The "Content" of Welfare Policy: The States and Aid to Families with Dependent Children

Previous analyses of state welfare policies and their determinants have not paid sufficient attention to provisions for eligibility and benefits that are contained in the policies themselves. As a result they have not been able to explain satisfactorily "who get what" in state redistributive politics, nor have they succeeded in showing how political factors affect this determination. However, once attention focuses on the content, rather than the cost, of welfare policies like the Aid to Families With Dependent Children, both the redistributive impact and the political determinants of such policies can be identified