I.When Heartfelt Passions Confront Political Reality: Now & Then

Chapter Seventeen Outline

I.When Heartfelt Passions Confront Political Reality: Now & Then

In the late 1880s, President Theodore Roosevelt tried to combat abuses of the environment in the name of industrial progress by proposing widespread conservation of national resources. He created game reserves and set aside 150 million acres of national forest, but his efforts to protect water resources were stopped by a Congress greatly influenced by business interests. Roosevelt moved his environmental agenda forward, but he was denied more comprehensive forms of reform.

America’s health care system had been an issue of growing national concern for decades. Spiraling costs and widespread complaints about limited access to care forced the issue to the forefront of the political agenda once again in 2009. President Barack Obama argued for universal coverage as well as the promise of a government insurance plan, known asthe “public option”, to compete with the corporate insurance sector to reduce costs. He soon met opposition not just from Republicans, but moderate Democrats. On December 24, 2009, the Senate passed a health care reform bill that lacked universal coverage and featured no public option. Still, the legislation amounted to a sweeping overhaul of the U.S. health care system aimed at mandating coverage and lowering costs.

Both cases illustrate that well-intentioned social policy strategies can be unrealistic in a system in which laws are difficult to pass due to separation of governmental powers, interest groups, and media scrutiny. Charles Lindblom said domestic policymaking was a “science of muddling through,” focusing on human nature, timing, and luck—an idea still relevant today. This opposed the widely accepted rational-comprehensive concept (rational decision makers using scientific analysis and logic) and the punctuated equilibrium theory (periods of stability broken by abrupt changes).

Social policy refers to the rules, regulations, and policies that affect the welfare of American citizens. It encompasses issues involving crime, health care, social security, the environment, and religious life.“Muddling through” with small steps remains the standard in the slow-moving American political system that is wary of sweeping change.

II. The Nature and Practice of Crime Policy

A. Democratic systems manage human relations by balancing public order with individual freedom through a criminal justice system.Herbert Packer in 1968 defined two broad models for criminal justice policy making. The crime control model focuses on controlling criminal behavior through “assembly line justice” as it moves cases quickly though the system. The due process model focuses on protecting individual rights through reliable information via an adversarial process.

The American criminal justice system acts as a battleground where these two models fight for dominance. Critics say that racial disparities and racial profiling are rampant (one study showed that murderers of white victims were four times more likely to get the death sentence than were murderers of African Americans). Defenders say that racial minorities do commit larger percentages of crimes, often due to economic disadvantages in our society.

Throughout American history, state and local governments created criminal justice policy, while in recent decades federal laws have been passed to deal with guns in schools, drugs, carjackings, and other criminal activities. However, at times the Supreme Court has reined in Congress and struck down some of these laws as unconstitutional.

III. The Welfare State

A. A welfare state is a social system in which the government takes responsibility for health care, employment, education, and retirement income, providing much more than just a safety net for its citizens. Welfare states provide universal services and balance between two economic systems—pure capitalism (means of production are the property of privately owned businesses) and socialism (means of production are the property of the community).

Early welfare states existed in the 1880s in Germany, by the early 1900s in Scandinavian countries, and later in other European nations. The U.S. resisted welfare policy until the Great Depression crippled the nation. FDR’s New Deal of the 1930s sought to rebuild it. Even the Social Security Act of 1935 was considered not a welfare program but a forced savings program.

Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society federal programs of the 1960s expanded the welfare state to include education, health care, and assistance to the poor. Still, the U.S. system is much less comprehensive than European systems due to the strong American work ethic.

IV. Policies and Programs for the Poor

A. Before the 1930s in the U.S., true welfare programswere run by churches and charitable organizations, and the federal government acted only in times of dire crisis. The Great Depression changed attitudes about welfare programs, including public jobs and emergency aid through the Works Progress Administration, the Federal Emergency Relief Administration, and Aid for Dependent Children (later Aid to Families with Dependent Children).

By the 1960s, the “war on poverty” meant the welfare state grew to encompass a federal food stamp program, medical clinics, legal services, and preschool programs such as Head Start, as well as Medicare (the federal program to provide health insurance for the elderly) and Medicaid (the federal program that provides limited health services for the poor).

Welfare reforms have been plagued by mismanagement, inadequate funding, and unawareness of programs or other lack of access. Critics considered them unfair benefits. In 1992, Bill Clinton promised to “end welfare as we know it,” and in 1996 signed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, which required recipients to seek work and limited benefits to five years.

V. The Social Security System

A. The Social Security system was created in 1935 as a self-sufficient national pension system in which workers (and employers) paid into a system, then would be distributed those funds at the time of retirement.

