The Divided Welfare State: The Battle over Public and Private Social Benefits in the United States

The Divided Welfare State: The Battle over Public and Private Social Benefits in the United States. By Jacob S. Hacker. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. xvi + 447 pp. Tables, figures, appendix, notes, index. Cloth, $55.00; paper, $23.00. ISBN: cloth 0-521-81288-7; paper 0-521-01328-3.

Jacob Hacker's account of The Divided Welfare State fundamentally changes our view of social provision in three ways. First, he challenges the assumption that the United States is a "welfare laggard," instead arguing that the United States has committed a share of its gross domestic product to social welfare that is comparable to that of other Western nations. Second, he stands the periodization of the history of American social welfare on its head, shifting our focus from the heroic changes of the 1930s and 1960s to the slow but steady accumulation of tax-law revisions that created the private welfare state during the twentieth century. Third, he raises the possibility that the unique mixture of public and private provision that characterizes American social welfare may lead to a political reality that will permanently produce a stalemate-a state of affairs that no one seems to like, that is inefficient, and that is impossible to change.

The core of Hacker's argument is that big business has played a unique role in the development of the American welfare state. Rather than simply resisting initiatives to expand government programs, business took an active role in...