Exam Chapters 18-20
Name: _____________________________________
MULTIPLE CHOICE. Choose the one alternative that best completes the statement or answers the question.
1. Policies that attempt to provide assistance and support to specific groups in society are called
A) equal opportunity policies.
B) tax subsidies.
C) social welfare policies.
D) means-tested policies.
E) anti-poverty policies.
2. An entitlement program is one
A) which requires a means test to qualify.
B) to which only a small group of people are entitled.
C) guaranteed in the Constitution.
D) which provides guaranteed benefits to those who qualify.
E) developed to create equality in college admissions.
3. In general over the last twenty years which of the following is true about the distribution of wealth in America?
A) Many of the poor are slowly gaining ground, relatively speaking, to higher-income groups.
B) All groups are increasing their wealth, with the poor increasing at a slightly lower rate.
C) Many of the poor are losing ground to the higher-income groups.
D) The middle class (the middle quintile of the population) is increasing its share of the national income, while the top and bottom quintiles are losing their share of national income.
E) All groups are increasing their wealth, with the poor increasing at a slightly higher rate.
4. The poverty line is measured by
A) the number of people filing for unemployment benefits.
B) proportion of the median income as determined by IRS records.
C) the minimum wage extended on a yearly basis.
D) the boundaries of an urban ghetto.
E) taking into account what a family would need to spend to maintain an “austere” standard of living.
5. Compared to the general population, poverty is more common among all of the following EXCEPT
A) children.
B) African Americans and Hispanics.
C) Asian Americans.
D) the elderly.
E) inner city residents.
6. If the government takes a bigger bite from the income of a rich family than from the income of a poor family, then the tax system is
A) progressive.
B) retrogressive.
C) regressive.
D) proportional.
E) redistributive.
7. Government’s main tools for influencing the distribution of income and wealth are
A) income taxation and expenditure policies.
B) extending eligibility for welfare and Medicare benefits.
C) equal opportunity and affirmative action programs.
D) monetary policy and wage and price controls.
E) legislating and enforcing economic policies.
8. The biggest chunk of transfer payments goes to
A) foreign aid.
B) Temporary Aid to Needy Families (TANF) in particular.
C) unmarried black females with children.
D) means-tested programs in general.
E) the elderly and other recipients of Social Security.
9. The “War on Poverty” was the set of social welfare policy initiatives begun by President
A) Jimmy Carter.
B) Ronald Reagan.
C) Harry S. Truman.
D) Lyndon Johnson.
E) Franklin D. Roosevelt.
10. Which of the following is an example of an entitlement?
A) low-interest college loans
B) Food Stamps
C) Social Security
D) Aid to Families with Dependent Children
E) Pell Grants
11. Medicaid provides
A) hospital care for people covered by Social Security.
B) hospital care for the retired and disabled people covered by Social Security.
C) medical and hospital aid to the poor on the basis of need through federally assisted state health programs.
D) medical insurance to those over 65 and disabled.
E) cash payments to aged, blind, or disabled people whose income is below a certain amount.
12. The feminization of poverty refers to
A) high poverty levels among the elderly, who tend to be female.
B) higher incarceration rates of women today compared to twenty years ago.
C) higher rates of homelessness among women.
D) the high incidence of poverty among married mothers and their children.
E) the high incidence of poverty among unmarried mothers and their children.
13. The Social Security Act of 1935
A) brought government into the equation of the obligations of one generation to another.
B) substantially freed children and adults from paying their parent’s medical expenses.
C) substantially freed adults from the obligation of caring for both their children and parents.
D) freed American citizens from the obligation of supporting the poor.
E) provided for free medical care for all citizens over the age of 65 until it was repealed by the Republican congress of 1953.
14. Criticisms of the current welfare system include each of the following EXCEPT
A) they do not include a means test to week out welfare fraud.
B) they discourage poor people from saving money.
C) they discourage recipients from getting married or even living together.
D) they make it profitable to be poor and victimized.
E) they discourage the poor from solving their problems.
15. Which of the following was a provision of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996?
A) people on welfare would have to find work within two years or lost all their benefits
B) basic health care benefits would be provided to those who found jobs.
