Social Security Act Essay

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The New Deal and the Great Depression: The Social Security Act.

Primary Sources
Landon, Alf, History Maters: The U.S. Survey on the Web, I Will Not Promise the Moon”: Alf Landon Opposes the Social Security Act, 1936 by Alf Landon, (October 15, 1936), Accessed January 16th, 2014, http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/8128/
As Governor of Kansas, the author was best known for balancing the budget and reducing taxes. On a national level, Landon was known for his opposition to the Social security Act of 1935, but perhaps best known for losing the election of 1936 to Franklin Delano Roosevelt in a landslide victory. Landon explains, in this source, his doubts about the Social Security Act and offers several examples of its potential harmful effects. …show more content…

This filmed document describes briefly that The Social Security Act’s primary function was to relieve financial stress for older-aged generations. Although the Act was geared mostly towards retirement for the elderly, it also provided relief for most struggling lower-class Americans who were in need of financial stability. The Security Act of 1935, along with this film clip, was hope and salvation to current and future generations that they would be cared for and represented in times of financial burden or …show more content…

The author describes FDR’s positive and progressive intentions in forming the Social Security Act. Old age pensions are covered in detail and described as extremely successful to this day and just as controversial as it was when it was first implemented.

Rose, Nancy E., Social Service Review 63.1, Work Relief in the 1930s and the Origins of the Social Security Act, (Mar 1, 1989), http://search.proquest.com.ezproxy.snhu.edu/pao/docview/1290931445
The author, professor and chair of economics at California State University, San Bernardino, has authored several books on the Great Depression and the New Deal and has been writing for the Monthly Review Press for over six-teen years. In this journal entry addressed to her peers and other economists, she examines the Social Security Act’s absent proposals such as Employment Assurance and other work relief programs, none of which made it to the Social Security Act. The journal covers the work relief programs of the 1930s and determines that they can provide suggestions for progressive alternatives to current proposals of today, which could help regain control of the welfare reform

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