Social Policy

Abstract

Social policy is made most visibly through decisions by government about the ‘welfare state’. This has no formal boundaries but is usually taken to cover government expenditure for social security, health and personal social services, education and housing. Together these programmes add up to about one-quarter (25.4 per cent) of GDP and confer great potential power on a handful of people at the centre of politics. The social security programme accounts for nearly half (£25, 840 m. in 1981–2) of welfare state spending, although as it consists of transfer payments it should strictly speaking be considered separately from the other spending which is mainly on goods and services.