C) the federal government would pay for all aspects of the program instead of the states
D) a lifetime maximum of fifteen years on welfare was set
E) a maximum number of children per household was set
16. All of the following are major social welfare programs EXCEPT
A) Medicaid
B) Social Security
C) Medicare
D) The Earned Income Tax Credit
E) Temporary Assistance to Needy Families
17. All of the following are ideas to fix Social Security EXCEPT
A) Allow Congress to grant exemptions to allow people not to pay into Social Security.
B) Increase taxes to pay for the program.
C) Raise the retirement age.
D) Decrease benefits to retirees.
E) Privatize a portion of the program.
18. Compared to most Western democracies, the United States provides
A) an average amount of social welfare benefits.
B) relatively few social welfare benefits.
C) selective rather than universal social welfare payments.
D) overly generous social welfare benefits.
E) more cash transfers, but few in-kind transfers.
19. The poor are disadvantaged by regressive taxation, which
A) occurs in states with a sales tax.
B) does not occur in the United States.
C) results from the federal income tax.
D) results from low welfare payments.
E) requires income withholding even though the wage earner will owe little or no tax in the end.
20. All of the following are true about health care in America EXCEPT?
A) Americans are the healthiest people in the world.
B) By the mid-1990s, Americans had spent over $1 trillion a year on health care.
C) The United States spends a higher proportion of its wealth on health care than any other country.
D) Informally, health care is rationed in the U.S.
E) Much of the money Americans pay for health care goes to services like organ transplants, kidney dialysis, and other treatments that are not widely available outside the United States.
21. Which of the following is a reason that American health care expenses are so high?
A) Doctors practice “offensive medicine” to avoid medical liability.
B) High-tech care is available for previously untreatable conditions.
C) Americans have longer hospital stays.
D) Americans visit the doctor more often.
E) HMO’s can deny coverage for some people.
22. Access to health insurance in the United States is strongly related to
A) race and income.
B) gender and income.
C) race and gender.
D) gender and geographic location.
E) race and geographic location.
23. A special interest group such AARP would probably have the greatest success in lobbying a legislator regarding a particular health care issue that
A) was very controversial.
B) the legislator needed specific information about, that the group could give them.
C) were supported by a majority of the U.S. population.
D) had been opposed by the president of a different political party.
E) would be covered extensively by the media.
24. The National Institutes of Health
A) provides funds for medical research in the United States.
B) is the largest hospital and physicians’ interest group in the United States.
C) administers the national health insurance system in the United States.
D) administers the Medicare and Medicaid programs.
E) is the federal agency that regulates private health insurance companies.
25. Medicare was adopted in 1965 to provide government health insurance to
A) the elderly.
B) veterans.
C) government employees.
D) the poor.
E) children living in poverty.
26. All of the following are true about Medicaid EXCEPT?
A) States have cut Medicaid coverage in recent years.
B) it is a means-tested program.
C) It provides health care for all poor Americans.
D) The costs of Medicaid are increasing rapidly.
E) It is funded by both the states and national government.
27. Business groups are becoming increasingly active in health care policymaking because
A) healthy employees are more profitable to businesses.
B) private employers often pay the insurance premiums for their employees.
C) businesses are run primarily by elderly Americans who have a vested interests in health care.
D) businesses contribute the most taxes that pay for Medicare and Medicaid.
E) Financial problems have made them unable to afford tax breaks for health care.
28. Which aspect of health care costs has increased the fastest?
A) prenatal care
B) treatment for drug and alcohol abuse
C) prescription drugs
D) emergency room care
E) out-patient surgery
29. The primary focus of President Clinton’s Health Security Act was
A) providing health care for all Americans.
B) the elderly.
C) fraud on the part of insurance companies.
D) rationing and access.
E) the establishment of national health insurance.
30. Why does Bill Clinton’s proposed Health Security Act fail?
A) Hillary Clinton was too experienced in health care and Republicans disliked her.
B) The health insurance industry ad campaign helped turned public opinion against the plan.
C) The federal government would have paid for the entire program as it was seen as cost prohibitive.
D) It would have required personal taxes to triple in order to pay for it.
E) The Republican majority in Congress stopped the plan since it reduced benefits to the poor.
31. Oregon started rationing health care provided under Medicaid by
A) moving toward greater high-tech breakthroughs in medicine.
B) distributing Medicare patients to a greater number of physicians.
