Welfare and Welfare to Work in the United States

Summary

Despite social work's historic ambivalence toward income support programs, the policy changes introduced by the TANF welfare to work program demand the profession's attention. Although social workers are not directly responsible for the administration or implementation of the program, many serve TANF clients whose lives have been affected by these changes. Tracing social work's historic but reluctant involvement with income support, this paper urges the profession to respond to the challenges posed by the TANF program in a more systematic way and to contribute more effectively to the wider task of poverty eradication.     

Evaluating the Effectiveness and Efficiency of Hong Kong Welfare Programmes in Reducing Child Poverty

This paper examines the effectiveness and efficiency of welfare programmes that are relevant to child poverty reduction in Hong Kong. We employ data from a cross‐sectional survey of a representative sample of families, conducted in 2015 through face‐to‐face interviews. Our results indicate that all four welfare programmes were inadequate in alleviating child poverty. This was either due to the deep poverty gap to be filled or high rates of exclusion error. Most programmes are also inefficient because of inclusion error. We conclude by suggesting some policy implications for the welfare programmes.     

加拿大社会福利制度及对广州的启示

本文从儿童福利等6个方面概要介绍加拿大社会福利制度,分析了福利制度的基础包括高度发达的经济、健全的税收和审慎的财政政策等,以及福利制度的调适和发展。在此基础上探讨福利制度背后的人本主义、公开透明、民主法治、多元文化以及诚实守信等治理理念,并从坚持科学发展、加大开放力度、实施审慎财政政策、推进法治建设、鼓励公众参与、打造人本宜居广州等方面,对广州民生和社会福利建设和政府治理提出建议。     

The Relationship of Prisoners,Poverty Measures,and Social Welfare Allocations in Ohio

Abstract

Prisoners are counted in the county in which they are incarcerated, according to U. S. Census Bureau guidelines. This policy is increasingly the subject of academic interest because census data are used for redistricting and for the allocation of federal and state funds based on population and poverty criteria. Using canonical correlation analyses, this study found that fewer prisoners, no prisons in a county, higher ruralness, fewer percentages of persons below poverty, and higher percentages of households receiving social security insurance are associated with lower allocations for case management, lower allocations for health and human services, and lower allocations for criminal justice. Taking into account the cross loadings, having a prison, higher ruralness, and fewer percentages of people below the poverty line remain significant. The author discusses the policy implications of these findings.     

Unintended Consequences: The Impact of Welfare Reform in the United States on NGOs

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) of 1996 dramatically transformed the structure and goals of the public welfare system in the United States. The vast body of research and evaluation generated by the 1996 welfare reforms largely overlooked nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) despite their substantial historical and contemporary involvement in the delivery of social services to low-income populations. Therefore, this paper presents a unique assessment of PRWORA's implications based on the perspective of 90 social service NGOs operating in the Detroit metropolitan area. Examination of their services, staffing, budgets, and clients reveals many changes experienced by NGOs between 1996 and 2000 related to the welfare reforms. Overall, the findings suggest an increased role for social service NGOs in the public welfare system as well as concerns regarding their capacity to adequately fulfill this growing responsibility in the future.     

Assessing Public Support for State Government Social Welfare Expenditures

Abstract

This study compared two different approaches to assessing the level of public support for social welfare spending at the state government level. The first approach focuses on the degree to which the public supports state government's involvement in public welfare spending. The second approach identifies the importance the public places on social welfare spending when compared to other possible functions of state government. Using Alabama data, the paper examined changes in general and comparative public support for state budget expenditures from 1980 to 2000 in Alabama. In addition, we examined the effectiveness of sociodemographic and attitudinal characteristics of respondents as predictors of both general and comparative support for three social welfare functions of state government. Support for “benefits for poor people” grew both generally and comparatively in the 20-year period; support for programs for older people remained steady; and support for mental health services declined. Sociodemographic predictors of general and comparative sup port were generally consistent with a self-interest model     

Welfare brokers and European Union migrants' access to social protection

In spite of the existence of an extensive national and supranational legal framework, European Union (EU) citizens who exercise their right to freedom of movement to work in another Member State face numerous hurdles in accessing social protection. While recent scholarship on street-level bureaucracy and on migration and welfare has shed light on the role of discretion and stereotypes in access to rights, little is known about the processes through which such hurdles are overcome. In this article, we focus on a specific strategy which is the recourse to what we call “welfare brokers”. These actors offer assistance to EU migrants to overcome specific cross-border administrative challenges in the area of social protection that derive from their use of the right to freedom of movement. Relying on qualitative data collected with brokers and Romanian migrants working in Germany, the article also demonstrates that welfare brokers attempt to transform the norms, bureaucratic practices and representations that condition access to these entitlements. The article concludes by underlining how the existence of a brokerage industry is a sign of existing inequalities in the exercise of freedom of movement within the EU.     

