Public Policy & American Democracy
1 Domestic Policy
Solomon answered: “You have shown great kindness to your servant, David my father,
because he walked before you with fidelity, justice, and an upright heart; and you have
continued this great kindness toward him today, giving him a son to sit upon his throne.
Now, Lord, my God, you have made me, your servant, king to succeed David my father;
but I am a mere youth, not knowing at all how to act—I, your servant, among the people
you have chosen, a people so vast that it cannot be numbered or counted. Give your
servant, therefore, a listening heart to judge your people and to distinguish between
good and evil. For who is able to give judgment for this vast people of yours?”
—1 Kings 3: 6-9
OBJECTIVES
01. Classify the types of public policies that the government may use.
02. Outline the process by which policies are formulated and implemented.
03. Explain the role and methods of carrying out social welfare policy.
04. Describe the origins and practices of Social Security.
05. Discuss the political approaches to policymaking.
SOURCES

Wilson, James Q., et al. American Government Institutions & Policies. 15th
ed. 2017. Chapter 17 “Domestic Policy”

Janda, Kenneth, et al. The Challenge of Democracy: American Government
in Global Politics. 13th ed. 2016. Chapter 18 “Policymaking and Domestic
Policy”
I. Policymaking Politics
A. Who governs, and to what ends?
1. Much of the study of government concerns who governs and by what
power, but having power is only the means to an end—what will they do
with the power?
2. All policies have costs (taxes, regulations, stigma, etc.) and benefits
(financial benefits like tax reductions or food security, social benefits like
class protection or increased prestige)
a. Weighing costs-versus-benefits is a perceived calculation more
than an actual one—is it better to spend on the military or on social
services? Economists refer to this as Ꮤ
b. If there a difference between the people that bear the costs and
receive the benefits, then people may question the legitimacy of the
program or the recipient.
B. Perceived costs and benefits can be widely distributed or narrowly
concentrated, meeting four possible classifications of politics:
1. Majoritarian politics: widely distributed benefits; Ꮤ
2. Client politics: concentrated benefits; widely distributed costs
3. Entrepreneurial Politics: widely distributed benefits; concentrated costs
4. Interest Group politics: concentrated benefits; concentrated costs
C. Types of Policies
1. Distributive policies: Government policies designed to confer a benefit
on a particular institution or group. These policies include pork-barrel
spending.
2. Redistributional policies: Policies that take government resources, such
as tax funds, from one sector of society and transfer them to another.
These policies emphasize Ꮤ
3. Regulation: Government intervention in the workings of a business
market to promote some socially desired goal. Americans disagree over
the extent to which markets should be regulated.
II. How policies are made
A. There are different ways to achieve public policy objectives
1. Incentives and disincentives as tax credits Ꮤ
2. Direct provision of services: Governments largest expenditures come
from direct payments to employees or vendors who implement programs.
3. Setting rules: what businesses or individuals can do in the marketplace.
B. Policymaking process has four stages
1. Agenda setting: The stage of the policymaking process during which
problems get defined Ꮤ
2. Policy formulation: The stage of the policymaking process during which
formal proposals are developed and adopted.
3. Implementation: The process of putting policies into action.
4. Policy evaluation: Analysis of a public policy so as to determine how
well it is working.
C. Fragmentation, Coordination, and Issue Networks
1. The separation of powers means that policy problems are worked out
by several government institutions. The fragmented approach to solving
policy means that different interest groups have influence on the process.
It also means there are several competing ways Ꮤ
2. In a pluralist system (many interested groups with several inputs into
the process) means that the working relationship between branches or
committees is important.
3. Issue networks—the shared-knowledge groups consisting of
representatives of various interests involved in public policy—plan an
important role in a pluralist system.
III. Social Welfare Policy
A. "promote the general welfare"
1. Social Welfare policy is based on the premise that society has an
obligation to meet the basic needs of its members. Social welfare
programs provide for the minimum living standards Ꮤ
2. Today’s social welfare policies and programs began with the New Deal
policies of the Great Depression, when Americans began to believe the
federal government had a permanent and major responsibility for welfare.
a. However, many believed social welfare was wrong because it
violated the individualistic creed that people should help
themselves unless they were physically unable to do so.
b. Americans still generally believe this today, but have broadened
their concepts of "unable" to go beyond physical characteristics.
