The State of Welfare Essay - 934 Words

The welfare system in the United States performs a wide variety of functions to assist people who have fallen onto hard times. Welfare programs are an evolution of the British Poor Laws whose roots lie in basic charity and the human ideology that one should aid those less fortunate. Today’s welfare system , being controlled by the state and federal governments are by no means perfect, but they do provide a more stable form of assistance so that the people of the United States know that if they fall into dire times, there is a safety net. As a government, of the people, for the people and by the people, it is only right that such a program should exist. As opposed to other countries in the past, the US government exists to serve its†¦show more content†¦Another agency that falls under the welfare umbrella of services is unemployment assistance. In Ohio, the program falls under the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services (DJFS). When a person becomes unemploye d, DJFS can provide a multitude of services ranging from unemployment compensation in the form of temporary cash assistance, to Job search and placement programs. Today’s economic situation is not dissimilar to that of the Great Depression according to Economist Laura Tyson in an interview with CNN. The major differences lie in two major areas. One of the differences is the massive monetary influx to the economy due to government stimulus. Many people may not see how this has affected them, but were these measures not taken to stabilize the economy it is believed that things could have gotten much worse. Secondly, the unemployment services offered by the states is much more developed that in the past. Persons not able to find employment in their area are able to feed their family and sustain warmth and shelter thanks to unemployment benefits and other welfare programs such as TANF. Were these programs in place in the manner in which they are now during the 1930’ s it is likely that the number of impoverished and starving people during the great depression would have paled in comparison toShow MoreRelatedWelfare Of The Welfare State2608 Words   |  11 PagesThe welfare state in Britain as we know it today did not exist, looking back through the 18th and 19th Centuries many of the social welfare benefits that are available to Britain’s today were not even imaginable to the people at that time. Today much of the help that is available to those in the margins of society is seen as an obligation for the state to correct. However in the Elizabethan Era the attitudes towards welfare and the poor were very negative and unsympathetic. 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