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The United States is one of the few developed nations without a system of family allowances. Many social insurance theoreticians and welfare economists propose a system of family allowances under the OASDHI program to help meet the hard-core poverty problem in the United States. This paper analyzes empirically the desirability and limitations of family allowances in reducing poverty. The central thrust of the paper is devoted to the proposition that a system of family allowances is a costly and inefficient technique for reducing the remaining hard-core poverty in the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In August 1965, the Home Office of Great Britain presented Parliament with a White Paper or provisional government proposal implementing its promise to make more effective the means of sustaining the family and of preventing and treating delinquency. The paper deals with "children and young persons in need of care, protection, and control." Two separate sets of proposals are involved: one affecting children below sixteen and the other, those between sixteen and twenty-one. In each, the government has suggested reforms in the judicial structure and procedures. The present responsibilities of the juvenile and adult courts are so be assumed by a combination of family councils, family courts, and young offenders' courts. In addition, major organizational changes have been recommended in the correctional system of remand and observation centers and borstal and approved schools. The proposals in the White Paper are part of a larger series of reforms planned for the family services generally.

Current public assistance programs are characterized by numerous defects, which include exclusion of large numbers of poor persons, inadequate benefits, stringent eligibility requirements, financing and needs test defects, administrative defects, and inadequate social services and research. In addition, the current welfare crisis centers around the AFDC program because of the expanding welfare rolls, disincentive effects, harassment of AFDC mothers, and numerous defects in the AFDC-UP and WIN programs. A new Family Assistance Plan (FAP) would be created to solve the above problems. Under the plan, a four member family with children would be guaranteed $1,600 annually plus other benefits. Although the plan has some desirable features, the defects of the FAP proposal far outweigh the advantages. The central thrust of this paper is that the FAP proposal in its present form will actually worsen the financial position of many poor persons, and that the present welfare crisis will not disappear once the plan is enacted into law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses some of the adjustments that parents without partners must make in their social, dating, and love relationships, as revealed in seminar groups conducted by Family Service of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Problems encountered include unrealistic expectations of others, stereotypes of the opposite sex, and confusion about and fear of promiscuity as opposed to sexual relations in deep, enduring love relationships. Also discussed are how to regain one's emotional freedom, to plan for remarriage and to live a full life If one remains single. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Family Service of New Haven participated with other Connecticut agencies in a five year pilot project to develop co-operative care for the mental patient and his family during and after hospitalization. Topics discussed in this paper include the development of workable procedures, difficulties in treatment and procedure, staff orientation and response to the lower-class psychotic patient and his treatment expectations, and the need for continuity of care. The authors conclude that there would have been a more secure base for agency practice in a neighborhood-based, supportive-empathic casework approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since income-maintenance is widely conceded to be the heart of the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program, much attention has focused on the administration of the budget. How is the budget for a family established, and how may it be modified? How often is it changed and under what circumstances? How much caseworker-client interaction is there in the area of budget, and how much friction over the allocation and expenditure of funds? Basing their conclusions on survey data collected from Wisconsin AFDC recipients in six counties, the authors find that budget levels do not fluctuate much, and there is little caseworker intervention in client spending. On the other hand, clients take little advantage of the flexible features for supplementing their budgets, such as Special Needs items, and attempt to get by on their basic monthly checks. If the budget is not a subject of controversy between caseworker and client, or of control over the client by the caseworker, it is due in large part to the lack of discussion between them. Despite paper provisions for extra needs and elaborate provisions for treating earned income of family members, most women operate on budgets that are static, unresponsive, and, at best, minimal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the role of public health to promote family planning in the U.S. In 1965, the Office of Economic Opportunity have made domestic grants in family planning wherein the Children's Bureau were then given the authority after two years. By 1970, legislation have been implemented which made all components and methods of family planning available to the public to include abortion and sterilization. The possible costs of complete family planning services for the population was also taken into account.

