurance and social assistance, the welfare state is a key aspect of our lives. This book provides a concise political and sociological introduction to social policy, helping readers to grasp the nature of social programs and the political struggles surrounding them.

Comprises 33 papers grouped under five themes: The Nature of social policy; The History of social policy; Social policy and the social services; The Political economy of social policy; and International and future perspectives on social policy.

This book identifies specific changes to bring U.S. social policy in accord with the Information Age of the 21st century, in contrast to the policy infrastructure of industrial America. Welfare State 3.0: Social Policy after the Pandemic acknowledges the existing social infrastructure, considers viable options, and provides supporting data to suggest social policy reform by four strategies: consolidating programs, harmonizing applications, expanding equity, and conducting experiments. The book favors discreet, poignant proposals of social programs. In 12 chapters, the text provides an analysis that honors past accomplishments, recognizes the influence of established stakeholders, and concedes program inadequacies, while plotting specific opportunities for policy improvement. In contrast to liberalism’s tendency toward idealism, the book adopts a realpolitik appreciation for social policy. Written by one of the most respected academics of U.S. social policy, this book will be required reading for all undergraduate and postgraduate students of social policy, social work, sociology, and U.S. politics more broadly.

This text offers a clear explanation of policy analysis. SOCIAL WELFARE: POLICY AND ANALYSIS, Third Edition, shows students how to apply the methods and processes of policy analysis to current American welfare programs. The description of welfare programs provides a basic introduction to the field and the explanations of how the programs have developed make them more understandable to social welfare students.