By the 1970s, high inflation and longer life spans strained the fund, and today’s funds are drawn from current workers’ paychecks. By 2025, when all baby boomers will qualify for Social Security, the system will be under considerable strain.Reform can be risky, because Social Security receives broad public support as not just another form of welfare, but a system that benefits all economic groups.

To support pensions, the government has encouraged retirement savings, such as tax-favored retirement plans including the following:

Individual Retirement Accounts (IRAs): Allow contributions up to $4,000 per year into a fund that is not taxed until it is withdrawn at age 59½.

Roth IRAs: Allow individuals to pay taxes on their current contributions, thus avoiding being taxed at the time of withdrawal

401(k) Plans: Act as tax-deferred vehicles for retirement, but allow workers to set aside potentially higher amounts, often matched by employers, not taxed at the outset

Keogh Plans: Allow self-employed workers to set up the equivalent of a 401K plan for themselves

D. In 2005, President Bush argued for the second time for a Social Security plan that partially privatized the system, with little support.

VI. Health Care Policy

A. Many European democracies have universal health care at government expense. The U.S. system has remained a privately operated activity based on insurance company benefits, with little government control. Several federal programs have been enacted, however, including health care for the elderly through Medicare (1965), a prescription drug program for seniors (2003), and federal laws regulating health maintenance organizations(HMOs) as a cost-cutting group insurance system. Most recently, legislation passed by Congress penalizes some citizens who do not obtain health insurance.

Significant criticisms of the health care system in the United Statesremain. Most of those who do have health insurance receive it through group plans offered by their employers, and the 2010 legislation does little to reverse that reality. Thus, when employees change jobs, their health insurance coverage is normally disrupted. Health insurance, in addition, is not the same as actual health care. Many continue to be hindered by a lack of access to primary care, with rural residents particularly disadvantaged.

VII. Other Policy Areas

Environmental Policy

A. Environmental policy was nonexistent in America until the early 1900s, when President Theodore Roosevelt’s administration preserved land and wildlife refuges and founded the National Forest Service (1905). But more than a half century passed before Congress created the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

B. It was not until the 1960s that several federal regulations took effect to combat potential environmental damage and pollution:

The Clean Water Act (1960) and Clean Air Act (1963) set environmental requirements for businesses.

The Federal Wilderness Act (1964) protected 650 million acres of federal land in forty-four states from logging, mining, drilling, and building.

The National Environmental Policy Act (1969) set restrictions on all federally funded projects.

The Environmental Protection Agency (1970) was created to coordinate and enforce these and all other environmental laws. In recent years, the EPA has increased its role in tightening standards and monitoring risks, despite political battles with the Bush administration and a considerably smaller budget than is granted other federal agencies.

Today, globalization—the increased economic interdependence of nations around the world—is seen by some as the promotion of a corporate business agenda with little regard for the world’s resources.

Education Policy

A. Public schools funded by state and local taxes gained momentum by the 1860s, and the public schools run by many states by the 1900s funded black and white school districts unequally.

B. Education policy has been created by the federal government through several bills and court rulings:

The Servicemen's Readjustment Act (1944), also called the G. I. Bill of Rights,marked the federal government’s initial involvement in funding public education.

Brown v. Board of Education (1954) declared that racially segregated schools were unconstitutional, leading to major education reform at the federal level. Fifteen years later, the courts were still enforcing this in some districts, and certain integration efforts (such as busing) were largely unworkable.

The Elementary and Secondary Education Act (1965) marked the first federal aid program for U.S. public schools, and recent amendments have required individualized education programs for students with disabilities.Since the 1960s, the federal government has funded about 7 percent of public education programs, while at times also restricting the states’ authority or ruling on their responsibilities.

The No Child Left Behind Act (2002) required mandatory testing of students to meet basic standards, though its merits continue to be hotly debated.

Energy Policy

The 1973 energy crisis made energy a popular topic of discussion in the United States. Though Americans constitute 5% of the world’s population, in most years they consume more than a quarter of the world’s energy.

Though Congress has passed numerous energy policy acts aimed at conservation and the further development of renewable energy sources, the U.S. continues to lack a comprehensive long-term energy policy.

While gasoline supply problems during the past decade have spurred calls for expanding U.S. refining capacity and transport systems for oil, national and local environmental regulations, along with local community sentiment, have created significant obstacles for policymakers hoping to implement such policies.

Critics of American energy policy often cite America’s dependence on foreign oil as the most troubling problem of all. It is no wonder then that so many politicians continue to press for America to fund the development of domestic petroleum sources in Alaska and elsewhere. The momentum for such development was at least temporarily halted by the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

Immigration Policy

The United States has long prided itself as a “nation of immigrants.” Even after the federal government began to place significant restrictions on immigration, the United States continues to accept more immigrants as permanent residents each year than all other countries in the world combined.