The article presents information on the role of short term training in family planning. The University of the West Indies has been very deeply involved in family planning at the research, training, and operational levels in various departments of the University the Medical Department, Social Welfare Department, and so on. The Department of Extramural Studies has a broad programme of social welfare training, which includes short-term courses, consultation courses at various levels, and subjects to meet the, particular needs of the moment.

The article discusses the future trends of social services in meeting the needs of children and families. A few years ago any forecast of how to meet the needs of children and families would have focused on the field of social welfare itself, that is, on the goals of the profession and the concerns of social work education. Today the focus is quite different. The current forecaster must look at how social work will react to the societal forces that affect it. Paramount among these are the availability of federal resources, changes in the law or in judicial philosophies and the setting of federal priorities, all variables in society that spell increased opportunity or increased frustration.

The AFDC program contains incentives for family dissolution, as well as the usual incentives regarding work effort inherent in transfer programs of its type. The research discussed below attempts to determine the extent of the impact of these incentives. Cross-section analyses of SMSAs in 1960 and 1970 arc presented, relating the proportion of female-headed families and the proportion of the female population receiving AFDC assistance to the size of the AFDC payment and related variables. The results indicate that both female-headship rates and AFDC recipient rates are significantly affected by the relative size of AFDC payments in white and nonwhite populations alike. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents the abstract of the paper The Role of the Family Agency in Counseling by Helen C. White. Differences among counseling services that have a trained personnel lie essentially in emphases and in methods of approach and procedure, rather than in fundamental objectives or philosophy. The primary interest of all is focused upon the individual, his relationship to his family and to his broader social environment. The family agency's role may be defined as one of helping people to meet and to adjust their everyday problems of life. The family caseworker is a college and professional school graduate. If she is a beginner, she is closely associated with persons of wider and longer experience. Usually such experience has been not alone in the family field in other fields of social work. She has acquired a body of knowledge and accepts as essential to growth the need for continued study. Modification of the place of relief in the family agency's service and of the client attitude toward the relief function is taking place, due in part to the rise of the public agency in this field and to the fact that widespread distress during the depression has for many removed the sense of stigma in purely material need.

The purpose of case work with families remains the same. It is the interpretation of its scope in the light of changing conditions and a growing body of knowledge of principles underlying social phenomena that mark its progress. Its steady growth depends upon the discriminating attitude of its exponents, in testing the new theories in related sciences and accepting as a part of the case-work kit such equipment as may be integrated into an improved or new social order. The case worker is always subjected to the temptation of becoming a faddist. The enthusiasm following a new discovery is likely to bring about an imbalance in treatment of the individual as a whole, unless judgments is used in measuring the value of such discovery in bringing about social adjustment. Economists in the early days of family case work played the leading role. It was believed by them that social maladjustment resulted from a defective economic system. Because the fallacy of this argument has been proven, there is an unfortunate tendency to relegate economics to a negligible place in the field of social work. Sociology, in interpreting the forces underlying social phenomena, is enabling the social worker to understand more clearly the motives that govern the activities of members of various community groups.

The article discusses as to where shall children be brought up--in their own homes, in foster homes, or in institutions. Normal children can best be brought up in normal families. This may be accepted as axiomatic as it is impossible to go into general sociological theory for the purpose of proving this thesis. But family relief agencies do not as a rule deal with normal families. The very fact that contact with the family by a relief agency exists, indicates some disturbance of normal conditions, whether physiological, mental, economic or social. The decision whether or not to preserve the family unit which daily concerns a family agency in its work, must, therefore, be based upon many considerations; the determination as to what constitutes minimum normal family conditions, the appraisal of the individual situation in the particular family, and finally its willingness and ability to raise to the minimum standard, to eliminate the disturbing factors which have reduced the family to a subnormal standard. Thus, the problem of selections between the three methods of child care is one of the most vital problems with which a family agency is called upon to deal.

