Social security in the United States.

  • United States Social Security Administration
Date:
1957
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Social security in the United States. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    ONE The Background i Our Program SINCE 1935, social security programs have built up basic protection for most families in the United States against social risks that very few can be sure of meeting wholly through their own efforts—the risks of loss or lack of income when the breadwinner is out of a job, is old or has to retire pre- maturely because of total disability, or dies leaving others who depended on him for support. These are social risks that have increased as countries become industrialized and their pple increasingly depend on money income for their livelihood. Social insurance is helping or starids ready to help millions of families to keep their financial independence when earnings are interrupted or cease. For those who cannot qualify for insurance benefits or who have special needs not covered by social insurance, the public assistance programs provide resources related to individual need. Still other programs provide special services to individuals, such as serv- ices for child health and welfare. This pamphlet is focused on programs under the Social Security Act. Two are insurance programs—old-age and survivors insurance, which now also provides protection against severe and long-lasting disability after age 50, and unemployment insurance. Another is public assistance to needy persons—the aged, the blind, those who are permanently and totally dis- abled, and children who lack parental care and support. A fourth program provides services for maternal and child ae and crippled children, and child welfare services. Because many people receive similar eas: or aid under other public programs, the related programs are discussed briefly in later chapters. In numbers of people who are or will be protected against social and economic risks, however, the programs under the Social Security Act are by far the most important. — The social security programs are part both of a larger public program of social welfare and of the whole scope of private and individual action to achieve security and the basis for a good: life for all. It is not possible to discuss.in this pamphlet our public health programs, with their achieve- ments in general community sanitation and health and their efforts to pre- vent or wipe out such diseases as tuberculosis or to limit the disabling effects of heart disease or other chronic conditions. Nor can this discussion deal with the special problems of institutional care or vocational rehabilitation or many other related public programs. In varying degrees, each of the social security programs with which we are directly concerned is supple- mented by privately organized benefit programs, and by private charitable activities as well as by all the measures for security that families take in- dividually. While these related measures cannot be described here, it will be evident that their existence has helped mold the social security programs and that these programs can only be understood in relation to the larger picture.