C) requiring Medicaid recipients to stop bearing children in order to receive free health coverage for their present families.
D) giving everyone a certain number of health care “credits,” which they can spend annually as they see fit.
E) deciding not to pay for some costly treatments in order to provide medical care to more people.
32. The enforcement of the Clean Air Act and other anti-pollution legislation is administered by what regulatory body?
A) Occupational Safety and Health Administration
B) Department of Justice
C) Federal Pollution Board
D) Department of Interior
E) Environmental Protection Agency
33. The Water Pollution Control Act of 1972
A) empowered the Department of Interior with enforcing tough anti-pollution laws on industries near national forests or national parks.
B) required permits from the EPA to allow waste products to be dumped into water.
C) banned the use of non-recyclable plastic bottles.
D) never passed Congress due to economic concerns about its effect.
E) helped create the foundation for Superfund legislation.
34. The Department of Transportation successfully accomplished all of the following through regulation EXCEPT
A) elimination and acid rain
B) increased the percentage of small cars on the road
C) use of unleaded gasoline
D) lower gas consumption/higher fuel efficiency standards
E) reduced carbon emissions from cars
35. Auto companies have been partially successful in their efforts to delay implementation of
A) mandatory air bag requirements.
B) auto safety legislation.
C) clean air standards.
D) oil price deregulation.
E) the National Environmental Policy Act.
36. The Endangered Specie Act of 1973, as originally passed, required that the government
A) merely acknowledge that some species were likely to go extinct.
B) actively protect each of the hundreds of species listed as endangered, regardless of the economic effect on the surrounding region.
C) actively protect each of the hundreds of species listed as endangered unless that protection would cause severe economic ham to the local region.
D) choose which species were significant enough to protect from extinction, while others would be allowed to die off.
E) create wilderness preservation areas to protect groups of more than 20 species living in similar areas.
37. All of the following are true about Superfund EXCEPT
A) Taxes on chemical products are used to pay for it.
B) Its costs represent the fastest growing segment of the nation’s environmental budget.
C) It was created by Congress in part to respond to the Love Canal disaster in New York state.
D) It has successfully located and isolated the country’s toxic waste dumpsites and has completely cleaned more than half of those sites.
E) It is administered by the EPA.
38. After more than a decade of political delays, President Bush in 2002 signed off on Congressional legislation choosing Yucca Flats, Nevada as the
A) new office location of the EPA.
B) site for the destruction of nuclear waste.
C) site for the long-term storage of nuclear waste.
D) only remaining pristine wilderness in the United States.
E) official location of the Superfund.
39. An estimated 90 percent of the energy resources of the United States is in
A) oil reserves.
B) natural gas reserves.
C) water.
D) coal deposits.
E) uranium deposits.
40. Global warming refers to
A) the spread of nuclear power throughout the world.
B) the expectation that the Earth’s atmosphere is becoming warmer due to the decreasing size of ice masses in Antarctica.
C) the melting of the polar ice caps.
D) the expectation that the world will share a common weather pattern by the year 2010.
E) the expectation that the Earth’s atmosphere is becoming warmer due to high levels of carbon monoxide production.
41. At the end of 1997, 150 nations met in Kyoto, Japan, and agreed in principle to
A) offer tax incentives for reducing carbon monoxide production.
B) stop using nuclear energy.
C) reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases below 1990 levels by about 2010.
D) stop producing carbon monoxide.
E) increase their reliance on renewable resources by 200 percent of their 1990 levels.
42. Diplomacy refers to
A) a recent philosophy regarding world relations.
B) formal and informal communications with representatives of other governments.
C) multi-sided arms negotiations.
D) regulation of international travel.
E) the exchange of military officials between countries.
43. Member countries of the United Nations agree to
A) elect their leaders through the democratic process.
B) limit the organization’s activities to a peacekeeping function, and not involve themselves in economic development or health, education, and welfare concerns.
C) renounce war and respect certain human and economic freedoms.
D) adopt capitalist economic systems.
E) adopt the United States Constitution as their model for self-government.
44. What part of the United Nations holds the most real power?
A) General Assembly
B) Secretary General
C) Secretariat
D) Security Council
E) Foreign Relations Committee
45. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization is an example of a
A) global organization for military purposes.