The wages of motherhood
Subtitle: inequality in the welfare state, 1917-1942
By: Gwendolyn Mink.
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Published: 1995
Place of publication: Ithaca, NY
Language: eng
Number of pages: 198
Subjects: Maternal and infant welfare -- Government policy -- United States; Motherhood -- Government policy -- United States; Poor women -- Government policy -- United States; New Deal, 1933-1939; United States -- Economic conditions -- 1918-1945
Description: Entering the vigorous debate about the nature of the American welfare state, The Wages of Motherhood illuminates ways in which a "maternalist" social policy emerged from the crucible of gender and racial politics between the world wars. Gwendolyn Mink here examines the cultural dynamics of maternalist social policy, which have often been overlooked by institutional and class analyses of the welfare state.

Mink maintains that the movement for welfare provisions, while resulting in important gains, reinforced existing patterns of gender and racial inequality. She explores how Anglo American women reformers, as they gained increasing political recognition, promoted an ideology of domesticity that became the core of maternalist social policy.

Focusing on reformers such as Jane Addams, Grace Abbott, Katherine Lenroot, and Frances Perkins, Mink shows how they helped shape a social policy premised on moral character and cultural conformity rather than universal entitlement.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.