11 Chapter 11: Social Welfare in Times of Crisis: The Covid-19 Pandemic

This chapter will serve as a recap of the development of social welfare in the US  and how American values have been reflected by the policies and programs established over time. By definition, social welfare is the well-being of a society. The well-being of a society is ensured through the collective response to needs or problems that hinder the healthy functioning of individuals within their families, communities and the larger environment. Social welfare can be summarized as the supports and services that individuals, families, communities and societies need to live productive and self-determined lives.

Section 11.1: A Comprehensive Overview of the Evolution of Social Welfare

Colonial America

Social welfare at the beginning of the country involved charity and mutual aid provided at the community level. The primary social values at this time were focused on individual responsibility and the need for all to be self-sufficient and morally upstanding. Social welfare policy in the colonial period centered on the local Poor Law institutions, which included a mixture of indoor (institutional) relief and outdoor (provided in the home) relief (Barusch, 2018).

While there was some safety net, it was only available to those deemed “worthy” of aid and those considered to be part of the community. A tradition of private philanthropy developed early in the new world and was funded by government and private donors. The poor, unable to support themselves, were supported through a levy assessed on the more economically well-off persons in their community. Americans also developed private philanthropic institutions.

Progressive Era and Early Federal Involvement

Turn of the 20th century Americans increasingly believed that environmental factors impacted the healthy development of people living in the bigger cities. Research began to show an undeniable correlation between the physical conditions in the cities and at work and poor outcomes. There were concerns that unregulated capitalism may not lead to economic prosperity for all.

It was a hard time in America. Poor immigrants continued to pour into the country. Employers held all the power. There was no federal protections or social welfare. Immigrants bore the brunt of industrialization in Northern and Midwestern cities. Around 15 million immigrants arrived between 1900 and 1914 (Library of Congress, n.d).   Major American cities consisted of separate ethnic settlements with churches, political machines, and newspapers. In 12 largest cities about 40% of population were immigrants and about 20% were 2nd generation and about 60% of the work force was foreign born (Hirschman & Mogford, 2010). Employers were unsympathetic to union organizing. Few policies or programs existed to protect persons from disease, poverty, discrimination, disability, crime, fires, and poor living conditions.

Rise of social reform movements

Social Darwinism, political power of corporations, and preoccupation with upward mobility created an unlikely environment for social reform at the outset of the Progressive Era. Most state legislatures met a few months in alternate years in many states. Government was dominated at all levels through people who had connections to those with money and power  (Jansson, 2018). Many Americans grew alarmed at the size and power of corporations, which prompted doubts that they could be effectively regulated.

Reforms during this type were done through a series of regulations that advocates pushed for primarily at local and state levels of government, along with some at the federal level of government. Progressives’ reforms did not require large government expenditures. Local property taxes were the primary source of governmental revenues and mainly used for schools and public services. Regulations were enacted for banks and economic institutions; conditions of employment; food and drugs; employment of children; and housing. These reforms contributed to efforts to implement a social services system and the development of a social work profession. However, there was no focus on the needs of workers, people in poverty, or oppressed groups.

The New Deal and the Birth of Modern Social Welfare

The Great Depression, which started in October of 1929, established the federal government’s role in providing social welfare. The U.S Constitution Preamble states that the government has the expressed purpose to “promote the general welfare.” In 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt used this to argue for the New Deal programs, a broad array of policies and programs, including the Social Security Act, that would rescue the nation from the crisis at the time but also ensure that this level of national financial disaster did not occur again. Upon signing the Social Security Act on August 14, 1935, Roosevelt said,

“The law will flatten out the peaks and valleys of deflation and of inflation. It is, in short, a law that will take care of human needs and at the same time provide for the United States an economic structure of vastly greater soundness.”

Through the New Deal programs and the Social Security Act, a partnership between the federal government and state and local governments was developed to provide a system of social welfare to those most in need.

Expansion in the Great Society Era

The prosperity brought by the end of World War II led to a contraction of social welfare in the late 1940s and 1950s (Florida State College at Jacksonville & Counsil, n.d.). Increased government spending, technological advances and the funding of housing and college by the G.I. Bill contributed to the rise of consumerism and a shift in the “American Dream” towards material wealth and homeownership. As we often see in the U.S., this prosperity was not equal across all populations.

Racism, sexism and heterosexism limited the economic opportunities for groups that had very little civil rights protection. The assassination of President John K. Kennedy gave his vice president and successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, enough political capital to sign legislation ensuring equal rights for people of color and women as well as legislation that expanded social welfare. During his first State of the Union Address, Johnson declared a War on Poverty, introducing a series of programs and policies aimed at addressing issues of rural poverty, access to education, training and jobs, educational reform and healthcare for the most vulnerable populations. Dubbed the Great Society Programs, they included Medicaid, Medicare, Food Stamps (now called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), Jobs Corps and Head Start among others. The 1960s resulted not only in needed social welfare programs but civil rights legislation that protected vulnerable populations from discrimination in jobs, housing and education.

Interestingly, one of the most important pieces of poverty-reducing social welfare legislation was originally conceived by Republican President Richard Nixon. The Earned Income Tax Credit, signed in 1975, is aimed at low-income families, eliminating most taxes paid and often providing a cash refund (Library of Congress, 2022). The program was originally intended as a small tax credit designed to reward work and help families afford higher gas and food costs after the recession in 1974.

Retrenchment and Reform (1980s – 1990s)

As we have seen throughout history, after a period of social welfare expansion comes retraction, or a push to reduce the size of the federal government. President Ronald Reagan declared in 1980 that the war on poverty had failed. He favored cutting government spending on social welfare programs and focusing on individual responsibility and economic growth through tax cuts and deregulation, which would create jobs and opportunities for those in poverty.