3. Further changes to social welfare policy came in 1964 with Medicare
and Medicaid as part of LBJ's "Great Society" welfare program.
4. The US is generally considered (at least by Americans, if not by people
in other countries—W) to be a "Welfare State"—a nation where the
government assumes some or all responsibility for the welfare of the
people through public services and redistributing income.
5. Modern social welfare
a. Ronald Reagan’s reelection resulted in a reexamination of social
welfare policy; He shifted the focus from economic equality to
economic freedom, and from the federal government Ꮤ
b. The greatest expansion of welfare benefits happened under
George W. Bush with Medicare’s prescription medicine coverage.
c. Obama enacted the biggest welfare state reform since the New
Deal with the "Obamacare" Affordable Care Act.
d. It is too early (as of March 2017—W) to determine what Trump's
social welfare goals will be over the course of his term.
B. Today, there are two types of benefits that depend on the program
1. Means-tested benefits: Conditional benefits provided by government to
individuals whose income falls below a designated threshold. These types
of benefits exist to help the poor. Income based programs represent client
politics: a (relatively) few people benefit, Ꮤ
2. Non-means-tested benefits: Benefits are provided to all with no income
requirements. These types of benefits are generally designed to help the
elderly, no matter their wealth. Age requirement programs represent
majoritarian politics: nearly everyone benefits, nearly everyone pays.
C. Public assistance programs (government aid to individuals who can
demonstrate they need it)
1. Typical programs include old-age assistance for the needy elderly not
covered by old-age pension benefits, aid to needy families with dependent
children, Ꮤ
2. Until 1996, the federal government imposed national standards on state
programs, and distributed funds based on proportion of the state’s
population living in poverty.
a. Poverty level: The minimum cash income that will provide for a
family's basic needs; calculated as three times the cost of a market
basket of food that provides a minimally nutritious diet.
b. The poverty threshold is what the Census Bureau uses to
determine the number of people who live below the poverty line
3. Teen pregnancy and the increases in rates of divorce have put more
women into the head-of-household role—which tends to push women and
children into poverty. A growing percentage of poor Americans are women
or their dependents. The feminization of poverty has been hard to fix.
D. Carrying out policies
1. Americans have insisted that the states play a large role in running
social welfare programs—the federal government could do anything in the
area of social policy, while federalism meant that any state so inclined
could experiment with welfare programs.
2. Nongovernmental organizations play a large role in administering Ꮤ
IV. Social Security
A. Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI) is the official name for
the Social Security program.
1. It is a social insurance program for people regardless of need. It is
financed by taxes on employers and employees.
2. It is an "entitlement program", providing benefits to which every eligible
person has a legal right and that the government cannot deny. Other
entitlement programs include:
a. Workers’ compensation: Social insurance to compensate
workers who lost income Ꮤ
b Medicare: A national social insurance program, administered by
the U.S. federal government since 1966, which provides health
insurance for Americans aged 65 and older who have worked and
paid into the system, as well as to younger people with disabilities
and certain illnesses.
3. Social insurance programs began in Europe after WWI; in the USA, the
elderly and unemployed were helped by private organizations and
individuals until Great Depression.
4. The Social Security Act 1935 provided for Social Security.
a. Social insurance – old-age, surviving spouse, unemployment
b. Financial assistance – needy, blind and disabled
c. Health and welfare services – for disabled children, orphans and
vocational rehabilitation for disabled
B. How Social Security Works
1. Revenue fund administered by Social Security Administration
2. It is a “pay-as-you-go” system, not a savings program. While workers'
contributions are recorded, they are not saved—the Social Security
Administration immediately redistributes funds to current recipients.
a. Universal participation essential and required. Ꮤ
b. In 1955: nearly 9 workers for each beneficiary; today, there are
less than 3 workers for every beneficiary.
c. Birthrates, mortality rates, unemployment rates, and the
economy affect the program.
3. The amount of the payout from Social Security varies based on the
amount you contribute and the age you begin withdrawing benefits. Payouts are to be a supplement to retirement savings, not the entire amount.
