social safety net

(noun)

A set of governmental programs, entitlements, or benefits providing citizens and residents with a minimum level of financial protection, food, access to public infrastructure, or medical services.

Related Terms

Examples of social safety net in the following topics:

  • The Clinton Administration

    • While many welfare programs were reduced, various measures were also introduced to improve the effectiveness of the social safety net, including an increase in the number of child care places, a significant expansion of the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) program, the introduction of new programs such as the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), and a child tax credit.
    • Socially, the administration began with efforts by Clinton to allow gays and lesbians to serve openly in the military, which culminated in a compromise known as "Don't ask, don't tell," theoretically allowing gays and lesbians to serve in the military if they did not disclose their sexual orientation (the policy was later repealed in 2010).

  • Compassionate Conservatism

    • A compassionate conservative sees the social problems of the United States, such as health care or immigration, as issues that are better solved through cooperation with private companies, charities, and religious institutions rather than directly through government departments.
    • As former Bush chief speechwriter Michael Gerson put it, "Compassionate conservatism is the theory that the government should encourage the effective provision of social services without providing the service itself."
    • Some argue that NCLB does not do enough to account for the wide range of factors related to social and economic inequality that cause schools to underperform, and that without this analysis, "corrective" measures do more harm than good.
    • Others on the left have viewed it as an effort to remove America's social safety net (such as social services) out of the hands of the government and give it to Christian churches and private corporations.

  • Conclusion: Populism Resurgent

    • The Occupy movement believed that the 1% was creating economic instability and undermining the social safety nets previously implemented by the government.

  • Relief and Conservation Programs

    • At that time, the federal government provided no safety net: there was no unemployment insurance, no Social Security, and no welfare.
    • The New Deal included some of the first national welfare programs, including Social Security, passed in August of 1935 and still in operation today.
    • The Social Security Act was an attempt to create a safety net against economic dangers such as old age, poverty, and unemployment.

  • Social Justice

    • Progressive reformers tried to achieve social justice by targeting poverty and all forms of social and political corruption.
    • The Progressive Era witnessed an increasing interest in social reforms.
    • In The Jungle (1906), socialist Upton Sinclair repelled readers with descriptions of Chicago's meatpacking plants, prompting many Americans to rally behind the federally-mandated remedial food safety legislation passed under Roosevelt's administration.
    • Leading intellectuals also shaped the political and social progressive mentality.
    • In sum, the "Progressive Era" is a broadly construed term that refers to a myriad of social, cultural, and political reform movements advocated by otherwise disparate interest groups and political parties that were reacting to the modernizing, industrializing economic and social situation that arose by the turn of the century.

  • Social Justice

    • Progressive reformers, concerned with the exploitation of society's most vulnerable individuals, called for social welfare legislation.
    • Jane Addams, of Chicago's Hull House, typified the leadership of residential, community centers operated by social workers and volunteers and located in inner-city slums.
    • Most of the support came from Democrats, but Theodore Roosevelt and his third party, the Bull Moose Party, also supported such goals as the eight-hour work day, improved safety and health conditions in factories, workers' compensation laws, and minimum wage laws for women.
    • With its innovative social, educational, and artistic programs, Hull House became the standard bearer for the movement that had grown, by 1920, to almost 500 settlement houses nationally.
    • Describe how Progressives attempted to achieve social justice with welfare policies

  • Features of Progressivism

    • The Progressive Era was a time of great political, social and economic reform for the United States.
    • At the state and national levels, new food and drug laws strengthened local efforts to ensure food system safety.
    • Their explicit goal was to professionalize and make "scientific" the social sciences, especially history, economics and political science.
    • Another item on the progressive agenda was Eugenics—a social philosophy advocating improvement of human hereditary qualities through selective breeding.

  • Early Efforts in Urban Reform

    • The fire led to legislation requiring improved factory safety standards and helped spur the growth of the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union, which fought for better working conditions for sweatshop workers.
    • In New York City, a Committee on Public Safety was formed, headed by Frances Perkins, a noted social worker, to identify specific problems and lobby for new legislation, such as the bill to grant workers shorter hours in a work week, known as the "54-hour Bill."

  • Debt and the Stock Market Plunge

    • Additionally, low income groups were affected by the reduction of social spending.
    • The net effect of all Reagan-era tax bills resulted in a 1% decrease of government revenues (as a percentage of GDP), with the revenue-shrinking effects of the 1981 tax cut (-3% of GDP) and the revenue-gaining effects of the 1982 tax hike (~+1% of GDP).
    • During the Reagan Administration, federal receipts grew at an average rate of 8.2% (2.5% attributed to higher Social Security receipts), and federal outlays grew at an annual rate of 7.1%.
    • Such programs included Social Security, Medicaid, Food Stamps, and federal education programs.
    • Although Reagan protected entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare, he attempted, in one of the most widely criticized actions of the administration, to purge tens of thousands of allegedly disabled people deemed by the administration to be not truly disabled from the Social Security disability roles.

  • Outdoor Recreation

    • The 1890s saw one of the biggest bicycle crazes of all, driven by several significant developments in bicycles: the invention of the "safety bicycle" with its chain-drive transmission, whose gear ratios allowed smaller wheels without a concurrent loss of speed, and the subsequent invention of the pneumatic (inflatable air-filled) bicycle tire.
    • Very quickly, the penny-farthing, or high-wheel, passed out of fashion, and multitudes of people all over the world began riding the "safety. " It was largely the popularity of this type of bicycle at this time which first caused roads to be paved.
    • Frederick Law Olmsted (April 26, 1822 – August 28, 1903) was an American landscape architect, journalist, social critic, and public administrator.
    • The Overman Victor Flyer, a popular safety bicycle during the 1890s