Action to improve the quality of family life during the decade of the sixties was not a new technique but a recognition of the need to modernize old principles and programs and to develop new ones. Ideas about personnel, materials, organizational structure and emphases were revised. Involvement of the Federal Government was a major catalyst and a force to be considered in the future. The impact of technology was a vital concern. More questions were raised for the remainder of the century by action programs than appear likely to be answered in the next ten years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information on the National Council on Family Relations (NCRF) and discusses the work it has been doing in the field of family relation and organization. It provides information on the number of members, the budget of the council and the areas of family life that the council focuses on. By 1969 the NCFR membership grew to 4,277. The NCFR budget increased to $149,000 in 1970 from $30,000 in 1960. Family relations, child development, home economics and family and marriage counseling are some of the disciplines that the NCFR focuses on.

The article discusses family life education programs established by U.S. Congress for useful and practical information related to agriculture and home. The service attempts to help individuals and group to develop skills, knowledge and training for effective leadership. Subjects include child development, family relations, human behavior designed to help people. It was observed children's aspirations and participation higher with the treatment group than the controlled group. The program challenges to improve its quality, attract audience and teaching ways for non-professional volunteers.

The increased state participation in the affairs of society generally has been paralleled by the expansion of state authority over the family. This has not necessarily meant greater external controls over the family, because the family has never been free of the conditioning influence of outside institutions concerned with the focal role of family. However, the trend toward greater responsibility by the state has both sharpened and made more complex the issues affecting the exercise of its authority over the family. These issues include both the range of state authority and the manner in which this authority functions to achieve desired goals for the individual, family, and society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To find direct effects of housing policy on the family is not easy, particularly when, as in the United States, serious dilapidation, absence of essential services, and severe over-crowding is uncommon. American housing policy, responding to the tastes of American families, has emphasized overwhelmingly the financing, building, facilitation of ownership, and protection of the single-family house, preferably unattached. Reflecting certain social characteristics of American families, this housing also strengthens these tendencies. While criticized for favoring the well-to-do, government policies make single-family housing available to families of median income and perhaps below. Programs of housing for the poor are mounted on a relatively small scale, and are subject to severe criticism. Policies are also criticized for failing to provide social heterogeneity and a satisfying pattern of community growth. To move in these directions involves coils American families do not seem willing to undertake. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economic programs of government have a significant impact on the U.S. family, because the family is a basic economic institution and a distributor of goods and services. In advanced societies such as the United States, the family is dependent upon money with which to purchase the necessities of life. To maintain such money income, the United States has established a variety of social insurance, public assistance, and service programs. Among these programs, this article examines social insurance, public assistance, and a variety of specific economic programs; makes suggestions for their improvement and presents some of the newer proposals now in the political arena such as a guaranteed minimum income. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A wide range of governmental health programs have impact on the American family. Some of these, like mass preventive services or professional licensure, affect all families directly or indirectly. Other programs assist specific families, like the welfare medical services, maternal and child health work, or the care of military dependents. Still other programs assist families struck with certain diseases, like tuberculosis, mental disorder, or crippling of children or adults. New 1965 health legislation greatly expands medical services for the aged and the poor. In general, government has facilitated the financial support and improved the technical organization of health services for the family. Much remains to be done, however, to assure adequate services to families of all socioeconomic levels and to apply scientific measures in the most economical and effective manner. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The proneness to value bias of methodological theories involving nominal concepts is discussed and illustrated by references to family and other research. The dangers of making unwarranted assumptions and of reifying theory are emphasized. An outline is presented of steps necessary to avoid such problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the scope, operation and impact of family planning programs of the Office of Economic Opportunity (OEP). The ultimate scope of operation for OEO's family planning services encompasses the entire poverty stricken population of the United States. Goals involve assuring that the poor have the capacity to have planned and wanted children, to do this by delivering comprehensive family planning services to all those in need who want them and to implement a primary aim of all medical programs to improve the general health status of those served. This program is service oriented, but not exclusively so. OEO is concerned with organizational and personal consequences of family planning services for the poor in addition to the services themselves. This adds a complete new dimension to the defined scope of family planning services in OEO. OEO is learning that methods of solving the problems of poverty are as varied as the problems themselves. One of the methods of eliminating poverty is certainly service. But poverty programs must also include the mobilization of scarce local, state and federal resources to comprehensively attack poverty.

