NEW DUAL FEDERALISM
9
programs that have been devolved or centralized to see if they differ before and after shifts
along the government hierarchy.
As functional federalism predicts, program movement up the government hierarchy
generally raises overall generosity by increasing average benefit levels and recipient
coverage. When the Social Security Act of 1935 (SSA) authorized the national government to
assume a share of the burden for dependent children in 1935, the majority of participating
states rapidly increased their average grants per family from the levels provided under the
heavily localized, pre-1935 mothers pension programs.
8
The SSA created a new federal-state
Aid to Dependent Children (ADC)
9
program that promoted greater generosity by requiring
participating states to provide statewide coverage, eliminating waiting lists, and encouraging
many states either to increase or eliminate legal caps on benefit levels.
10
This expansion of
generosity occurred despite ADC’s relatively low levels of federal reimbursement,
11
lack of
national standards for benefit levels,
12
and generally permissive regulations.
13
In addition to dependent children, the Social Security Act also introduced federal-state
matching for aid to the elderly and blind poor. Forty years later, Congress boosted those
categorical programs up the federal ladder.
14
The Social Security Act amendments of 1972
consolidated and centralized the previous matching programs for the aged, blind, and disabled
into a new, nationally controlled program, Supplemental Security Income (SSI), with uniform,
8
See table on p. 244, Abbott (1938).
9
Initially, the program provided support only for children in eligible families. In 1950, Congress
added a grant for the parent/caretaker and subsequently changed the program’s name to Aid to
Families with Dependent Children (AFDC).
10
The mothers’ pension programs had operated typically on a county-by-county basis. Many used
waiting lists. Several states capped the amount that counties could offer. See Abbott (1938), pp. 242-
245.
11
In the Old Age Assistance and Aid to the Blind Programs, the federal government reimbursed states
for one-half of payments made, up to $30 per month per eligible recipient in 1935. This amounted to a
maximum federal payment of $15 per month. By contrast, in the ADC program, the federal
government reimbursed states for one-third of payments up to $18 for the first child and up to $12 for
each additional child in an eligible family. This amounted to a maximum federal grant of $10 for a
family with two children. The legislation assumed that states and localities would pick up the other
two-thirds of ADC costs. See "Public Assistance: Major Changes, 1935-64."
12
Congress rejected efforts by the Children’s Bureau to include in the final legislation a requirement
that states provide "assistance at least great enough to provide, when added to the income of the
family, a reasonable subsistence compatible with decency and health." (Quoted in Abbott (1938), p.
240.) Indeed, although social workers welcomed the post-1935 increases, they continuously
emphasized the overall inadequacy of the benefit levels. As Abbott observed (p. 245), "These are, of
course, entirely inadequate grants even from an emergency-relief standpoint and can give only
starvation security to children."
13
States were not required to participate in ADC and were allowed to set their own benefit levels and
establish their own eligibility criteria.
14
The Nixon Administration had proposed centralization of all of the categorical programs, including
AFDC, into a negative income tax. That grand plan failed in Congress, with SSI as the consolation
prize.
Convention