An Examination of the Persistence of the Residual Child Welfare System in the United States: Addressing Charges of Radical Theoretical Myopia with Implications for Social Work Practice

The United States follows what has been termed a “residual” approach to its public child welfare system. This article describes the residual model and contrasts it with the policies of other industrialized nations. It also explores the causes and persistence of the residual model in the United States through the lens of structural-functionalist theory. By doing so, this article attempts to respond to critics of structural social work who maintain that it is overly reliant on conflict theory and has nothing to offer in terms of distinct practice methods. Suggestions for a structurally informed social work practice are made.     

Understanding Professional Projects in Welfare Service Work: Revival of Old Professionalism?

The professional terms for occupations that provide welfare services are changing, and here the introduction of new public management in the Nordic countries since the 1990s is indicative of wider developments. The article explores professional projects in welfare service work from both conceptual and empirical perspectives. The aim is to produce a gender‐sensitive analysis of the professional projects at the lower levels of the occupational hierarchies in health care. The first part reviews the literature conceptualizing the societal and institutional embeddedness of professional projects. The institutional matrix of welfare states emerges as a key context in shaping the welfare service work performed by women‐dominated professional groups. The second part examines the case of Finland and suggests that recent reforms have created new inequalities in the system of professions, in which occupational groups in welfare service work are becoming marginalized. This signals a move away from ‘democratic professionalism’ towards a revival of ‘old professionalism’.     

Pioneering Health Care for Children with Disabilities: Untold Legacy of the 1916 Polio Epidemic in the United States

In 1916, the United States experienced its first polio epidemic, resulting in 6,000 deaths and 21,000 injured individuals. Medical practices were ill prepared to stop the disease and treat survivors. Historians have documented the creation of the polio vaccine during the 20th century, but less is written about efforts to provide rehabilitation services to children afflicted with polio. This research looked at Polio After-Care Committees, a new form of community practice that provided care to children with disabilities. The Committees worked to change community-level systems of care while providing medical care, demonstrating that new forms of community-based service organization could reach children.     

Inheritance of Welfare Recipiency: An Intergenerational Study of Social Assistance Recipiency in Postwar Sweden

Intergenerational transmission of welfare dependency has received increasing attention among social scientists, especially in the United States, as greater availability of longitudinal data has shed new light on this issue. It remains unclear, however, to what extent the intergenerational correlation of welfare recipiency observed in the United States reflects or interacts with unobserved variables, the racial composition of the population, and the institutional structure of social policies. This study focuses on Sweden, a country with an ethnically homogenous population and institutional social policy structures that differ from those in the United States. It utilizes an internationally unique longitudinal data set to test hypotheses on the inheritance of welfare benefit recipiency as indicated by reliance on means‐tested social assistance. A clear intergenerational effect is observed. This effect, however, reflects a combination of social assistance in the family of origin, children's school adjustment, and parental criminality. Children who lack this combination of problems do not show signs of intergenerational welfare dependency.     

Reproducing Social Conditions of Poverty: A Critical Feminist Analysis of Social Assistance Participation in Ontario,Canada

This study uses repeated Cox Proportional Hazards models to explore the characteristics significant in predicting social assistance (SA) exit rates in Ontario, Canada. The results indicate that gender, age, immigration status, family structure, and presence of children significantly affect the likelihood of SA exit. Interpreting these findings through a critical feminist lens, I highlight the structural barriers that potentially influence people’s trajectories. Social policies that might better address the lives of women and other groups are explored, and a human rights framework is discussed as one avenue to advance poverty reduction efforts.     

Computerizing the welfare state

Although computer technology is central to the operation of the modern welfare state, there has been little analysis of its role or of the factors shaping the way in which it is used. Using data generated by expert informants from 13 OECD countries, this paper provides an indicative comparison of the aims of computerization in national social security systems over a 15-year period from 1985 to 2000. The paper seeks to identify and explain patterns in the data and outlines and examines four hypotheses. Building on social constructivist accounts of technology, the first three hypotheses attribute variations in the aims of computerization to different welfare state regimes, forms of capitalism, and structures of public administration. The fourth hypothesis, which plays down the importance of social factors, assumes that computerization is adopted as a means of improving operational efficiency and generating expenditure savings. The findings suggest that, in all 13 countries, computerization was adopted in the expectation that it would lead to increased productivity and higher standards of performance, thus providing most support for the fourth hypothesis. However, variations between countries suggest that the sociopolitical values associated with different welfare state regimes have also had some effect in shaping the ways in which computer technology has been used in national social security systems.     

Social protection in Chile: Reforms to improve equity

At the beginning of the 1980s, Chile pioneered the implementation in Latin America of structural reforms that fully or partially privatized pensions, health‐care and social assistance systems. Implemented without prior social dialogue, these reforms – which subsequently influenced similar reforms in other countries of the region and elsewhere – led to reduced social solidarity and equity and intensified poverty and inequality. Over the past 18 years, however, democratic governments have corrected many design faults in the original reforms. The author examines the progress achieved and areas of persistent social inequality in terms of coverage, gender balance and funding, and identifies future challenges.     