Currently the foreign-born share of the U.S. population is approximately 10 percent, with the vast majority of recent immigrants (8 in 10) hailing from countries in Latin American and Asia.

While the diversity of the American people has contributed to America’s strength, the assimilation of so many foreign natives into the citizenry has not been free of controversy. When specific ethnic populations emigrate in large waves, they are often subject to discrimination; language barriers contribute further to the difficulties many immigrants face. Many legal immigrants have to wait years for applications to be processed.

The ranks of illegal immigrants began to swell in the 1970s. Since the 1990’s the number of illegal immigrants has outpaced the number of legal immigrants, causing public officials to wonder whether federal immigration policies are broken. Undocumented aliens create numerous problems for authorities.

Major and lasting immigration reforms are more likely to come from the federal government than from the individual states. In 2009, the Obama administration signaled its willingness to consider proposals to strengthen border controls and crack down on employers hiring illegal aliens, among others.

VIII.Now & Then: Making the Connection

U.S. social policy is rarely created without controversy. Some believe that it is the responsibility of government to spread riches to all in need. Others believe that capitalism and a free market should prevail, and that individuals are responsible for themselves, their actions, and ultimately their fates. The nation has historically relied on churches and nonprofit organizations to provide social services. But by the 1930s the federal government was launching social welfare programs and by the 1960s it was expanding these significantly, along with education and environmental policies.

Theodore Roosevelt’s attempt to establish landmark environmental conservation policy met with resistance in Congress. Barack Obama entered office in 2009 with hopes of passing comprehensive health care reform featuring universal coverage and a government-run public option. His administration did manage to transform the system in significant ways; yet universal coverage and a “public option” were nowhere to be found in the final bills. Roosevelt and Obama, even with a generally supportive Congress on their respective sides, had to scale back their goals or risk achieving nothing at all.

XI.Chapter Summary

Social policy encompasses the rules, regulations, and policy making that affects U.S. citizens’ quality of life and welfare as related to crime, health care, social security, and environmental policy. Democracies need to strike a balance between the need for public order through law enforcement and the need for individual freedom and mobility.

The nature and practice of crime policy

Democratic governments must strike a delicate balance between maintaining public order and protecting individual freedom. Especially severe and strict forms of law enforcement would make citizens safe, but with a very high cost to taxpayers and possibly some loss of individual freedom as well.

Though criminal justice policy making has been an area of law reserved primarily to state governments, the federal government has more recently become more proactive in legislating such areas as gun control, drug-trafficking, and carjacking.

The welfare state

A. The welfare state is a social system in which the government is responsible for health care, employment, education, and retirement income while balancing between pure capitalism and socialism.

Though many European countries embraced welfare systems, the U.S. resisted this intervention until the 1930s New Deal programs, and their expansion in the 1960s through widespread initiatives such as Medicare and Medicaid.

Policies and Programs for the Poor

President Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society programs of the mid-1960s further advanced welfare programs in the United States, introducing such programs as Medicare and Medicaid.

The Social Security System

A.Social Security is a retirement benefit program for members of the U.S. workforce. Though it has provided retirement income for millions of retirees since 1935, many economists predict that by about year 2030 the system will pay out significantly more than it brings in.

B.A number of proposals to privatize Social Security have been suggested; however, to date the U.S. Congress has enacted no major policy changes, and the crisis on Wall Street in September 2008 put off all discussion of privatization for the time being.

C.The U.S. government encourages private retirement investing through tax-free investment vehicles such as IRAs, Keoghs, and 401(k) plans.

Health Care Policy

Health care policy in America falls drastically short of the universal health care found in other democracies and is characterized by limited access and high costs. Today about one in seven Americans under age sixty-five have no health insurance.

Criticisms of the U.S. system focus on limitations on access and excessively high costs. The 2010 federal legislation addressed various inequities in the insurance industry, but did not address these access-to-care issues.

Other Policy Areas

Environmental policy was crafted piecemeal beginning in the 1960s; the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is the principal agency responsible for administering the Clean Air Act and other federal programs.

Education has traditionally been a state and local responsibility. LBJ’s Great Society of the 1960s included programs to assist disadvantaged preschool children and programs offering federal aid for public education and low-cost student loans for college.

The United States has no comprehensive energy policy; public officials worry that with America’s continued dependence on foreign oil, the nation will continue to experience supply disruptions and price volatility.
Despite the pride Americans take in their country’s position as a “nation of immigrants,” the political system has struggled in its efforts to address the illegal immigrant problem, as well as issues of assimilation and discrimination.