Essential Concepts in American Social and Economic Policy

Economic and Social Policy Definitions

• Poverty Line: The official standard regarding what level of annual cash income is sufficient to maintain a decent standard of living; those with income below this level are eligible for most public assistance programs.
• Literacy Test: An examination of a person’s ability to read and write as a prerequisite to voter registration, outlawed by the Voting Rights Act of 1965 as discriminatory.
• GDP: A measure of economic performance in terms of the nation’s total production of goods and services for a single year.
• SNAP: A public assistance program that provides low-income households with coupons redeemable for enough food to provide a minimal nutritious diet.
• Medicare: A social insurance program that provides health care insurance to elderly and disabled people.
• Medicaid: Federal aid to the states to provide health insurance for low-income persons.
• Jim Crow: Second-class citizen status conferred on Blacks by Southern segregation laws, derived from a 19th-century song and dance act, normally performed by a white man in blackface, that stereotyped Blacks.
• Means: Spending for benefits that is distributed on the basis of the recipient’s income.
• Affirmative Action: A program, whether enacted by a government or by a private organization, whose goal is to overcome the results of past unequal treatment of minorities and/or women by giving members of these groups preferential treatment in admissions, hiring, promotions, or other aspects of life.
• Federal Reserve: An independent agency of the executive branch of the federal government charged with overseeing the nation’s monetary policy.
• Poll Tax: Taxes imposed as a prerequisite to voting; it was prohibited by the 24th Amendment.
• Social Security Act: An act to provide for the general welfare by establishing a system of federal old-age benefits. Some states are able to make more adequate provision for aged persons, blind persons, children with problems, public health, and the administration of their unemployment compensation laws.
• Keynesian Theory: A theory which says the government should increase demand to boost growth. Consumer demand is the primary driving force in an economy. As a result, the theory supports expansionary fiscal policy. Keynesian policies increase inflation.
• Voting Rights Act: Signed by President Johnson, aimed to overcome legal barriers that prevented African Americans from exercising their right to vote as guaranteed under the 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. It is considered one of the most far-reaching pieces of civil rights legislation in U.S. history.
• Grandfather Clause: Several Southern state constitutions designed to enfranchise poor whites and disenfranchise Blacks by waiving high voting requirements for descendants of men voting before 1867.