This article describes preventive intervention work done with families considered to be in a state of crisis because of the birth of a premature infant. The work was an exploratory phase of a larger project conducted at the Harvard School of Public Health Family Guidance Center, which studied the reaction patterns and coping mechanisms of families in crisis. Identifications of patterns, both adaptive and maladaptive, could serve as indices for prediction of outcome and also as a guide to caretakers and helping professions for the deployment of resources and for focused intervention. Prevention, in the public health field, is conceived of as a continuum of activities to protect the health of the community. Early diagnosis and treatment are considered to be secondary prevention, while the last two categories are classified as tertiary prevention. In general, most public health activities are directed at designated groups in the community which are considered, on the basis of epidemiological study, to be populations at risk.

The article presents a preliminary report of the first study conducted in the Research Center of the School of Social Service Administration, University of Chicago, and describes factors that were found to be associated with whether or not a group of clients of two family welfare agencies continued beyond the early interviews. The preposition being examined is that the client's use of casework service is determined by his motivation, his capacity, and the opportunities afforded him both by his environment and by the social agency from which he seeks help. The basic instrument, consisting of a series of rating scales, was applied to case record material by seven experienced caseworkers who were employed by the Research Center and who were trained and tested in the use of the instrument before the study began. Ratings are made for each primary client, defined as a client who was in the focus of treatment or who was intended by the worker to be involved in treatment. Each client included in the study was independently rated by three judges and that ratings on which at least two of the three judges agreed is the one used in the analysis.

The article presents information on recent developments in the field of social work in the U.S. Looking at the anachronistic residence laws, the article calls for more humane and flexible laws in accordance with the right of free movement. The continued existence of these discriminatory statutes, which contravene both the right of free movement and social work's principle of human worth, is a skeleton in the closet of the conscience of social workers. It discusses new developments in the field of family service agencies and casework treatment. Family casework has moved from the provision of concrete services such as relief, child placement and homemaker service to a psychosocially oriented counseling service dealing with various family relations. In view of this development the future of the family agency is to strengthen its counseling services by employing both social treatment as well as psychological methods. Mentioning National Conference on Parole held in Washington from April 9-11, 1956, the article reports that the conference stated that more specific and intensive counseling and orientation is required during the period immediately preceding release of inmates.

Social workers are found to be engaged in such diverse activities as budgeting for relief applicants, a study of a couple desiring to adopt a child, supportive psychotherapy, work initiation of court action against parents neglecting their children, community organization to pressure the city council into action to improve a neighborhood, informal education through relationships and play with a group of chronically ill children in a hospital, or helping adolescents to feel socially at ease in the teenage canteen of a neighborhood settlement house. Social work today can be viewed as an organized movement to establish a professional jurisdiction and point of view which will lead to a replacement of historical, traditional, and operational criteria by new standards and practices more in accord with present professional ideals. In certain settings, such as child welfare agencies, adoption agencies, family service agencies, neighborhood settlement houses, and medical social work departments, persons identified with social work occupy most of the professional positions.

This article presents information on several literary volumes, books, and pamphlets related to various interrelated fields of social sciences. Some of these volumes are: "Why the Ghetto Must Go," by Sterling Tucker; "After College...What?: A Career Exploration Handbook," by Newell Brown; "Learning to Apply New Concepts to Casework Practice," edited by Gertrude Einstein; "Pupil Personnel Services," compiled by Garry R. Watz and James L. Lee; "The Use of Information in Personnel Services," compiled by Juliet V. Rich; and "Elementary School Counseling and Guidance," compiled by John E. Hechlik. "Why the Ghetto Must Go" is a collection of public affairs pamphlets with additional materials which were abstracted from a book by Tucker. Tucker is the executive director of the Washington Urban League. "Learning to Apply New Concepts to Casework Practice," presented by the Family Service Association of America, is the condensed proceedings of a staff development seminar held by the Jewish Family Service of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This report is claimed to be valuable for personnel and guidance workers interested in learning to apply new concepts to their own practices.