Working for Benefits: Rational Choice and the Rise of Work—Welfare Programmes
| Author | Desmond S. King,Hugh Ward |
| DOI | 10.1111/j.1467-9248.1992.tb00704.x |
| Date | 01 September 1992 |
| Published date | 01 September 1992 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Political
Studies
(1992).
XL.
479-495
Working for Benefits: Rational Choice and
the Rise of Work-Welfare Programmes
DESMOND
S.
KING
St
John’s
College,
Oxford
and
HUGH
WARD*
University
of
Esse.u
This paper develops a rational-choice explanation for the adoption ofdeterrent work-
welfare programmes by recent governments in Britain and the
US.
Such programmes
require the recipients of welfare
or
unemployment benefits
to
participate in a training
programme
or
work activity in exchange for receiving their benefits and reflect a New
Right (in contrast to a social democratic) conception
of
social citizenship. Govern-
ments design such policies
to
generate a partial separating equilibrium under which
some claimants identified by the state as undeserving are discouraged from seeking
benefits. These programmes are intended to overcome problems of free-riding and
false claiming viewed. by the New Right. as inherent in state-administered benefit
systems.
The last decade has witnessed a shift to ‘work-welfare’ programmes in a number
of advanced industrial democracies, notably the US and Britain, though they are
not the only practitioners. Under these programmes the recipients of welfare
or
unemployment benefits are required to undertake a work or training activity. It is
a condition of receipt
of
the benefit that this exchange be agreed and the activity
discharged. These programmes are not identical across countries but their aims
are similar. In specification such programmes can reflect a policy either of
deterrence (the purpose being
to
extract an exchange from the recipient to deter
their application for benefits)
or
assistance (the purpose being to assist the
recipient acquire skills or competences necessary to enter the labour market).
Examples of the former are found in several
US
states under the Community
Work Experience Program; the tatter is exemplified by Swedish policies.’ Such
programmes reflect the integration of employment and welfare policy during the
last decade. Our interest is with the former sort.
In the first section we describe the adoption of these programmes in the
US
and
Britain and then relate them to alternative conceptions of social citizenship. The
*
The authors are grateful for comments and criticisms of this paper received from participants at
the Rational Choice group and the Nuffield College Democratic Theory seminar and from Jack
Hayward, Mark Wickham-Jones and two anonymous reviewers.
A
caveat is that the difference in the institutional structure
of
the welfare state in these countries
will influence any work-welfare programmes adopted.
0032-32 17/92/03/0479-17
0
1992
Political
Studies
’
third section is taken up by
a
discussion of the possible incentive structure
underpinning this public policy development. We argue that governments design
such policies to generate a partial separating equilibrium under which some
claimants identified by the state as undeserving are discouraged from seeking
benefits. These programmes are intended to overcome problems of free-riding
and false claiming viewed, by the New Right, as inherent
in
state-administered
benefit systems.
The
Growth
of Work-Welfare Programmes in the
US
and Britain
United
States
In the
US
Title
I1
of
the Family Support Act of 1988, the JOBS programme,
amended Title
IV
of the Social Security Act of 1935 by making the receipt of
welfare benefits conditional upon the discharge of a work
or
training
requirement.’ Each state was required to draft and enact (with the approval
of
the federal government) a law implementing Title
11,
the
Jobs
Opportunities and
Basic Skills Training Program,j operative from October 1990. The 1988 Act
includes details about ‘participation rates’. the percentage of welfare recipients
who must participate in the work-welfare programmes, specified for the next five
years at an ascending rate:
7
per cent in fiscal year (FY) 1990 and FY 1991
;
1
1
per
cent in FY 1992;
15
per cent in FY 1994; and 20 per cent in FY 1995. Under
federal regulations, to satisfy these participation requirements the states will be
compelled to force participants to engage in unproductive work, limit the states’
ability to give volunteer participants first consideration and limit child care
provi~ion.~ This mandatory clause (and its specifications) was included in the
Family Support Act against the protests of the National Governors’ Association,
the Bill’s key interest-group advocate, and many members of the Congress, and
at the insistence of the Reagan White House.
Each state’s JOBS programme must offer the following
service^:^
1
where necessary educational activities to provide high school graduation
literacy equivalent and English as a second language (this clause can include
post-secondary education);
2
job skills training;
3
job readiness programmes;
4
job development and placement services;
5
child care and transportation support services.
*
For
details see
D.
S.
King, ‘Citizenship as obligation in the United States: Title
11
of the Family
Support Act
of
1988’.
in M. Moran and
U.
Vogel (eds),
The Frontiers
of
Citizenship
(London,
Macmillan,
1991).
There were a number of measures introduced before
1988
empowering the states
to impose such conditions upon welfare recipients but their implementation was optional.
’
Almost half of the states had implemented their own work-welfare programmes after
1981,
when the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act empowered such programmes. These state
programmes range on
a
continuum from liberal (in which participation is voluntary, such as
Massachusetts)
to
punitive (in which participation is mandatory and the range
of
activities available
is
limited, such as West Virginia and California).
See
54
Federul Regisrer
156,
pp.
38-95.
See Family Support Act
1988
(Public Law
100-485).
Title
11,
s.
482.
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