When millions of Americans struggled to find stable employment in the 1930s, Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins helped federal government officials understand it was time for larger interventions. Thus, in 1935 as part of his New Deal, President Franklin Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act, which implemented a national welfare system for the first time. Crafted by Secretary Perkins and focused on income maintenance, the Social Security Act established both unemployment insurance and retirement benefits for the aged and provisions for children. Known as Aid to Dependent Children (ADC), the program gave qualified mothers a way to request monetary benefits for the care of their child(ren). Thirty years later, President Lyndon Johnson enhanced the Social Security Act when he signed an amendment establishing Medicare and Medicaid. Like ADC, the administration of Medicaid was delegated to the states, which relied on local county welfare offices and their staff to distribute benefits to those most in need. These jobs were predominantly filled by women who evaluated whether applicants qualified for services, and then worked with them to develop plans aiming at self-sufficiency and moving off the government dole.
Why women? Like many professions, women entered social services for several reasons. Some women were likely inspired by their contemporaries, such as Hull House leader and social work pioneer Jane Addams (1860-1935). Working in welfare also came with several benefits not typically available to women in the private sector. Government employment guaranteed these women a pension, health benefits, time off to enjoy their families, and the opportunity to build a career. Furthermore, unlike many industries open to women at the time, public service offered a pathway to leadership positions, which had historically been out of reach. Beginning in the late 1960s, federal administrators lowered the bar for women interested in pursuing a career in social welfare when they separated two key functions of benefit distribution: case management and benefit computation.
These new guidelines created a distinct job class accessible to women: the Eligibility Technician. Technicians processed paperwork and calculated the level of benefits, freeing up social workers to connect clients with resources and job training to help them wean off government assistance, with the goal of establishing independence. Eligibility Technicians, unlike social workers, did not need a college degree. Since women were still woefully underrepresented on university campuses in the United States, the Eligibility Technician role allowed access to stable, government jobs that had minimal entry requirements. This stability proved temporary. The separation of case management and benefit calculation caused the job to accidentally become “deprofessionalized,” leading to a false perception that the work was simple, easily automated, and could presumably replace the work done by women. This misunderstanding led politicians to begin searching for ways to streamline eligibility computation to rein in the steep costs associated with welfare administration.