Regulating the Lives of Women: Social Welfare Policy from Colonial Times to the Present (Revised Edition) / Edition 1

by Mimi Abramovitz

Overview

This important book looks at the changes in AFDC, Social Security, and Unemployment Insurance, and welfare "reform." This new edition reveals how welfare policy scapegoats women more than ever to justify widespread retrenchment and to divert the public's attention from the real causes of the nation's mounting economic woes.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780896085510
Publisher:	South End Press
Publication date:	07/01/1999
Series:	Women's Studies
Edition description:	REV
Pages:	428
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.80(d)

Editorial Reviews

This critical historical analysis of U.S. social welfare policy argues that the ``feminization of poverty'' is not a recent development but dates back to colonial times. Abramovitz (social work, Hunter) demonstrates how rules and regulations of social welfare programs have been ideologically based, related to the assignment of homemaking and childcare responsibilities to women. She examines this policy, which has served women poorly, and its relationship to key programs: Social Security, AFDC, unemployment insurance. Ambitious and well researched, despite reliance on sweeping historical overview; of wide interest. Marie Marmo Mullaney, Caldwell Coll., N.J.

Library Journal