Fertiliser Subsidies and Social Cash Transfers as Complementary or Competing Instruments for Reducing Vulnerability to Hunger: The Case of Malawi

Fertiliser subsidies and social transfers are complementary instruments for reducing vulnerability to hunger in poor agrarian countries. The former act on production and aim to reduce food insecurity through yield growth, while the latter tackle food‐entitlement failures directly, by providing either food itself or the cash to purchase food to selected beneficiaries. The policies compete for scarce public resources, and each represents an ‘opportunity cost’ compared to the other. Using Malawi to illustrate these comparisons, this article shows that a mix of policies can be affordable, allowing for strategic choice over the portfolio most likely to achieve a reliable consumption floor for the most vulnerable rural people.     

The Volunteer Citizen After Welfare Reform in the United States: An Ethnographic Study of Volunteerism in Action

In the United States, neoliberal strategies for social, economic, and state organization have been accompanied by frequent calls for volunteers to solve serious social problems. A case study of a community mobilization of middle-class volunteers to provide one-on-one support to families in poverty shows both possibilities and limitations. Volunteers provide social support to families in poverty, thus alleviating social isolation. Volunteers learn about systemic forces that cause poverty, its effects on families and communities, and about themselves and their capacities to engage in poverty work. However, social isolation is but one of many problems associated with poverty, and even a more knowledgeable amateur volunteer corps cannot take the place of substantial social, economic, and political change.     

On the Front Lines: The Voices and Experiences of Racialized Child Welfare Workers in Toronto,Canada

Drawing on focus group data highlighting the perceptions and experiences of racialized child protection workers in the Greater Toronto Area, this article explores the ways in which race operates in the Ontario child welfare system. Most study participants experienced the agencies in which they worked as White-normed environments characterized by systemic racial discrimination in promotion and advancement as well as ongoing instances of racial microaggression—common, everyday practices that denigrate people of color. Several participants spoke of having to contend with White-normed and middle-class-oriented policies, tools, and practices that often prevented them from meeting the unique needs of racialized service users. The article concludes with participants' recommendations for creating a more equitable child welfare system.     

Resources reduction and welfare changes: tensions between social workers and organisations. The Italian case in child protection services

Within the field of studies on professionalism, this paper explores the changes in roles of social workers and the new tensions emerging in the relationship with their organisational contexts, due to the reduction of resources and the introduction of neoliberal and managerial policies in the welfare system. The paper is based on qualitative research carried out through 32 in-depth interviews with frontline social workers engaged in child and family services in Italy. The paper investigates how spending cuts have affected the relationship with the organisation arguing that the ways the cuts are implemented, as well as the room for professional recognition set by the organisation, are relevant. A four-character social worker typology is outlined, drawn from the intersection of two meaningful dimensions: sense of belonging and critical thinking. It is argued that a ‘critically engaged’ type points to a new form of professionalism that may emerge from the current crisis of the relationship between the organisation and social workers.     

Searching for Innovative Design: Architectural Competitions in the Silvering Swedish Welfare State

The new millennium has seen an increased interest in appropriate housing for the senior part of the Swedish population, defined as those aged 65 years and older. In 2010, the Swedish government launched a 2-year program called “Growing Old, Living Well” that targeted the living conditions of not only older people with few or some needs for homecare services, but also the smaller group of dependent and frail older persons whose everyday living depends upon regular caregiving. The program promoted architectural competitions as a tool for innovation. This article assesses the outcome of 3 architectural competitions that were carried out by 3 municipalities in accordance with the program. It concludes that existing notions about appropriate space for aging populations prevailed, since the competition briefs evolved from existing data and consequently allowed for only a low degree of innovative thinking. Hence, the relationship between architectural design and older people's age-related needs was only addressed indirectly. Further work needs to be done in the area of housing for the Swedish silvering welfare state in order for this factor to become an essential criterion for creating innovative architecture and urban design.     

Implementing a strengths perspective in child welfare and protection: a challenge not to be taken lightly

Although it can be observed that the popularity of a strengths perspective in social work is increasing, social work researchers have articulated the necessity to gain empirical knowledge about actual social work practice that claims a strengths perspective. We explore the findings of recent research into a strengths-oriented pilot project in the field of child welfare and protection in Flanders (the Flemish speaking part of Belgium), in which we examined whether the strengths-oriented discourse in social work actually took place in the relationship between social workers and families in practice. The research reveals an ambiguous picture of the ways in which the strengths perspective can be implemented in practice, because social workers walk a tightrope between responsibilizing and governing families. We argue that the implementation process needs a conceptual and theoretical foundation that goes beyond mere eclecticism. We also argue that this demands a broadening of the focus of strengths-oriented social work from a relational to a political level, as this strengths-oriented social work practice remains situated within the broader social, economic, and political context.