Abstract
No social administrator could write about policy options in charging and means-testing in the social services as if the universalists had not made their objections to the selectivist instruments. No discussion of charging and means-testing in any context should take place without a careful assessment of the validity of the universalist objections in that context. Also, perhaps the most important lesson is that generalisations from one context and period of time to another are difficult to substantiate, and that their assessment in a context demands stronger evidence than has been available in the past. The first part of this chapter is therefore devoted to a discussion of universalist argument in one selectivist context where such evidence has been collected — the school meals service of the late 1960s. The main universalist argument of relevance to this policy are first stated, and how well they survive in the light of survey evidence is then assessed. The second part of the chapter then considers the primary policy variants available to a selectivist system for the provision of social welfare.
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Notes and References
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© 1980 Social Science Research Council
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Davies, B. (1980). Policy Options for Charges and Means Tests. In: Judge, K. (eds) Pricing the Social Services. Studies in Social Policy. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-16286-4_8
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