These structural changes to the role of government in the provision of social welfare along with a cultural shift about who deserved support eventually led to the end of the cash assistance program originally established in the New Deal programs and Social Security Act. Aid to Families with Dependent Children, originally called the Aid to Dependent Children, was designed to allow caregivers to stay home and raise their children. During his campaigns for governor of California and president, Reagan frequently referred to “welfare queens,” a stereotype of African American women in large cities that were scamming the welfare system (Black & Sprague, 2016). This stereotype led to a systemic push by legislators, supported by public opinion, to reform the way that cash assistance was delivered in the U.S.

It was President Bill Clinton in 1996 that finally oversaw the “end of welfare as we know it” and implemented the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (Semuels, 2016). The Act included a wide range of policies designed to promote individual responsibility, two-parent families and state control of social welfare. Through the federal Temporary Assistant to Needy Families program, block grants were provided to states with some basic requirements including a strict time limit (a strict 60-month lifetime limit for benefits), work requirements and rules regarding establishment of paternity. Over the next twenty years, two of the primary goals of PRWORA were met – the number of people receiving cash assistance was reduced significantly and the number of mothers in the workplace increased significantly. There is much discussion over its impact on poverty however (Moffit & Garlow, 2018).

Contemporary Developments (2000s – Present)

Since 2000, there have been milestone changes in terms of historic policy impacting health care, immigration and education as well as civil rights for the LGBTQ+ population. We have had catastrophic natural disasters, terrorist attacks on American soil and a global Pandemic that shut down the world. The first African American president was elected and a businessman and reality television star was elected in two non-consecutive elections. The US Supreme Court has affirmed same sex marriage, struck down federal protection for abortions and ruled that corporations have the right to free speech.

Future challenges and opportunities

The U.S. has long experienced periods of expansion and contraction in social welfare policy and funding. In 2025, with the election of Donald Trump for a second term, public sentiment clearly reflected a desire to reform immigration and prioritize individual responsibility with a smaller federal government. A look at the past tells us that significant income inequality and deregulation of business tends to be followed by a period of reassessment of the role of the government. As we saw following the 1920s leading into the Great Depression, in the 1960s, and again in the early 2000s, a liberal swing toward more protective policies and focus on collective responsibility tends to follow very conservative and laissez-faire approaches.

Section 11.2: Reflecting on Social Welfare as a Mirror of Societal Values and Changes

You will remember at the beginning of this book, we discussed competing beliefs that underlie our social welfare system (Segal, 2020):

• • Undeserving v deserving
  • Individual responsibility v social responsibility
  • Individual change v social change
  • Self-sufficiency v social support
  • Entitlement v handout
  • Aid to those we know v aid to strangers
  • Religious and faith based practice v separation of church and state
  • Crisis response v prevention
  • Sympathy v empathy
  • Trust v suspicion
  • Rationality v emotions

As we study the development of social welfare since the first settlers came to the US, we can recognize the beliefs that were held by politicians and the citizens that elected them. As we review immigration policy since the 1800s, we can see the periods when immigrants were welcome and treated with trust, particularly when we needed their labor. During other times, we can see them treated as undeserving of protection and with suspicion.

Social welfare and assistance to vulnerable populations has been impacted by collective beliefs around who deserves aid and whether it is a societal responsibility or contributes to dependency. The US is an inherently charitable and philanthropic society (National Philanthropic Trust, 2023). And we tend to act with empathy when we can understand the experience of the person in need of assistance. But society struggles with those that are perceived as unwilling to change or take responsibility for themselves or their families. We can see this through history as we look at policy that have developed for people in poverty, family violence and substance abuse.

As we recognize the ongoing struggles of vulnerable populations in the US, social workers understand that our work to advocate for policies and programs that ensure all people, particularly those at higher risks for oppression and discrimination have access to the supports and services they need to be successful is not done.

References

Black, R. & Sprague, A. (2016, Sept. 22). The rise and reign of the welfare queen. New America. https://www.newamerica.org/weekly/rise-and-reign-welfare-queen/

Beito, D. (2005). Mutual aid (United States). In Encyclopedia of social welfare history in North America (pp. 247-250). SAGE Publications, Inc., https://doi.org/10.4135/9781412952521.n99

Florida State College at Jacksonville & Counsil, C. G. (n.d.) U.S. history II: 1877 to present. Lumen Learning. Retrieved June 25, 2025 from https://fscj.pressbooks.pub/modernushistory/.

Hirschman, C., & Mogford, E. (2009). Immigration and the American industrial revolution from 1880 to 1920. Social science research, 38(4), 897–920. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssresearch.2009.04.001

Jansson, B. (2018). Empowerment series: the reluctant welfare state (9th ed.). Cengage.

Library of Congress (2022, April 28). The Earned Income Tax Credit: legislative history. https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R44825

Library of Congress (n.d.). Immigrants in the progressive era. U.S. history primary source timeline. https://www.loc.gov/classroom-materials/united-states-history-primary-source-timeline/progressive-era-to-new-era-1900-1929/immigrants-in-progressive-era/

Moffit, R.A. & Garlow, S. (2018). Did welfare reform increase employment and reduce poverty? Pathways: Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality. https://inequality.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/Pathways_Winter2018_Employment-Poverty.pdf

National Philanthropic Trust (2023). Charitable giving statistics. https://www.nptrust.org/philanthropic-resources/charitable-giving-statistics/

Peters, G. & Woolley, J. T. (n.d.) Franklin D. Roosevelt, Statement on Signing the Social Security Act. The American Presidency Project. https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/209017

Semuels, A. (2016, April 1). The end of welfare as we know it. The Atlantic. https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/04/the-end-of-welfare-as-we-know-it/476322/