4. Because inflation constantly raises the cost of living Congress
established cost-of-living adjustments (COLAs) for Social Security in 1972,
tied to the Consumer Price Index—a way of measuring inflation.
C. Social Security Reform
1. Future of Social Security is a concern. Since 2010, Social Security tax
revenues are no longer sufficient Ꮤ
2. Attempts to reform Social Security tend to fail due to tough choices
involved—most plans either reduce the amount of benefits paid to retirees
or to raise the age at which people are eligible to receive payments.
3. Republicans often advocate privatization—allowing people to invest
money in the stock market rather than pay into OASDI plans. During most
economic periods, that would increase earnings for people, but it also
makes people subject to risk that Social Security does not provide.
V. The politics of policy
A. Antitrust Laws: Majoritarian Politics
1. For the first 125 years of American History, the government was not
very active in regulating business.
2. By the turn of the 20th Century, a strong populist movement
encouraged the government to be active in regulating business. There
was a strong feeling that businesses had become too strong and were
limiting competition—Ꮤ
3. Much of the anti-trust legislation of the Populist era (and its middle-class
cousin, the Progressive era—W) such as the Sherman Act (1890), the
Federal Trade Commission Act (1914) and the Clayton Act (1914) were
attempts at "trust-busting".
4. The trust-busting effort was strengthened by adding the Federal Trade
Commission. The FTC is a “watchdog” agency to investigate regulatory
violations and stop unfair business practices like price discrimination.
5. Modern anti-trust efforts are inconsistent and driven more by the
ideology of a presidential administration than by legal statue. Some
believe the very existence of large corporations is a threat to popular rule;
while others believe politics is a threat to the very existence of a market
economy and the values that they believe such an economy protects.
6. There is no well-organized opposition to the laws because they have
diffuse costs, and diffuse benefits because they affect people in general.
B. Labor and Occupational Health and Safety: Interest-Group Politics
1. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration was created in
1970 to give legal protection to laborers who worked in unsafe conditions.
a. It was started through strong lobbying on behalf of labor unions.
b. OSHA decisions were frequently challenged in courts—in part
because its broad mission Ꮤ
2. Like anti-trust protections, the strength of OSHA powers have changed
based on administration. Carter’s OSHA director was sympathetic to labor
unions, while Reagan’s de-regulation attitude lifted a number of rules.
3. Safety regulations provide benefits for one group (laborers) while
passing on the costs to a totally different group (employers).
C. Agriculture Subsidies: Client Politics
1. In the 1930s, dairy farmers suffered for fast declines in the price of milk,
and farmers faced crisis. The Department of Agriculture began issuing
“market orders” to prevent competition among farmers.
2. Consumers ended up paying more for milk than if the free market
operated laissez faire, but no one knows how much. Because the true cost
is unknown, Ꮤ
3. Agriculture subsidies are Client Politics: they provide benefits for a
small group (farmers), but pass on costs to taxpayers in general.
4. Client politics is also used in regulating licenses—cosmetologists claim
that they are licensed to protect public health, but they also serve to keep
people from easily becoming barbers, which protects hair stylist’s jobs
(and how many people have ever died from a bad haircut?—W).
D. Consumer Protection: Entrepreneurial Politics
1. In April 1987, a seven-year-old girl was killed by a lawn dart thrown by
one of her brothers' playmates in the backyard of their home in Riverside,
CA. Yard darts were about 1-foot long with a sharp metal point; families
played by throwing them towards a target.
a. In the previous eight years, 6,100 people had been sent to the
emergency room due to lawn darts in the USA. Out of that total,
81% were 15 or younger, and half of them were 10 or younger.
b. The girl's father began a crusade to get lawn darts banned,
claiming that there was no way to keep children from getting their
hands on lawn darts Ꮤ
c. Due in part to his lobbying, in 1988, the Consumer Product
Safety Commission outright banned the sale of lawn darts in the
US. The week the commission banned the product, an 11-year-old
girl in Tennessee was hit by a lawn dart and sent into a coma.
2. Policies like this are Entrepreneurial Politics, when an interested party
pursues a policy goal with narrow costs but widespread benefits. Other
examples include pollution limits, food safety laws, and banking rules.