Welfare Receipt and the Intergenerational Transmission of Work-Welfare Norms*

Abstract

This article investigates the role of welfare receipt in shaping norms regarding work and welfare using unique Australian data from the Youth in Focus Project. We begin by incorporating welfare into a theoretical model of the transmission of work‐welfare norms across generations. Consistent with the predictions of this model, we find evidence that youths' attitudes toward work and welfare may be influenced by socialization within their families. Young people are more likely to oppose generous social benefits and to believe that social inequality stems from individual characteristics if (i) their mothers support these views; (ii) their mothers were employed while they were growing up; and (iii) their families never received welfare. Finally, youths' work‐welfare norms appear to be unrelated to their neighbors' welfare receipt suggesting that socialization occurs primarily within families rather than within neighborhoods.

Pathways of Disadvantage: Unpacking the Intergenerational Correlation in Welfare

“…Cultural explanations of intergenerational welfare have their roots in theories of poverty from the 1960s and largely attribute welfare dependency to the values and social norms that children acquire from their parents and neighbors (see Duncan et al, 1988;Patterson, 1986;Bartholomae et al, 2004). The concern is that growing up in welfare-reliant families (or neighborhoods) may weaken children's work ethic and self-reliance by reducing the stigma or information costs associated with welfare receipt (Stenberg 2000;Page 2004;Dahl et al 2014;Barón et al 2015; see Boschman et al 2019 for a review). Despite being integral to the policy debate on welfare dependency, there is little empirical evidence linking welfare-work attitudes to exposure to the welfare system.…”

“…Santiago (1995) and Edwards et al (2001), for example, find no support for the notion that in the United States attitudes towards welfare, low paid work and traditional gender roles are associated with an increase in the likelihood of welfare dependence. 27 In the Australian context, young people are more likely to oppose generous social benefits and to believe that social inequality stems from individual characteristics (rather than institutional factors) if: i) their mothers share these views; ii) their mothers were employed while they were growing up; and iii) their families never received welfare (Barón et al 2015).…”