The Beveridge strait-jacket: Policy formation and the problem of poverty in old age
Titel:
The Beveridge strait-jacket: Policy formation and the problem of poverty in old age
Auteur:
Fawcett, Helen
Verschenen in:
Contemporary British history
Paginering:
Jaargang 10 (1996) nr. 1 pagina's 20-42
Jaar:
1996
Inhoud:
In the late 1950s, the Labour Party devised a radical plan to reform the British welfare state. The policy document, National Superannuation: Labour's Policy for Security in Old Age, aimed to move away from the flat-rate universalism of the Beveridge model of income maintenance and to institute an earnings-related system of contributions and benefits. In comparative perspective, the development was of great significance since many European countries were developing comparable schemes in the 1950s. However, the Labour Party failed to implement any structural reforms until 1975 when it launched the State Earnings Related Pension Scheme which was substantially less radical than the original proposals. This article argues that the feedback effects generated by the Beveridge model itself were a powerful barrier to long-term change. By creating short-term pressures for increases in the basic retirement pension, and causing, through the very inadequacy of that pension, the growth of a powerful private sector policy 'lock-in' effects developed, and it became progressively more difficult to reform the system..
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